Following closely in the footsteps of Sir Walter Scott, the novel uses its truthful historical backdrop to tell a fictional story of people who sculpted the past.

[2] Royalist sentiment did not evaporate, however, and in Brittany, violence between the two sides – "Blue" Revolutionaries against "White" Chouans – continued as the Chouannerie, even when Napoleon took power in 1799.

[5][6] Balzac had previously only published potboiler novels under a variety of pseudonyms, books designed to excite readers and sell copies.

Biographer Graham Robb notes that the original subtitle of the book was La Bretagne en 1799 – the year of Balzac's birth.

"[11] As he neared completion of his novel – originally titled Le Gars – Balzac wrote an announcement heralding its imminent publication.

Under the pseudonym "Victor Morillon" and writing in the third person, he describes his intent to "place his country's history in the hands of the man in the street … to illuminate and make the ordinary mind realize the repercussions that entire populations feel of royal discord, feudal dissension and popular uprising….

"[12] Balzac – or, rather, "Morillon" – also declares his intention to write a companion volume entitled Le Capitaine des Boutefeux (The Captain of the Firebrands), about war in fifteenth-century Paris.

de Pommereul) to Le dernier Chouan ou La Bretagne en 1800, and signed the novel "M. Honoré Balzac".

"[15] The second edition also demonstrates the author's maturing political philosophy (softening his representation of the royalists), and the evolved female characters testify to his relationship with Hańska.

Fooled by Corentin into believing that Montauran loves her mortal enemy Madame du Gua, Marie orders Hulot to destroy the rebels.

In his introduction to the 1901 edition, poet and critic George Saintsbury writes that the character of Montauran enjoys "a freedom from the flatness which not infrequently characterizes Sir Walter's own good young men.

[21][23] In later editions its chapter breaks were removed (though some versions now restore them), and the work is in three sections – the final of which comprises nearly half the novel.

The novel's feel is compounded by the lack of clarity on some points; some characters' motives are unclear even at the end, and the chaotic sequence of events is difficult to track.

[25] In Les Chouans, Balzac places the romance of Montauran and Marie de Verneuil at the center of the narrative, around which all other elements revolve.

For this reason (and owing to the florid descriptions of romantic elements), the novel has been compared to William Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet.

[26] As the translator Marion Ayton Crawford puts it: "Hero and heroine are star-crossed lovers, whose fate is brought about by forces of the times acting on their own internal weaknesses….

His attention to the details of relationships – failed and successful – are woven into Les Chouans, and Marie herself is based on a woman with whom he had had an affair.

[28] Corentin and Madame du Gua, foils to the happy couple, plot and scheme endlessly to bring about the misery and downfall of those who will not love them.

She represents revenge and hatred chiseled from romantic injury, and has been noted as a rough sketch of the title character in Balzac's La Cousine Bette.

Her reversal (followed by two subsequent changes of heart, back to the original mission and then in opposition to it) counterbalance the wickedness of Madame du Gua and Corentin.

[32] When she first considers Montauran, she recognizes that a return of the king would bring privileges; still, her oscillating actions follow the path of her passions, not rational self-interest.

[25] Les Chouans is considered Balzac's first real success as a writer – a milestone for which he was prepared, evidenced by his willingness to sign his own name.