At the Sign of the Cat and Racket: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

At the Sign of the Cat and Racket, credited to Honoré de Balzac, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of At the Sign of the Cat and Racket by Honoré de Balzac. (Translated by Clara Bell.) Read in English by Bruce Pirie. The short novel “At the Sign of the Cat and Racket” was one of Balzac’s earliest fictions, first published in 1830 and substantially revised in following years. The title (“La Maison du Chat-qui-pelote”) refers to a sign that hangs over a Parisian fabric shop, depicting a cartoon cat playing racquetball. The business is owned by a family with a narrow view of prim bourgeois propriety. Their complacency is disrupted when a gifted young man of artistic temperament and aristocratic upbringing woos their daughter. What follows is a poignant picture of domestic life and the stress that ensues when different social classes meet and marry. - Summary by Bruce Pirie

Recording facts

• Recording title: At the Sign of the Cat and Racket
• Author credits: Honoré de Balzac
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 4
• Listed recording duration: 2:46:05

Catalogue topics

• marriage
• social class
• realism
• bourgeois
• 19th century france
• middle class

Track guide

1. 01 - Section 1 — 40:20
2. 02 - Section 2 — 58:49
3. 03 - Section 3 — 38:51
4. 04 - Section 4 — 28:05

Listen to this recording

Open the complete recording and player on Internet Archive. The player includes the full track list and available download formats.

Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.