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Pere Goriot

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The French author Honore de Balzac (1799-1850) wrote nearly a hundred books over the course of his relatively short life. Most are considered part of his incomplete opus titled La Comedie Humaine (the Human Comedy), with reoccurring characters and overlapping themes. The goal of this oeuvre was to create a panoramic view of French society, staring from the Revolution and continuing to the current (mid nineteenth century) age, exploring the aspects of country, city and military life. Balzac believed that just as the differences of heredity and environment produce various species of animals, so did the varying pressures of society produce differentiations among human beings. In the Human Comedy, Balzac attempted to describe and classify these human "species."

_Pere Goriot_ is arguably the most famous and artistically successful entry of the opus, a masterful study of a father who sacrifices his wealth and health to assure his two daughters into the hotbed of Parisian high-society. Through the eyes of Rastignac, an impoverished youth eager to gain social success, we see Goriot's maniacal obsession to his "babies," constantly succumbing to their lavish demands and paying off their debts, all the while prevented from being seen in public with them or even visiting their houses. Goriot is deemed unfit company and a threat to the illusion of success, the latter of which being Balzacs central theme for this particular novel:

In the whirl of Parisian high-life, it is not so much the individual talent or intelligence or virtue one has that gives him or her a respected standing; instead, the trappings of wealth and the way in which one displays it is the standard and the rule: conspicuous consumerism for the bygone era. And let us gaze upon the technocratic twenty-first-century pyramid of Hollywood and its ilk-with actresses famous solely for the size of their breasts, and psychos killing just to appear on television, and a whole media subculture slavishly devoted to the whims and waste and trials of the celebrity identity, it is easy to see that the game never ends, the rules never really change; in this cyclical social circus, those with the finest illusion garner the highest raves, the chance at longevity, the narcotic of fame. Proof of that ancient adage: how much times change, how much they stay the same

This is an amazing book. Highly recommended to the student of life.

Honoré de Balzac's 1834 novel, "Le Père Goriot," is a novel of strange and fascinating power. As the doorway into his interconnected cycle, La Comédie Humaine, it presents as much welcome to interested readers as Dante's fateful "abandon all hope..." entrance to Hell in the Divine Comedy. "Le Père Goriot" gives us a fallen world, driven by self-interest, where all ties of genuine human feeling seem to be relegated to a no longer existent past, or to the rarely-glimpsed pastoral countryside. Balzac presents the stories of Eugène de Rastignac - a young law student from the southern provinces, Jean-Joachim Goriot - a former pasta merchant who gave all he had as dowry for his two daughters, and Vautrin - a man who lives and works in shadows. Balzac's novel illustrates the lengths and depths that these three, and everyone around them, go to in order to secure even the most fleeting happiness in the moral wasteland of Paris about 4 years after the fall of Napoleon.

The novel begins with our introduction to Maison Vauquer, a boarding house with a crumbling plaster statue of Cupid in the yard, which is home and prison to the respectably indigent. Goriot has lived in the Maison Vauquer under the increasingly unsympathetic gaze of Madame Vauquer and her boarders for almost 10 years - wasting away, Goriot has become a figure of fun for the house, coming to be known teasingly as "Old Goriot." His tragic affection for his two well-married daughters, Delphine de Nucingen and Anastasie de Restaud, has driven him out of their homes, and into a state wherein his only joys come from seeing them from afar, and mortgaging what remains of his fortune to assist them in financial difficulties. Into the Maison and Goriot's life comes young Rastignac, whose lack of fortune fuels his desire to enter the fashionable world of Parisian high society. Here, Rastignac meets Vautrin, who offers the youth a possible means to do so - means both underhanded and deadly.

One of the novel's great questions is the great Biblical dilemma - what does it profit a man to gain the world if he must lose his soul in the process? The novel's three main characters, but particularly Rastignac, illustrate the dilemma from different vantage points. For Vautrin and Goriot, their choices were made long ago, and Balzac's work with them concerns the results of lives organized around self and others, respectively. The novel's primary concern is with Rastignac, who is continually in the process of weighing his options - in a world in which there is little grey area, will Rastignac opt for a life of good or evil, of self-interest (as with fellow-boarders Mlle. Michonneau and M. Poiret) or service (as with fellow-student Bianchon)?

Balzac sets relationships, particularly those concerned with family, up for consideration in the novel. We see bonds created by birth, as well as by social class and wealth; of course, family and money are rarely inseparable, and certainly are not mutually exclusive for the novel's characters. Rastignac is in Paris studying the law only because of the financial sacrifices being made by his family in the country. Rastignac's kinship with Madame de Beauséant provides him with a taste of the seeming luxury of Paris. Victorine de Taillefer, a motherless young girl at the Maison Vauquer, makes a fruitless yearly application to her hard-hearted father, who has disowned her completely. As Rastignac interacts with and becomes part of Goriot's life and that of his fellow-boarders, we are encouraged to consider the role of the family as it relates to society. If family is Balzac's basic social unit, then how do we regard the family constituted by Goriot and his daughters? The one made up of the "guests" of the boarding house? That of Vautrin's Ten Thousand Society?

I have barely scratched the surface of Balzac's novel. Its engagements - literary, sociological, and moral, are extensive. Balzac's engagements with literary and philosophical models, from Shakespeare to Rousseau, are worth taking notice of, as are his proposed "three attitudes of men toward the world: obedience, struggle, and revolt." For a novel with seemingly clear moral polarities, it is difficult to say who are the heroes and who the villains in "Le Père Goriot." Though the novel is by no means a simple satire, getting swept up in the novel's overt sentimentality may say as much about the reader as it does about the novel's characters and situations. Balzac's anonymous narrator offers continually biased judgments, which can cloud the reader's ability to remain objective. Any way one reads it, "Le Père Goriot" is a terrific novel - and the invitation to enter Balzac's uninviting world is well worth accepting.

In May 2000 I stood hat in hand at Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris paying my respects to a giant named Honore de Balzac. His masterpiece, PERE GORIOT, has resonated across over 30 years since that happy moment in 1968 when I first sat down to dine at Mme de Vauquer's boarding house, since I first heard the whispered confidences of Mme de Nucingen and the sighs of the Duchesse de Langeais, and since I first ran into that master criminal Vautrin.

Balzac was at the same time an extraordinarily ambitious man and one who knew the limits of fame and fortune. For years he chased his Polish countess, and no sooner did he win and marry her than he fell ill and died. I would like to think that there was a smirk on his face as he saw the irony: He was himself a character in a Balzac novel, a composite of all his characters -- whether of the court or the hovel, from bankers to ragpickers, high and low.

On the surface, this is a modern day version of Lear: An old man gives everything to his ambitious daughters and dies. The focus of the story, however, is no more on Papa Goriot and his daughters than on all the other characters in the story: the ambitious Rastignac, the plotting Vautrin, the good Dr. Bianchon, the clueless Victorine, the struggling Delphine de Nucingen -- all are caught in a web. (As was Balzac.)

This book changed the way I see the world. It can do no less for you. It is as if, suddenly, the mist that hides the motives of men parts, and we see the world of men as it really is, with all the marionette strings tangled up as each puppet strives to claw its way toward the top.

I'm going to go ahead and ruin something for you, the potential reader, about Honoré de Balzac. It's nothing to do with plot or character, so you can rest assured that you're safe to get a fresh read from Père Goriot; instead it centers on the author himself. It's something you're going to pick up on as you read through this book.

You see, Honoré de Balzac is your best friend.

This sounds funny, I realize that, but it's the simple truth. You can feel it in the way that the man writes- He doesn't tell the story to you, so much as he explains it. It's like listening to one of those old men you find in a bar; you're so certain that you're going to laugh at him as he recounts his tale, you're so certain that when he tells you that it's a sad one, that you've heard that statement enough before to know it's a falsity...but then as things progress you begin to realize that you can trust him. You can feel the hand of Balzac on your back, guiding you forward. You begin to trust him...and it's all because he's talking to you as though you were an old friend.

Indeed, Père Goriot is a sad tale. Without giving away any more than the back of the book already does, I can say that it encompasses the tale of a man who has sacrificed of himself for his children's sake, as laid out in contrast to the story of a man who asks of his own family that they sacrifice for him. It is the study of both sides of that equation, all tied together through a boardinghouse where every boarder has a story to tell, where every turn and twist is an obstacle for some, an opportunity for others, and an escape for none. All are tied into this Paris that lives and breathes on the page.

Balzac was a character writer. He tells you about the person, all the intimate little details that seem so trivial but that build up the image of the person in your mind. You can see Vautrin, the mysterious all-knowing boarder as he watches young Rastignac, the young law student, struggle inside of himself as he wrestles his way into an unforgiving society. In the process of doing so, you watch sometimes in horror, sometimes in fascination, listening to the man deliver speech upon speech, some of which seem to bear an eerie early foreboding to Dostoevsky's `The Grand Inquisitor' for it's sheer, unflinching look at some point of society. Like that writer, Balzac builds the man, then lets him be himself on the page, summoning only those talents that are necessary in a writer to get out of the way and allow the story to tell itself.

Is this book worth reading? Absolutely. Who should read it? Anyone who enjoys a tale with action, honor, and ethical, internal struggles. There are criminal men, unscrupulous women, love affairs, dedication, a betrayal...there are all the elements of the modern novel, told in an engaging and playful style that you come to trust and respect and that, in the end, leaves you with a mighty hunger for more...

Henry Reed does a great translation as well. His afterword helps to place the novel in the series that it belongs, putting into proper perspective in Balzac's La Comedie humaine, a series of novels and stories built around Paris during a certain time period. Balzac was a very dedicated writer, putting himself to the task sometimes for hours on end (up to 18 by some accounts). His works contain in them many characters that repeat into other works, as in the two that I mentioned above (Rastignac in particular).

Bottom line: I cannot highly enough recommend this book to anyone. It is fantastic and easily enjoyable.

-LP

This was the first Balzac book I had ever read because I was told it was his best. I found myself reading it at a fairly quick pace enjoying the bulk of it. Unfortunately the plot goes stale from about pages 30 - 60 but from then on in it is superb. Goriot is a wonderfully written ex pasta merchant who's good intentions are constantly met by depression, mostly thanks to his two daughters Delphine (M. de Nucingen) and Anastasie (M. de Restaud.) They are a pair of spoiled little girls who take their father for granted which eventually brings about his demise. Eugene Rastignac is a countryboy trying to climb into Parisienne society but discovers that it is unfulfilling and empty. Vautrin, a recurring psycopath in Balzac's books, makes an appearance but seems to leave rather suddenly.

Overall an excellently written story, although after I read Eugenie Grandet by Balzac I have to admit i preffered that one. None the less, still worth it, better than any of the stuff being printed today.

Warning: Every one of Balzac's characters usually has at least two different names, you musrt be fully aware of both of their names at the beginning or you will find yourself grasping and losing the plot.

This is the first book I've ever read by Balzac, though first published more than 150 years ago, it goes to show how little human nature has changed, the theme here is greed, and some of the characters in this book stop at nothing in their pursuit of money.

The title character is Pere Goriot, an ex-pasta merchant with two daughters who are thoroughly spoiled and self centered; he gave all his money to them when they married in the hope that he would live with them and their rich husbands and be cared for in his old age. Instead his daughters refuse to even receive him in their homes, he has become only an object of shame and derision for them and lives on a pittance in a old boarding house, Maison Vauquer, run by the unforgettable Madame Vauquer, a widow of someone. The main character is Eugene de Rastignac, another boarder at la Maison, a honest (at least at the start) young man from the country whose loving family has toiled and saved to be able to send him to law school in Paris, he is brought into the company of the rich and famous, the creme de la creme of Parisian society and begins to think of another path for himself than the one laid out by his family. Almost everyone of the boarders is living for money, some more willing than others to do anything to obtain it.

As I was reading this I kept thinking of what a great stage play this would be, this is a true comic tragedy. It was a little difficult to get into a first, it is a translation and a very old book describing times now gone for good, for me it began to flow more easily after 50 or so pages. I think a modern day look too at Pere Goriot would not leave a reader feeling such pity for him because of his daughters' treatment. He became rich by hoarding food and waiting for a famine to make a financial killing off desperate people, then educated his daughters and brought them up to feel themselves to be ladies and superior to other people, I felt like he deserved a lot of what he got, Rastignac is the one I was more interested in.

Goriot is an unscrupulous pasta merchant who amasses a fortune and manages to get his two beloved daughters married to wealthy men. To accomplish that, he gives away all his money to the daughters, who turn out to despise their father for his humble origin. They turn him away, forbidding him to live wtih them, and so he moves to a flophouse. Pain and poverty consume the man, who lives in the small world of the boarding house. There, he befriends Eugene de Rastignac, a naive young man aspiring to climb in the upper society of frivolous Paris. Vautrin, a regular in Balzac's novels, is an ex-con with a great and mysterious personality, and with a past. Rastignac becomes the lover of one of Goriot's daughters, an affair which only leads to misery. Goriot will die lonely and poor, his life destroyed by pain and a profound sadness inflicted on him by his beloved daughters. This is one of Balzac's best books, a deep portrait of the misery of the human condition as well as a depiction of the decadent society of Paris in the 19 century. Note that Paris' dcadence is in no way exclusive to that place or age, just as the human condition hasn't changed much since. Balzac was a master writer, and this novel is an excellent example of what he could do with words. A must for literature lovers.

I'm a french Balzac's fan. I read Balzac in french indeed but I'm interested in americans or english reviews on Balzac. So I read all the reviews on Balzac in "amazon.com".
"Old Goriot" ("Le père Goriot" in french) is my favourite Balzac's novel. Why ? Because it's the center of Balzac's world. He invented the return of characters with this novel. When I read this novel for the first time my elder daughter was very young (3 months) and I was discovered the paternity at the same time that "Old Goriot". I was feeling a lot of sympathy for this "father's king" who is able to sacrify his life for his two daughters.
So this novel remind one of my most impressive experience of reader.
To finish, I can say that there a lot of other very good reasons to read "Old Goriot".

Le Pere goriot is the brightest gem among Balzac's otherbrilliant works. It is not about creating a riveting, action packedplot, but rather chronicling the saga of a man's ultimate deception and betrayal after giving everything to his daughters, only to have them respond by selfishness and unbridled materialism. Rastignac is the quintessential male character of this time period. He recognizes the deceipt of Goriot's daughters, but is nonetheless overwhelmed by his unquenchable desire to fit into aristocratic society. Balzac leads the writer through the mixed emotions of Rastignac until the final culmination of the masterpiece's bitter irony and Rastignac's betrayal not only of the memory of Goriot, but of the reader as well. A must read in order to understand the sickening power of greed.

Balzac was a most enthusiastic participant of high society in Paris in his heyday principally because it yielded so many characters for his human comedy. Despite the artifice of glamor, wealth and nobility, a young attorney named Rastignac learns that it is shallow, materialistic and vain beyond all sense. Aspiring to make a name for himself, Rastignac stays in a bording house where he meets old Goriot, a vermicelli merchant with two daughters prominent in Paris society. Like King Lear, Goriot loved his two beautiful daughters but cannot control them and eventually they drain him of all his wealth, refusing to visit him even when he's on his deathbed. Balzac points out that tailors in Paris made more men successful than any other influence. The women who adorned high society were often fighting economic desperation, pawning jewelry and fighting stingey and unfaithful husbands who abandon them. Rastignac is fascinated but repulsed by high society -- probably much like Balzac himself. The writer pours himself emtoionally into his stories, occasionally guilty of being overly sentimental -- the men in difficult or tragic situations easily and frequently shed tears. Balzac painted hundreds, if not thousands, of portraits of the French of his time in his epic human comedy. Not that much has changed really, as far as the human comedy goes. In his garret in Paris writing in the quiet of the late night and early morning, this great and prolific writer has left an astonishing legacy of profound, realistic and wise fiction. From his work it's possible to be transported to Balzac's time and find oneself deeply engaged in his human comedy. Clearly, Balzac is one of France's most important writers and Pere Goriot is certainly one of his finest works. Therefore, to experience Balzac, one couldn't find a more inspired entree in Pere Goriot.