Honore de Balzac, the ladies loved him

Generally, the open shirt pose is for those with but one chin. But M. Balzac knows better than you, you chien américain.

Today's portrait of a dead Frenchman is Honore de Balzac author of one of my favorite novels Pere Goriot (the protagonist is a disolute law student who slowly abandons his studies for wine and women...hits close to home, it does.) And the author of my favorite short story, The Unkown Masterpiece (of which, there exists in this wide world, an edition illustrated by Picasso in 1927). Also, his name is the subject of several dirty sophmoric puns that we've all heard so keep it to your self. His Human Comedy work consisted of beautifully detailed characterizations of post-Napoleonic French society; what is little known is that they grew out of his early attempts at fiction, publishing historical advetures in the style of Sir Walter Scott (he of the dread Ivanhoe, if you haven't read it: don't). Also I saw a statue of him by Rodin at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena once. So there you are, my readers--Balzac: libertine, writer, philsopher, dead Frenchman.

Stay tuned for a bonus "dead Frenchwoman". I can't wait, can you?