Eugénie Grandet is a novel first published in 1833 by French author Honoré de Balzac. While he was writing it he conceived his ambitious project, La Comédie humaine, and almost immediately prepared a second edition, revising the names of some of the characters so that Eugénie Grandet then fitted into the section: Scenes from provincial life (Scènes de la vie de province) in the Comédie. He dedicated the edition to Maria Du Fresnay, who was then his lover and was the mother of his daughter, Marie-Caroline Du Fresnay. Source: Wikipedia (en)