Honore de Balzac’s short story ‘The illustrious Gaudissaart’ reveals the arrogance and prejudice on both sides of the city-country divide.When a slick salesman from the big city visits the provincial town of Vouvray, he is confident that the locals will buy anything. But Gaudissart’s apparent belief in the doctrine of Saint-Simonianism, which teaches that industrialisation will empty the countryside and create a Utopian society of workers, riles a local man named Vernier.He tricks him into selling items to his unstable neighbour Margaritis, who convinces the salesman to buy two non-existent wine barrels.This vindictive practical joke then escalates into legal action and a dramatic duel ensues. For more insights into life in 1830s Europe, try Elizabeth Gaskell’s ‘Ruth’ and ‘North and South’.-
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