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The Red and the Black (Penguin Classics) Paperback – September 24, 2002

by Stendhal (Author), Roger Gard (Editor, Translator)

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Charts the rise and fall of an ambitious young social climber in a cruel, monarchical society

Handsome, ambitious Julien Sorel is determined to rise above his humble provincial origins. Soon realizing that success can only be achieved by adopting the subtle code of hypocrisy by which society operates, he begins to achieve advancement through deceit and self-interest. His triumphant career takes him into the heart of glamorous Parisian society, along the way conquering the gentle, married Madame de Rênal, and the haughty Mathilde. But then Julien commits an unexpected, devastating crime—and brings about his own downfall. The Red and the Black is a lively, satirical portrayal of French society after Waterloo, riddled with corruption, greed and ennui, and Julien—the cold exploiter whose Machiavellian campaign is undercut by his own emotions—is one of the most intriguing characters in European literature.

Roger Gard's fine translation remains faithful to the natural, conversational tone of the original, while his introduction elucidates the complexities of Julien's character. This edition also contains a chronology, further reading and an appendix on Stendhal's use of epigraphs.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for Burton Raffel’s translations

For Balzac’s Père Goriot

“Raffel’s Père Goriot is both faithful and beautiful, and that makes it a masterpiece.” —Alain Renoir

“I predict that this translation will give Balzac’s great novel a new life for English and American readers. . . . The definitive translation for this generation.” —Peter Brooks

“[Raffel’s] translation has the vigor and elasticity of Balzac’s style, and catches with uncanny accuracy the tone of the period.” —Guy Davenport

For Cervantes’s Don Quijote

“[Raffel’s Don Quijote] recasts the original into lively English, without losing the complexity and flavor of the Spanish. . . . This Quijote flows smoothly and reads, in fact, like original prose rather than a translation.” —Adrienne Martin

About the Author

Henri Marie Beyle, known through his writing as Stendhal, was born in Grenoble in 1783 and educated there at the École Centrale. A cousin offered him a post in the Ministry of War, and from 1800 he followed Napoleon’s campaigns in Italy, Germany, Russia and Austria. In between wars, he spent his time in Paris drawing rooms and theatres.

After the fall of Napoleon, he retired to Italy, adopted his pseudonym and started to write books on Italian painting, Haydn and Mozart, and travels in Italy. In 1821 the Austrian police expelled him from the country, and on returning to Paris he finished his book De l’amour. This was followed by Racine et Shakespeare, a defense of Romantic literature. Le Rouge et le noir was his second novel, and he also produced or began three others, including La Chartreuse de Parme and Lucien Leuwen. None of his published works was received with any great understanding during his lifetime.

Beyle was appointed Consul at Civitavecchia after the 1830 revolution, but his health deteriorated and six years later he was back in Paris and beginning a Life of Napoleon. In 1841 he was once again recalled for reasons of illness, and in the following year suffered a fatal stroke. Various autobiographical works, Journal, Souvenirs de l’egotisme and La Vie de Henri Brulard, were published later, as his fame grew.

Roger Gard was educated at Abbotsholme School, Derbyshire, and at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. Before his death in 2000 he was Emeritus Reader in English at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London. Among his publications are books on Henry James, Jane Austen and the teaching of fiction in schools. He also translated Alfred de Vigny’s The Servitude and Grandeur of Arms, and edited Henry James’s A Landscape Painter and Other Tales, The Jolly Corner and Other Tales and a selection of his literary criticism, The Critical Muse, for Penguin Classics.

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Product details

Series: Penguin Classics
Paperback: 607 pages
Publisher: Penguin Classics; Penguin Classics edition (September 24, 2002)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 9780140447644
ISBN-13: 978-0140447644
ASIN: 0140447644
Product Dimensions: 5.1 x 1.1 x 7.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 150 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #156,530 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #165 in Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > European > French
- #1618 in Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > Criticism & Theory
- #3877 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Contemporary

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Essential classic

February 2, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Stendhal concludes this tale with a dedication: TO THE HAPPY FEW. After we read about Julien Sorel, the protagonist, and the people he encounters, it is an apt way to finish the book because what is missing from the story is happiness. The few times it happens, it is always conditional on something else. Even when Julien experiences love, he is overwhelmed by feelings of triumph, not passion.

Because this classic was written in 1830, today’s readers can be forgiven if some of the plot lines, psychological exposition, obvious use of foreshadowing and characters seem a bit familiar. It is easy to envision a young Theodore Dreiser, Erich Maria Remarque, Saul Bellow or Willa Cather holed up in a corner devouring every word as it sowed the seeds for their writing (I found so many parallels with An American Tragedy and Augie March). Stendhal’s story delves deeply into a particular society in a unique period of history. Julien indeed feels a bit lost; he would rather have been marching with his hero Napoleon in an earlier time. At times it seems tedious, which Stendhal comically acknowledges: “The total boredom of the life led by Julien, without real interests, will no doubt be shared by the reader. These are the flatlands of our journey.”

Yet the journey takes us to a conclusion that has a lasting effect. I doubt it can be forgotten by anyone once read. Like training for a long race, it makes all the toil that came before it more enjoyable and relevant. I can better understand why, in life, there are but a happy few.

12 people found this helpful

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Rise and fall in a hypocritical society

July 3, 2014

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

This novel had been on my "to-read" list for a long time and now I've read it i'm appalled that I didn't read it sooner. The biting criticism and satire of society and its hypocrisy is still relevant today.
The plot follows a young man who wants more from life than being a peasant. He educates himself and comes to the attention of the local church hierarchy. He furthers his education and gains a position in a middling household as a tutor to the children of a local somebody. The envy he feels and the derision and contempt he is treated with conspire to push his ambition further to ruinous heights. He commits adultery and causes scandal eventually ending in murder.
One feels sorry for him as a victim of society's class divisions and rules yet at the same time he brings his tragedy on himself. It is almost Shakespearean in its scale.
Highly recommended for all lovers of quality literature.

12 people found this helpful

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Translation Question

October 27, 2014

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

No question that Stendhal's two major novels deserve to be read by any common reader who loves great fiction. The problem is--which translation is best?

Some would say that Stendhal's French is fairly easy to read, and the best solution is to learn to read him in the original. My objection to this view is that though I can read French modestly well, I would still need a dictionary to read Stendhal and, even more important, the nuances of 19th century French are different from what I learned in school.

Moreover, all of Stendhal's translators have said that his "simple" style is really quite hard to reproduce in English.

Most famously, Moncrieff was the translator of Proust, a writer whose style is far from simple. Could this make it difficult for him to adjust to Stendhal?

Going purely by the way the translation reads in English, I would say that good as Moncrieff is, the old Penguin version by Margaret Shaw is the one that sounds "like Stendhal" to me, and I've read at least four translations. This may be nostalgia speaking, because I think I read Shaw's translation first.

Whichever translation you read, lisez Stendhal!!!!!!

3 people found this helpful

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Still the most charismatic novel ever written

February 19, 2008

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

This novel has everything: political intrigue, the psychological detail of detective work, the ambiguity of love and romance; it's a comedy of manners, but also a saga of helplessness and tragedy, incisive social commentary. Published in 1830, The Red and The Black, is timeless: its relevance to contemporary Westernized or Americanized, bureaucratic, and capitalist-developed nations is both a condemnation and a triumph.

The Red and the Black first caught my attention 25 years ago in January 1983; a stack of copies were set out on a table in the Tattered Cover Bookshop, Denver (then on 1st Avenue in the Cherry Creek area). At that time, the Penguin edition was a new translation to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of the author, Henri-Marie Beyle, January 23, 1783. I don't know how or why I decided to buy a copy; maybe it had something to do with the brief review on the back cover, which was perhaps then as it is now: "Handsome, ambitious Julien Sorel is determined to rise above his humble provincial origins." Maybe I saw something of Julien in myself, or maybe like Mathilde de la Mole, I was looking for a life outside the script dictated by parents and society, or trying to find a world beyond materialism and utilitarianism, something inspirational and possibly Romantic. It was with this novel that I first realized that a writer could communicate intimately across centuries; I fell in love with Stendhal. I wanted to know about his life. He wrote with integrity; he wrote what he knew to be true about life, and he did not let the marketplace dictate what he should write. Beyle was a human being first, then a writer.

In January 1983, as now in January 2008, reading The Red and the Black, I am astounded with the author's ability to move smoothly from the character's interior thoughts into action or landscape while encompassing his characters in their political/social matrix. Whether in a high-society drawing room or in the stillness of night, Stendhal gave his work movement, dynamism. There is something uncanny about the author's ability to draw characters like Madame de Renal and her husband, a small-town merchant, politician, religious hypocrite. It is the Renals of the world who have the power to destroy the Romantically inspired Juliens and Mathildes, and yet a market-driven nation doesn't seem to function without the Renals. An unusual but appropriate companion reading to Stendhal's work might be Tocqueville's Democracy in America; volume one published in 1835.

35 people found this helpful

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