petite Roque.

And yet Maupassant adores this nature, the one thing that moves
him.... But, in spite of this, he can control himself; the artist is
aware of the danger to his narration should he indulge in the
transports of a lover.

With an inborn perception, Maupassant at once seizes on the principal
detail, the essential peculiarity that distinguishes a character and
builds round it. He also, in the presentation of his character,
assumes an authority that no writer, not even Balzac, ever
equalled....

He traces what he sees with rapid strokes. His work is a vast
collection of powerful sketches, synthetic draftings. Like all great
artists, he was a simplifier; he knew how to "sacrifice" like the
Egyptians and Greeks....

Thanks to his rapid methods the master "cinematographed," if I may use
the word, inexhaustible stories. Among them, each person may find
himself represented, the artist, the clerk, the thinker, and the
non-commissioned officer.

Maupassant was always impatient to "realize" his observations. He
might forget, and above all, the flower of the sensation might lose
its perfume. In Une Vie he hastens to sum up his childhood's
recollections. As for Bel Ami, he wrote it from day to day as he
haunted the offices of Editors.

As for his style, it is limpid, accurate, easy and strongly marked,