Where to Start with Stendhal: A Reading Guide
Where to start with Stendhal — whether to begin with The Red and the Black or The Charterhouse of Parma. A complete reading guide to the French novelist's best work.
Stendhal (1783–1842) — the pen name of Marie-Henri Beyle — was the French novelist whose two masterpieces, The Red and the Black (1830) and The Charterhouse of Parma (1839), established him as one of the founders of the psychological novel and as one of the great novelists of European literature. He lived through the Napoleonic era and its aftermath, and his fiction is saturated with that experience: the heroism and the betrayal of the Revolutionary and Imperial ideal, the mean-spirited reaction of the Restoration, and the bitter comedy of a society that rewards birth and conformity over intelligence and ambition. Balzac, who declared The Charterhouse of Parma one of the greatest novels ever written, helped establish his reputation; Stendhal himself predicted that he would be understood only in the twentieth century.
Where to Start: The Red and the Black (1830)
The essential Stendhal — and one of the founding texts of the psychological novel. Julien Sorel, the son of a carpenter in provincial France, possesses two gifts: an extraordinary memory (he has memorised the entire Latin New Testament) and a ferocious ambition that can find no legitimate outlet in the Restoration France of 1830, where birth and connection determine advancement. He becomes a tutor, insinuates himself into the local aristocracy, rises through the church, enters the Parisian nobility’s service, and eventually destroys himself.
The ‘red and the black’ of the title refers to the two paths available to talented young men in Restoration France: the military (red) and the church (black). Julien, who was born too late for Napoleon’s meritocracy, must choose between them. His psychology — the combination of genuine sensitivity and cold calculation, genuine love and the inability to trust it — makes him one of the most compelling figures in nineteenth-century fiction.
The Charterhouse of Parma (1839)
Stendhal’s most romantic and most exuberant novel — written, he claimed, in 52 days, and bearing the marks of that spontaneity in its rush of incident and its warmth. Fabrizio del Dongo, a young Italian nobleman, is present at Waterloo as a teenager — wandering through the chaos of the battle, unable to find the Emperor, uncertain whether what he is witnessing is actually a battle. This sequence, which Balzac called one of the most celebrated passages in European fiction, establishes the novel’s tone: a world of great events rendered from a bewildered individual’s perspective.
The novel follows Fabrizio through romantic adventures, political intrigues, imprisonment in the Farnese Tower in the fictional state of Parma, and eventual withdrawal from the world. It is less tightly plotted than The Red and the Black but more warmly romantic; the love story at its centre is the most beautiful Stendhal wrote.
Reading Stendhal
Stendhal’s fiction is distinguished by a quality that was genuinely new in the European novel of his era: the close, unsentimental analysis of consciousness — what characters actually think and feel as opposed to what they say or what convention expects them to feel. His novels are early masterpieces of the psychological novel, and they read with a freshness and a directness that makes them feel contemporary in a way that many of their contemporaries do not. Begin with The Red and the Black for the more compelling protagonist and the tighter narrative; read The Charterhouse of Parma for the more romantic atmosphere and the most celebrated battle sequence in fiction.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where should I start with Stendhal?
The Red and the Black (1830) is the essential starting point — the novel that established Stendhal as one of the founders of the psychological novel in European literature and that gave us Julien Sorel, one of the great anti-heroes of fiction. Set in Restoration France, it follows Julien, the brilliant, calculating son of a carpenter who uses his intelligence and his ambition to rise in a society defined by birth and connection. It is the more immediately engaging of Stendhal's two major novels, with a tighter plot and a more compelling central character. The Charterhouse of Parma is more romantic and more expansive, and is the better choice for readers who want Stendhal's most operatically beautiful novel.
What is The Red and the Black about?
The Red and the Black (1830) follows Julien Sorel, the son of a Franche-Comté carpenter, who is brilliant, handsome, and consumed by ambition in a France that offers the talented poor no legitimate path to advancement. He becomes tutor to the children of M. de Rênal, the local mayor, and has an affair with Madame de Rênal; he rises through the church and then through the service of a Parisian marquis, falls in love with the marquis's daughter Mathilde, and finally destroys himself in a moment of violent, self-destructive passion. The novel is an analysis of ambition, hypocrisy, and the psychology of a man who cannot be satisfied with any position he occupies.
What is The Charterhouse of Parma about?
The Charterhouse of Parma (1839) follows Fabrizio del Dongo, a young Italian nobleman who is present at Waterloo as a teenager (in one of the most celebrated sequences in European fiction), falls in love, embarks on various adventures, and eventually retreats from the world. The novel is set in the fictional Italian state of Parma during the Restoration and is simultaneously a romantic adventure, a satire of political intrigue, and a meditation on the nature of happiness. Stendhal claimed to have written it in 52 days; its prose has a spontaneous energy that makes it quite unlike the more deliberate construction of The Red and the Black.
How difficult are Stendhal's novels?
Stendhal's novels are not technically demanding — his prose is clear and vigorous, his plots are well-constructed, and he does not require specialist knowledge of French history to appreciate the human drama at the centre of the books. The Red and the Black rewards some awareness of Restoration France (the tension between the ancien régime and the bourgeoisie, the role of the church) but works perfectly well without it. The Charterhouse of Parma is set in a fictional Italian state and requires no historical knowledge. Both novels are available in excellent modern translations. Begin with The Red and the Black for the tighter plot and the more compelling protagonist.
