Product Description

A masterful study of a father whose sacrifices for his daughters have become a compulsion, this novel marks Balzac's "real entrée" into La Comédie Humaine, his series of almost one hundred novels and short stories meant to depict "the whole pell-mell of civilization."

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #317365 in Books
• Published on: 2004-12-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Customer Reviews

brilliant translation
The story is marvelous, but what I'm most impressed with is the quality of the translation. This is an elegant, witty, and very readable translation which adds much to the appreciation of Balzac. The translator, Henry Reed, was a well regarded poet in the UK. His only other Balzac translation is of Eugenie Grandet, out of print, but worth looking for.

The Cesspool That Is Paris
Getting involved in the works of Balzac is like entering a magnificently equipped library with an insatiable appetite for books. His output was prodigious: novels, short stories, and essays, but it is primarily the HUMAN COMEDY for which he is best known. The complexity that is that book had its origins much earlier in his novel FATHER GORIOT (PERE GORIOT). Balzac liked to move characters back and forth from book to book like chess pieces. In much of his fiction, he places his characters in cities like Paris that are center of dissolution and corruption that test their moral mettle. Most often they fail, but it is in their failures that give his work their distinctive flavor.

Father Goriot is an old, sick pensioner who has raised his two daughters improperly such that they now return his earlier parental errors with daughterly ingratitude that elevates him to the status of a wounded Lear. He lives in a boarding house on the third floor, the cheapest floor. He had once been able to avoid the more expensive lower, but as he has given far too much of his dwindling resources to his greedy daughters, he is now facing poverty. This boarding house is a bustling center of activity, with Goriot only one part. A young and money hungry lawyer Eugene de Rastignac lives there too. He is handsome, witty, and definitely willing to bend a few rules to advance in the cesspool that is Parisian society. Eugene becomes the lover to one of Goriot's wealthy daughters, hoping that she can open doors to him that might otherwise have been closed. This daughter Delphine is only slightly less mercenary than her sister Anastasie, with whom Delphine is not on speaking terms. A friend of Eugene, Vautrin, who is aware of Eugene's poverty, offers to kill the brother of a woman that Eugene is dating, thus ensuring that in the event of a marriage, Eugene will marry into money. The primary focus of the story is on the disintegrating relation between Goriot and his daughters. They take his money until there is no more. For his part, Goriot remains inexplicably oblivious to their machinations. When he dies, both daughters find reasons not to attend the funeral which only Eugene attends. FATHER GORIOT is a novel of pessimism. It is not an unpleasant read, just an unpleasant topic, yet in Balzac's dramatic portrayal of the origins and consequences of greed and betrayal, it shows the depths to which people may plunge, while an uncaring city does little more than sit back and not take notice.

Good Intro To French Lit
Hesitant at first, I rapidly developed an interest in the book. On the surface it provides a snapshot of Paris in the early 1800s. Dig a little deeper and you get a feel for what de Balzac called "The Human Comedy." Would recommend a few minutes on the internet researching the author before you begin this book. Understanding de Balzac and the place "Pere Goriot" occupies in his rich collection of books adds to the enjoyment. A very good read.