La Peau de chagrin
by Honoré de Balzacliterary work· published 1831
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La Peau de chagrin (French pronunciation: [la po də ʃaɡʁɛ̃], The Skin of Shagreen), known in English as The Magic Skin and The Wild Ass's Skin, is an 1831 novel by French novelist and playwright Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850). Set in early 19th-century Paris, it tells the story of a young man who finds a magic piece of shagreen (untanned skin from a wild ass) that fulfills his every desire. For each wish granted, however, the skin shrinks and consumes a portion of his physical energy. La Peau de chagrin belongs to the Études philosophiques group of Balzac's sequence of novels, La Comédie humaine. Before the book was completed, Balzac created excitement about it by publishing a series of articles and story fragments in several Parisian journals.
Adaptations (1)
La Peau de chagrin was adapted into a film.
Magic Skin? · film · 90 min · dir. Konstantinos Samaras · IMDb ↗Running away from a life filled with failure and rejection, Nikos desperately dives into the dark waters of human desire, after closing a faustian pact. He is given an old piece of animal skin that promises its owner everything, but at a high price - his life. As he steadily steps down the spiral of madness, Nikos wonders if he could ever wake up from a life that more and more resembles a dream. A contemporary, radical outlook on Balzac's classic novel.