The Chartreuse of Parma: Translated from the French of Stendhal (henri Beyle)
1839
Translated by Mary, Lady Loyd
A young Italian aristocrat stumbles through the Battle of Waterloo without realizing he's in a battle at all, mistaking the cannons for thunderstorms. This is Stendhal's genius: the interior life rendered with unprecedented intimacy, a young man's heart and ambitions laid bare against the sweep of Napoleonic Europe. Fabrizio del Dongo abandons his noble name to fight for the French emperor, falls desperately in love with a married duchess, and eventually finds himself imprisoned in the Tower of Parma, where a legendary psychological novel unfolds in the dark. The title refers to a Carthusian monastery that appears only on the final page, a distant promise that haunts every page before it. Stendhal captures the intoxication of political change, the tortures of unrequited desire, and the calculating cruelty of Italian court life with a precision that made Balzac weep with admiration. This is the novel that invented the modern psychological interior.
