Cousin Betty Volume 2 By Honoré de Balzac Written in 1846 at the height of Balzac's powers, this novel portrays the stunningly malevolent Cousin Bette and her intricate plans for revenge against the wealthy relatives on whom she depends and whose condescension she bitterly resents. As Bette's insidious deceit relentlessly unravels the lives of the obsessive womanizer Baron Hulot and his angelic wife, Adeline, Balzac displays a sense of verbal comedy as acute as Dickens's and creates a world that is vivid and densely real. Henry James considered him the greatest of all novelists; in Cousin Bette Balzac gives ample proof of his genius. Fox Searchlight's film adaptation, starring Jessica Lange and Elizabeth Shue, will be in theaters in June 1998. We are delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience.