The Red and the Black: A Chronicle of 1830 is Stendhal's novel about Julien Sorel, an ambitious young man in post-Napoleonic France. Through his loves and social rise, it explores class, the church, and the army. It is worth listening to for its psychological insight and sharp social critique.
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Cover of the original edition (Project Gutenberg, public domain).
Text source: gutenberg.org · The work is in the public domain.
Opening of the book
THE RED AND THE BLACK
A Chronicle of 1830
BY
STENDHAL
TRANSLATED BY HORACE B. SAMUEL, M.A.,
Late Scholar Corpus Christi College, Oxford
LONDON
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & Co., LTD
NEW YORK: E.P. DUTTON AND CO.
1916
Contents
INTRODUCTION
Some slight sketch of the life and character of Stendhal is particularly necessary to an understanding of Le Rouge et Le Noir (The
Red and the Black) not so much as being the formal stuffing of which introductions are made, but because the book as a book stands in the most intimate relation to the author’s life and character. The hero,
Julien, is no doubt, viewed superficially, a cad, a scoundrel, an assassin, albeit a person who will alternate the moist eye of the
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