Andreas Mayer:
The Physiognomist of the Body: Balzac’s Pedestrian Observations

In 1833, Honoré de Balzac published a short essay entitled La théorie de démarche. In this highly original text, he defines for the first time his historical-anthropological approach to the society of his epoch that would lead to the vast and unfinished project of The Human Comedy. Based on observations on the Parisian boulevards, the young writer sketches a "code of walking" whose axioms appear to be at first glance an extension of Lavater’s physiognomy which reads in a person's gait her or his virtues and vices, work habits and illnesses. However, a discussion of the complex genesis and contexts of this little studied essay can yield important insights into Balzac’s own practice of observation and the role of images.

Andreas Mayer is Directeur de recherches (Research professor) at the CNRS and teaches at the EHESS in Paris. He has worked at the MPI for the History of Science in Berlin and at the University of Cambridge. Several visiting fellowships and professorships (Wissenschaftskolleg, Humboldt University, Centre Marc Bloch Berlin, Villa I Tatti, University of Southern California). He has published widely on the history and epistemology of the human sciences.). His major recent publications are La Marche. Histoire d’une fascination savante (Paris, 2025), a new edition of Balzac’s La Théorie de la démarche (Paris, 2025), a new annotated German translation of Balzac’s Études Analytiques (published by Matthes & Seitz, Berlin), and Freud gegen den Strich (Berlin 2026).