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Πραγματεία περί των Νεωτέρων Διεγερτικών
Ο Μπαλζάκ με τη γοργότητα της δημοσιογραφικής γραφής του μιλάει, με χιούμορ, για πέντε διεγερτικές ουσίες αθώες, όχι από άποψη υγείας αλλά κοινωνικής παραδοχής. Προσεγγίζοντας αυτές τις ουσίες -μεταξύ άλλων το οινόπνευμα, τον καπνό, τον καφέ- δείχνει, όπως σημειώνει ο Τίτος Πατρίκιος, πόσο εύκολα μεταβάλλονται από διεγερτικές σε καταπραϋντικές, από ερεθιστικές σε ναρκωτικές, από ευφραντικές σε τοξικές και αναδεικνύει εκείνες ακριβώς τις ιδιότητές τους που συνεχίζουν ως τις μέρες μας να μας ελκύουν και να μας φοβίζουν.
Πάνω από εκατόν πενήντα χρόνια έχουν περάσει από τότε που ο συγγραφέας της "Ανθρώπινης Κωμωδίας" έγραψε αυτά τα κείμενα. Στο διάστημα αυτό πολλά άλλαξαν και πολλά έμειναν ίδια. Εκείνο πάντως που δεν άλλαξε είναι η ικανότητα του Μπαλζάκ να δημιουργεί αναγνωστική απόλαυση. Παραμένει τόσο διαχρονική όσο κι ένα ποτήρι γαλλική σαμπάνια.
Πάνω από εκατόν πενήντα χρόνια έχουν περάσει από τότε που ο συγγραφέας της "Ανθρώπινης Κωμωδίας" έγραψε αυτά τα κείμενα. Στο διάστημα αυτό πολλά άλλαξαν και πολλά έμειναν ίδια. Εκείνο πάντως που δεν άλλαξε είναι η ικανότητα του Μπαλζάκ να δημιουργεί αναγνωστική απόλαυση. Παραμένει τόσο διαχρονική όσο κι ένα ποτήρι γαλλική σαμπάνια.
104 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1839
6 people are currently reading
242 people want to read
About the author
Honoré de Balzac
9,536 books4,364 followersFrench writer Honoré de Balzac (born Honoré Balzac), a founder of the realist school of fiction, portrayed the panorama of society in a body of works, known collectively as
La comédie humaine
.
Honoré de Balzac authored 19th-century novels and plays. After the fall of Napoléon in 1815, his magnum opus, a sequence of almost a hundred novels and plays, entitled, presents life in the years.
Due to keen observation of fine detail and unfiltered representation, European literature regards Balzac. He features renowned multifaceted, even complex, morally ambiguous, full lesser characters. Character well imbues inanimate objects; the city of Paris, a backdrop, takes on many qualities. He influenced many famous authors, including the novelists Marcel Proust, Émile Zola, Charles John Huffam Dickens, Gustave Flaubert, Henry James, and Jack Kerouac as well as important philosophers, such as Friedrich Engels. Many works of Balzac, made into films, continue to inspire.
An enthusiastic reader and independent thinker as a child, Balzac adapted with trouble to the teaching style of his grammar. His willful nature caused trouble throughout his life and frustrated his ambitions to succeed in the world of business. Balzac finished, and people then apprenticed him as a legal clerk, but after wearying of banal routine, he turned his back on law. He attempted a publisher, printer, businessman, critic, and politician before and during his career. He failed in these efforts From his own experience, he reflects life difficulties and includes scenes.
Possibly due to his intense schedule and from health problems, Balzac suffered throughout his life. Financial and personal drama often strained his relationship with his family, and he lost more than one friend over critical reviews. In 1850, he married Ewelina Hańska, his longtime paramour; five months later, he passed away.
Honoré de Balzac authored 19th-century novels and plays. After the fall of Napoléon in 1815, his magnum opus, a sequence of almost a hundred novels and plays, entitled, presents life in the years.
Due to keen observation of fine detail and unfiltered representation, European literature regards Balzac. He features renowned multifaceted, even complex, morally ambiguous, full lesser characters. Character well imbues inanimate objects; the city of Paris, a backdrop, takes on many qualities. He influenced many famous authors, including the novelists Marcel Proust, Émile Zola, Charles John Huffam Dickens, Gustave Flaubert, Henry James, and Jack Kerouac as well as important philosophers, such as Friedrich Engels. Many works of Balzac, made into films, continue to inspire.
An enthusiastic reader and independent thinker as a child, Balzac adapted with trouble to the teaching style of his grammar. His willful nature caused trouble throughout his life and frustrated his ambitions to succeed in the world of business. Balzac finished, and people then apprenticed him as a legal clerk, but after wearying of banal routine, he turned his back on law. He attempted a publisher, printer, businessman, critic, and politician before and during his career. He failed in these efforts From his own experience, he reflects life difficulties and includes scenes.
Possibly due to his intense schedule and from health problems, Balzac suffered throughout his life. Financial and personal drama often strained his relationship with his family, and he lost more than one friend over critical reviews. In 1850, he married Ewelina Hańska, his longtime paramour; five months later, he passed away.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
July 6, 2023
TRAITÉ DES EXCITANTS MODERNES-HONORÉ DE BALZAC
✒️"Comme observateur, il était indigne de moi d’ignorer les effets de l’ivresse. Je devais étudier les jouissances qui séduisent le peuple, et qui ont séduit"
😎Kakav je #healthylifestyle influenser bio ovaj Balzak. 😂
😎Alkohol,kafa,čaj,šećer,duvan-to sve ništa nije zdravo,a da bi nam to dokazao čika Balzak se žrvovao pa se nalivao vimom i kafom. Kakav li bi tek pisac bio da je otkrio absint 😂
😎Kratka filozofska rasprava na temu stetnosti materija koje uzbudljivo deluju na naša čula a prilično su štetne uz mnoge dosetljive izjave.
😎Ako je verovati Balzaku-kad biste živeli samo na kafi,ili samo na šećeru,vrlo brzo više ne biste bili živi. Po malo valjda može,ali obzirom da je poživeo samo 51 godinu,nešto sumnjam da se sopstvenih saveta pridržavao. 😁
#7sensesofabook #balzac #bookstagram #knjige #literature #readingaddict
✒️"Comme observateur, il était indigne de moi d’ignorer les effets de l’ivresse. Je devais étudier les jouissances qui séduisent le peuple, et qui ont séduit"
😎Kakav je #healthylifestyle influenser bio ovaj Balzak. 😂
😎Alkohol,kafa,čaj,šećer,duvan-to sve ništa nije zdravo,a da bi nam to dokazao čika Balzak se žrvovao pa se nalivao vimom i kafom. Kakav li bi tek pisac bio da je otkrio absint 😂
😎Kratka filozofska rasprava na temu stetnosti materija koje uzbudljivo deluju na naša čula a prilično su štetne uz mnoge dosetljive izjave.
😎Ako je verovati Balzaku-kad biste živeli samo na kafi,ili samo na šećeru,vrlo brzo više ne biste bili živi. Po malo valjda može,ali obzirom da je poživeo samo 51 godinu,nešto sumnjam da se sopstvenih saveta pridržavao. 😁
#7sensesofabook #balzac #bookstagram #knjige #literature #readingaddict
September 24, 2022
why did i read this
cool illustrations though
cool illustrations though
December 27, 2020
Picked up this ridiculous little essay in a bookstore out of pure curiosity. What an excellent little dose of serotonin. Brilliantly unscientific even for his day (beware of wine causing spontaneous human combustion). The bourgeoisie *almost* made some points with this one.
September 11, 2022
A delightful little book, originally published in 1839 as an afterward to Brillat-Savarin’s The Physiology of Taste, focused specifically on what alcohol, coffee, and tobacco do to the body, especially the mucus membrane. In other words, it’s a text still within the humoral medical tradition.
As such it is uninteresting as science, but as always with Balzac, it is filled with delightful and hilarious aperçus. For example:
“When he is too excessive in his intellectual and romantic life, a man of genius will die like Raphael and Lord Byron. Chaste, one dies from overwork, just as one can die from debauchery.” (6)
“Grains created artistic peoples. Spirits killed the Indians. I call Russia an aristocracy propped up by alcohol. Who knows if the abusive chocolate did not contribute to the degradation of the Spanish nation.” (8)
After getting fantastically drunk at the Opera, he takes a carriage home and offers the following perfectly Balzackian description that remains utterly familiar two centuries later: “The rain came down in torrents, but I remember not one drop having fallen on me. For the first time in my life, I tasted one of the most powerful and fantastic pleasures in the world, indescribable ecstasy, a delight that one it feels when crossing Paris at eleven thirty at night, rapidly transported among the street lamps, watching the movement of a myriad of shops, lights, signs, silhouettes, groups, women under umbrellas, astonishingly lit street corners, squares in shadow; all while observing, through the ribbons of rain, a thousand things that one wrongly believes one has already seen somewhere in the full light of day. And everywhere the feathers and lace, even in the cake shops.” (16-17)
“Under certain exceptional conditions, the state you are in when you drink coffee on an empty stomach produces a kind of nervous energy that resembles anger: your voice is raised, your gestures denote a pathological impatience; you want everything to get moving, your ideas race; you are antagonizing, enraged for no reason; you embody the temperamental character of the poet who is often condemned by grocers; you imagine others are is lucid as you feel.” (25)
“If the English experience is real, tea gives the English their morals, makes their skin pallet, makes them prone to hypocrisy and back biting; this much is certain, it does not improve women’s moral or physical hygiene. Where women drink tea, love is defiled to its very core. Such woman are wan, feeble, gossipy, tedious, holier than thou.” (27)
“Intoxication, however it manifests itself, is the enemy of social progress. Alcohol and tobacco threaten modern society. When one has seen the gin palaces in London, one understands the temperance movement.” (39)
As such it is uninteresting as science, but as always with Balzac, it is filled with delightful and hilarious aperçus. For example:
“When he is too excessive in his intellectual and romantic life, a man of genius will die like Raphael and Lord Byron. Chaste, one dies from overwork, just as one can die from debauchery.” (6)
“Grains created artistic peoples. Spirits killed the Indians. I call Russia an aristocracy propped up by alcohol. Who knows if the abusive chocolate did not contribute to the degradation of the Spanish nation.” (8)
After getting fantastically drunk at the Opera, he takes a carriage home and offers the following perfectly Balzackian description that remains utterly familiar two centuries later: “The rain came down in torrents, but I remember not one drop having fallen on me. For the first time in my life, I tasted one of the most powerful and fantastic pleasures in the world, indescribable ecstasy, a delight that one it feels when crossing Paris at eleven thirty at night, rapidly transported among the street lamps, watching the movement of a myriad of shops, lights, signs, silhouettes, groups, women under umbrellas, astonishingly lit street corners, squares in shadow; all while observing, through the ribbons of rain, a thousand things that one wrongly believes one has already seen somewhere in the full light of day. And everywhere the feathers and lace, even in the cake shops.” (16-17)
“Under certain exceptional conditions, the state you are in when you drink coffee on an empty stomach produces a kind of nervous energy that resembles anger: your voice is raised, your gestures denote a pathological impatience; you want everything to get moving, your ideas race; you are antagonizing, enraged for no reason; you embody the temperamental character of the poet who is often condemned by grocers; you imagine others are is lucid as you feel.” (25)
“If the English experience is real, tea gives the English their morals, makes their skin pallet, makes them prone to hypocrisy and back biting; this much is certain, it does not improve women’s moral or physical hygiene. Where women drink tea, love is defiled to its very core. Such woman are wan, feeble, gossipy, tedious, holier than thou.” (27)
“Intoxication, however it manifests itself, is the enemy of social progress. Alcohol and tobacco threaten modern society. When one has seen the gin palaces in London, one understands the temperance movement.” (39)
June 6, 2025
Wow. Apparently I read this already and yet had no memory of it?! That's frightening. I wonder what Balzac would say. I at least am giving it the same rating as I did before. We are all different people and yet, we are the same.
This made me laugh out loud at times. I think most of it is intentional? Balzac has a way of turning an expression. He also repeats some obviously ridiculous things. Take for instance these lines: "The man who lived on chocolate died in an appalling state of putrefaction, devoured by worms. His limbs fell off, one by one, just like the members of the Spanish monarchy." I will not spoil you with more. Perhaps I read this in such a state myself, because you think I would remember such things. While the latter half of this small work may not produce as many guffaws as the chocolate area, it still manages to combine a ridiculous attitude and a certain kind of wit. The translator suggests multiple readings shall reveal subtleties: perhaps, when I forget again that I have read this and read it again later, I'll find the section on tobacco funnier.
This made me laugh out loud at times. I think most of it is intentional? Balzac has a way of turning an expression. He also repeats some obviously ridiculous things. Take for instance these lines: "The man who lived on chocolate died in an appalling state of putrefaction, devoured by worms. His limbs fell off, one by one, just like the members of the Spanish monarchy." I will not spoil you with more. Perhaps I read this in such a state myself, because you think I would remember such things. While the latter half of this small work may not produce as many guffaws as the chocolate area, it still manages to combine a ridiculous attitude and a certain kind of wit. The translator suggests multiple readings shall reveal subtleties: perhaps, when I forget again that I have read this and read it again later, I'll find the section on tobacco funnier.
August 3, 2020
Short essay about the use of stimulants — coffee, alcohol, tobacco — in Balzac's France. He concludes that the use of these substances delivers tangible benefits to the intellect or creative process, but at the cost of damaging one's "vital energies" or something: there's a lot of outdated science here, but the writing is good enough that this doesn't come at the cost of annoyance. Short and fun to read for anyone who is a fan of Modern Stimnulants.
November 24, 2018
3.5 stars. Less a judgment of quality than quantity. I would have much preferred a more substantive collection of Balzac's writings in this vein over a brief set of essays (originally pub'd as an appendix). Still, it's hard to argue with this price point. As always, Wakefield Press delivers a handsome volume, ably translated.
February 8, 2020
Very short and simple book. Didn't find a lot of interesting things when read.
However, I think it's an interesting book to be written at 1839.
Also the topic is as relevant as always and insights are true and common knowledge now.
However, I think it's an interesting book to be written at 1839.
Also the topic is as relevant as always and insights are true and common knowledge now.
September 6, 2018
O lectură elegantă
November 8, 2021
Pensemos, por un segundo, en la Francia de la Restauración como antesala de la Monarquía de Julio y la Revolución de 1848 (Balzac muere en 1850). Este periodo, que desembocará en la Segunda República y la Belle Époque, fue un momento histórico de transición, en el que aún no se asentaban del todo las condiciones de explotación en que vivían los obreros ni la cuota que los nuevos sistemas de producción habían cobrado al campo. En cambio, un miembro de la incipiente burguesía industrial o de los terratenientes tenía tiempo de sobra para dedicarse a los placeres frívolos de la “joie de vivre” y la alta cultura.
La medicina se encaminaba con pasos cada vez más firmes al establecimiento de su versión “científica” (gracias a Pasteur) y al nacimiento de la fisiología (gracias a Claude Bernard), pero sus alcances, métodos y descubrimientos estaban lejos, bastante lejos de permear activamente a una sociedad cuyos habitantes vivían (en promedio) solo 33 años. Esto sin mencionar siquiera que las mujeres no eran parte visible de la sociedad, más allá del mínimo reconocimiento que se hacía de las actividades que se esperaban tradicionalmente de su género.
Es en este contexto histórico que Honoré de Balzac escribió este breve ensayo, publicado en 1839 como apéndice a “Fisiología del gusto” del gastrónomo Brillat-Savarin, donde, apelando en buena medida a la cultura médica y científica de su época, analiza de manera irónica los estimulantes propios de su época: el alcohol, el café y el tabaco, con breves alusiones que incluyen al azúcar y el té.
Estrictamente personales y con un estilo que busca dejar constancia de cuáles son los “axiomas” que se desprenden de sus reflexiones, este libro (bellamente traducido por Julio Baquero Cruz y editado por Menoscuarto) es un deleite genuino para las y los lectores que deseen pasar una mañana en los albores del s. XIX, preguntándose si en verdad —como afirmaba su autor— “cuanto más civilizadas y tranquilas son las sociedades, más se adentran en el camino del exceso” o que “todo exceso que afecta a las mucosas acorta la vida”.
Naturalmente, como suele ocurrir con los libros buenos de veras, no exhorto a nadie —salvo por el precio— a que lo consuma con moderación.
La medicina se encaminaba con pasos cada vez más firmes al establecimiento de su versión “científica” (gracias a Pasteur) y al nacimiento de la fisiología (gracias a Claude Bernard), pero sus alcances, métodos y descubrimientos estaban lejos, bastante lejos de permear activamente a una sociedad cuyos habitantes vivían (en promedio) solo 33 años. Esto sin mencionar siquiera que las mujeres no eran parte visible de la sociedad, más allá del mínimo reconocimiento que se hacía de las actividades que se esperaban tradicionalmente de su género.
Es en este contexto histórico que Honoré de Balzac escribió este breve ensayo, publicado en 1839 como apéndice a “Fisiología del gusto” del gastrónomo Brillat-Savarin, donde, apelando en buena medida a la cultura médica y científica de su época, analiza de manera irónica los estimulantes propios de su época: el alcohol, el café y el tabaco, con breves alusiones que incluyen al azúcar y el té.
Estrictamente personales y con un estilo que busca dejar constancia de cuáles son los “axiomas” que se desprenden de sus reflexiones, este libro (bellamente traducido por Julio Baquero Cruz y editado por Menoscuarto) es un deleite genuino para las y los lectores que deseen pasar una mañana en los albores del s. XIX, preguntándose si en verdad —como afirmaba su autor— “cuanto más civilizadas y tranquilas son las sociedades, más se adentran en el camino del exceso” o que “todo exceso que afecta a las mucosas acorta la vida”.
Naturalmente, como suele ocurrir con los libros buenos de veras, no exhorto a nadie —salvo por el precio— a que lo consuma con moderación.
October 24, 2024
20° de mis #librosen2024.
4.810 #páginasleídasen2024.
Me encuentro (un poco) en crisis porque estoy leyendo «Theodoros», la última novela de Mircea Cărtărescu, autor de «Solenoide», mi libro favorito, y me está costando. Ya reflexionaré mejor cuando la termine y por ahora sólo diré que necesitaba parar durante un par de días y estimularme con una lectura breve que me desconectara de semejante salvajada.
Publicado como apéndice de una edición de la famosa «Fisiología del gusto», de Brillat-Savarin, un clásico de la literatura gastronómica de todos los tiempos, «Tratado de los excitantes modernos» es una tesis que defiende que los excitantes legales de la época (alcohol, café y tabaco, sobre todo) pueden ser nefastos para la voluntad humana y para la conservación de la energía vital.
Es una lectura rápida, curiosa y divertida, llena de razonamientos peregrinos a día de hoy, pero incuestionables a mediados del siglo XIX en boca de Balzac, principal representante de la llamada novela realista, junto con Flaubert, en la que hay experimentos que nunca sabremos si sucedieron (allí no había forma de contrastar al momento, como hacemos ahora), experiencias psicodélicas en una ópera por culpa del alcohol y el tabaco, y justificaciones del proceso de escritura gracias a los efectos del café. Y me imagino al bueno de Honoré, puesto de café hasta las trancas —el único de estos excitantes del que abusó— amarrado a su escritorio, escribiendo a un ritmo que se sabe que le llevó a sufrir problemas de salud, financieros y personales.
Me ha gustado, mucho, y me ha despertado ganas de leer alguna de las casi noventa novelas que componen su monumental «Comedia humana» así como la curiosa «Fisiología del gusto» de Brillat-Savarin, pero por ahora me vuelvo a Theodoros, que dicen que en la segunda mitad se arregla el galimatías de la primera.
4.810 #páginasleídasen2024.
Me encuentro (un poco) en crisis porque estoy leyendo «Theodoros», la última novela de Mircea Cărtărescu, autor de «Solenoide», mi libro favorito, y me está costando. Ya reflexionaré mejor cuando la termine y por ahora sólo diré que necesitaba parar durante un par de días y estimularme con una lectura breve que me desconectara de semejante salvajada.
Publicado como apéndice de una edición de la famosa «Fisiología del gusto», de Brillat-Savarin, un clásico de la literatura gastronómica de todos los tiempos, «Tratado de los excitantes modernos» es una tesis que defiende que los excitantes legales de la época (alcohol, café y tabaco, sobre todo) pueden ser nefastos para la voluntad humana y para la conservación de la energía vital.
Es una lectura rápida, curiosa y divertida, llena de razonamientos peregrinos a día de hoy, pero incuestionables a mediados del siglo XIX en boca de Balzac, principal representante de la llamada novela realista, junto con Flaubert, en la que hay experimentos que nunca sabremos si sucedieron (allí no había forma de contrastar al momento, como hacemos ahora), experiencias psicodélicas en una ópera por culpa del alcohol y el tabaco, y justificaciones del proceso de escritura gracias a los efectos del café. Y me imagino al bueno de Honoré, puesto de café hasta las trancas —el único de estos excitantes del que abusó— amarrado a su escritorio, escribiendo a un ritmo que se sabe que le llevó a sufrir problemas de salud, financieros y personales.
Me ha gustado, mucho, y me ha despertado ganas de leer alguna de las casi noventa novelas que componen su monumental «Comedia humana» así como la curiosa «Fisiología del gusto» de Brillat-Savarin, pero por ahora me vuelvo a Theodoros, que dicen que en la segunda mitad se arregla el galimatías de la primera.
July 12, 2021
This is a strange little pamphlet in the public domain. Celebrated author Honoré de Balzac gives a rambling and disjointed diatribe against the social and medical ills of distilled alcohol, tobacco, coffee, tea and sugar, all of which were only recently (at the time) mass consumed in France. He gives a few hilarious anecdotes of his own excesses with wine and ludicrously strong coffee, but his beliefs concerning human health and physiology are based on medical myths that were outdated even then. His conclusion is that substance abuse is deleterious to the virility of the nation. Strange how that assertion is still heard today in the same context as well as others, almost two centuries later. A curio, nothing more.
April 22, 2025
Balzac’ın böyle bir kitabının olduğunu görünce şaşırdım. Kitapta Balzac’ın tütün, alkol, çay, şeker ve kahve gibi uyarıcılara ait değerlendirmeleri var. Ama bana sorarsanız işin ilginç yanı bu değerlendirmeleri değil; bu değerlendirmeleri yaptığı dönem. 1800’lü yıllarda; bu maddelerin çoğunun tüketiminin özendirildiği veya belli başlı nedenlerle arttığı bir dönemde bu tespitlerde bulunması daha ilginç bana sorarsanız.
April 24, 2022
O carte buna din care consider ca am invatat multe aspecte istorice si as recomanda-o celor care sunt la inceput de drum. Nu este o carte greu de inteles iar notele de la final de pagina au fost foarte folositoare. Cu toate astea nu m-a impresionat in mod special, la fel si pentru tratatul despre viata eleganta.
July 6, 2021
A curious mixture of (pseudo)science, irony and some anecdotes, possibly true, possibly fictitious. Still, the author is the same Balzac, as in "All of you, illustrious human candles, who are consumed by the head, approach and listen to the Gospel of the vigil and the intellectual work."
January 10, 2022
Fun little treatise! Very short, but great if you want to know a literary Frenchman's take on the effects of coffee and tobacco on posterity.
Made another 30-minute blog post:
https://vogliodio.wordpress.com/2022/...
Made another 30-minute blog post:
https://vogliodio.wordpress.com/2022/...
May 24, 2021
A fun little volume with Balzac's thoughts on alcohol, coffee, tobacco and more.
June 9, 2021
Very French man says some very French things.
February 12, 2023
Short treatise about coffee, alcohol, wine, cigarettes. Balzac being Balzac. Nothing else.
May 4, 2023
je ne stopperai pas le café pour autant désolée balzac
”fumer un cigare, c’est fumer du feu”
”fumer un cigare, c’est fumer du feu”
May 17, 2024
Silly little book
October 27, 2025
Funny little essay
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August 25, 2021Modern Çağ Uyarıcıları Risalesi gibi garip adlı bir metni varmış demek Balzac'ın diyerek okumladım. Herif metinde, o zamanlar - 19. yy ortaları - tüketimi daha yeni yeni kitleselleşmeye başlayan şeker, çay, kahve, alkol ve tütün için bunlar toplumların çöküşüne sebep olacak diyor. İşte, alkolikleri, kahvehanelerdeki tiryakileri vs. tiksinerek tasvir ediyor. Gariptir, bir yandan da her birinin bünyesinde yarattığı etkileri deneyimlemeye bayıldığı anılarından sızan şevkten - öyle belli belirsiz falan da değil - hemen fark ediliyor. En radikal kahve tüketimi, aç karnına; soğuk ve az miktarda suyla, öğütülmüş ve bastırılmış kahveyle hazırlanır derken mesela, anlattığı şey zehir ürkütücülüğündeymişçesine ama zıpırca da bir heyecanla yazıyor. En uca gitmek hoşuna gidiyor gitmesine ama toplumların başına dert açacağından da emin (gerçekten sikinde mi yoksa öyleymiş gibi mi yapıyor ben de ondan emin değilim). Alkolün kendisini çarpmadığını ama bir gün şişeleri devirdikten sonra 2 sigar içip operaya gidince o salonda nasıl sarhoş olduğunu tüm o savsaklığını, düşüncelerinin ağırlığından kurtuluşunu, hafiflemesini, Paris'in ışıklarının ve vitrinlerdeki nesnelerin birbirine karıştığını falan detaylıca betimleyerek anlatıyor. Pasajı okurken içimden, empresyonizm, şarabın dibine vurup, gecenin bir yarısı, astigmatların gündelik hayatlarında deneyimledikleri şekliyle ışıklara maruz kaldıkları için ancak böyle bir çağda ortaya çıkabilirdi zaten herhalde diye geçirdim. Hedefinden şaşan ya da hedefini saklayan metinleri seviyorum. Bunu da toplumların çöküşünü hazırlayacak modern tüketim maddeleri envanteri sıkıcılığında değil kendi deyimiyle bu yeni modern çağ uyarıcılarını deneyimlemekten imtina etmeyen bir yazarın anıları olarak okumladım. Keyifliydi.
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January 15, 2019This was the first book I read in 2019 on the first of January at 4 a.m. First published in 1839, it is a "treatise," as it title says, on the history of coffee, cigarettes, and alcohol. It does not really condemn the three substances (being more exhaustive than a pamphlet and apolitical in tone) as much as offer a wry depiction of impending doom. About alcohol, I don't remember much; Balzac writes something about "feathers" and "lace." I must have been transported mentally to my early days of intoxication in fancy dress or pleasantly distracted by my neighbor walking by in sweats. The book confirms my fears about and conclusions reached by many discussions on tobacco. It causes degeneracy and poverty. Somewhere in the notes perhaps or in between the lines I read that Balzac, like the American Bush women, was a "secret smoker," publicly condemning the habit, while secretly partaking in it every once in a while. My husband and I had a good laugh, after he woke up and brewed the coffee, over the confessions of both the writer and editor that the book was fueled by coffee. A couple times in the book, Balzac nods to "orientals," as being masters of earthly pleasures and vices.
March 6, 2019
Reading about nineteenth-century ideas of physiology is always going to be entertaining. Balzac’s little book on booze, fags and brews is a testament to that.
’All excesses that harm our mucus systems shorten our life spans.’
The Translator’s Afterword has some interesting historical facts. Certainly the most shocking piece of information we learn is that Balzac was known to enjoy his coffee prepared as a ‘cold fusion’. This means that hipsters indeed did not invent cold brew, the French bourgeoisie did it hundreds of years ago... and... and... oh. So that’s why they like it, it’s the drink of their forefathers.
PERSONAL NOTE
I brought this book on a weekend break in Paris. I tried reading it when I wasn’t distracted by sleeping Adonis stirring in the white hotel sheets. Or by gilet jaunes setting police vans on fire.
’All excesses that harm our mucus systems shorten our life spans.’
The Translator’s Afterword has some interesting historical facts. Certainly the most shocking piece of information we learn is that Balzac was known to enjoy his coffee prepared as a ‘cold fusion’. This means that hipsters indeed did not invent cold brew, the French bourgeoisie did it hundreds of years ago... and... and... oh. So that’s why they like it, it’s the drink of their forefathers.
PERSONAL NOTE
I brought this book on a weekend break in Paris. I tried reading it when I wasn’t distracted by sleeping Adonis stirring in the white hotel sheets. Or by gilet jaunes setting police vans on fire.
March 21, 2023
Balzac'in alkol, şeker, çay, kahve ve tütün olarak 5 maddeye giydirdigi yazilarindan olusan bir derleme. Bu 5 maddeden ucunu hic kullanmadigim icin 3 yildiz verdim :P cay ve kahve dokunulmazdir :)
Isin sakasi bir yana 18. yuzyila gore cok yerinde guzel tespitlerin oldugu bir kitap. Ozellikle kahvenin demleme methodu ve turk kahvesine iliskin soyledikleri, turklerin tutun aliskanligi, hollandalilarin neden buyuk bir devlet olamayacagi gibi bircok ilginc noktalarda yorumlari var. kendisinin gunde 50 fincan kahve ictigi soylentisi dogruysa kendisi icin ele verir talkini, kendi icer espresso shot'ini demek dusuyor bize :)
Isin sakasi bir yana 18. yuzyila gore cok yerinde guzel tespitlerin oldugu bir kitap. Ozellikle kahvenin demleme methodu ve turk kahvesine iliskin soyledikleri, turklerin tutun aliskanligi, hollandalilarin neden buyuk bir devlet olamayacagi gibi bircok ilginc noktalarda yorumlari var. kendisinin gunde 50 fincan kahve ictigi soylentisi dogruysa kendisi icin ele verir talkini, kendi icer espresso shot'ini demek dusuyor bize :)
March 24, 2023
Inspirado en el ejemplo del bon vivant Savarin, Honorato de Balzac elaboró un opúsculo donde revisaba las virtudes y excesos a los que conducía la ingesta del café, el alcohol, entre otras sustancias. Hubo oraciones chistosas pero frente al estilo satírico de José Fuentes Mares, el texto resultó insípido.
October 29, 2018
I picked this up because it is written by Balzac, but as sometimes happens to the prolific novelist, detours into nonfiction can be scattershot. The text is so desperately short and thin on content that I think only an aficionado of some relevant topic - Balzac, 19th century Paris, coffee - would find this book fulfilling. And frankly I didn’t care for the indecipherable ink drawings at all. Would definitely have appreciated a volume in this style that combined multiple short texts from Balzac.
November 4, 2018
Another in a series of short- to mid-sized essays and fictions from famous and forgotten authors, works now obscure that serve to illustrate—as the Treatise's translator, Kassy Hayden, points out—observations on various topics from an era's most articulate and insightful writers (such as, in this case, on coffee, sugar, and tobacco) that reveal its "history, language, culture, science and medicine, gastronomy, . . . and politics."
February 3, 2023
Kitap, Balzac'ın alkol, şeker, çay, kahve ve tütün olarak sıraladığı beş uyarıcıya ilişkin yorumlarından oluşmakta..
Bu uyarıcılar ile toplumların çöküşü arasında kendince bir bağlantı kurar ve eleştirilerini sıralar. Dikkat çekici değerlendirmeler olsa da bazılarını yeniden gözden geçirmek lazım günümüz bilimsel gelişmeleri ile.
Bu uyarıcılar ile toplumların çöküşü arasında kendince bir bağlantı kurar ve eleştirilerini sıralar. Dikkat çekici değerlendirmeler olsa da bazılarını yeniden gözden geçirmek lazım günümüz bilimsel gelişmeleri ile.
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