- Paperback: 304 pages
- Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks; New edition edition (11 Feb 1999)
- Language French
- ISBN-10: 0192835696
- ISBN-13: 978-0192835697
- Product Dimensions: 19.2 x 12.8 x 1.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 422,442 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
This is the tragic story of a father whose obsessive love for his two daughters leads to his financial and personal ruin. It is set against the background of a whole society driven by social ambition and lust for money. The detailed descriptions of both affluence and squalor in the Paris of 1819 are an integral part of the drama played out by a wide range of characters, including the sinister but fascinating Vautrin. Unquestionably one of Balzac's finest novels, Pére Goriot still has the power to move the modern reader.
About the Author
Translated by A. J. Krailsheimer, Emeritus Student and former Tutor in French at Christ Church, Oxford
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
MADAME VAUQUER, nee de Conflans, is an old woman who for the past forty years has run a family boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, between the Latin Quarter and the Faubourg Saint-Marceau. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
MADAME VAUQUER, nee de Conflans, is an old woman who for the past forty years has run a family boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, between the Latin Quarter and the Faubourg Saint-Marceau. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
14 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This novel is one of Shakespearian proportions, and many parallels can be seen with King Lear. As in that play the tragedy in Pere Goriot revolves around the male character and his two daughters. The other central character is the young Rastignac, who goes on to feature in other novels belonging to Balzac's La Comedie Humaine, a collection in which this novel plays an important part. All of Balzac's novels are page-turners and this is no exception: love, betrayal and death are important themes. I found Pere Goriot to be a deeply involving work, and also a moral one; Balzac invites you to make judgements on the actions of his many characters. This novel is set in the nineteenth century and shows the glittering world of the Parisian nobility, but also the poorer circles of Paris. The interesting thing is that Balzac portrays money here as a corrupting influence, and avarice and love of power results in tragedy. In this way it has many points in common with modern fiction. If in the past you have enjoyed Balzac's and Emile Zola's novels you will love this; and even if you haven't read any works of either of these authors before then you couldn't start in a better place than Pere Goriot. Read it and weep!
Format:Paperback
In these brilliantly written studies of the `human heart', Honoré de Balzac proves to be a master of suspense, creating mysteries and revealing the hidden histories, goals, truths, motives, emotions, desires and strategies behind the differently marked faces in this novel which represent all segments of the `human comedy'.
Through his mouthpiece, Vautrin, he shouts loudly his view on human society and the bold strategies needed to survive in `an ocean of mud'.
Characters, not types
Balzac doesn't work with `types' (G. Lukács) but with `characters': Père Goriot's loving daughters become harpies in the hands of their husbands, who squeeze the juicy orange and throw away the peel in the gutter.
Mankind and society
The author's mouthpiece, the criminal Vautrin, describes `the world as it is: laws and morality powerless against wealth, and success the ultimo ratio mundi. Wealth can buy everything. At the bottom of every great fortune without apparent source, there's always some crime - a crime overlooked because it's been carried out respectably.' `How corrupt are women here, and how despicably vain the men.'
Strategies
At the bottom, there are only two strategies to survive: stupid obedience or revolt.
`The poor drones which do the hard work without getting the slightest reward for their labors, the ones I call the Brotherhood of God's Down-at-Heels. To be sure that's virtue at the height of its stupidity.'
The right strategies are: `the more coldly you calculate, the further you'll go. Strike without pity; and you'll be feared. Look at men and women simply as post-horses, and leave them behind as soon as they're exhausted. And if you have any feeling, hide it like treasure.'
In this superbly built novel, Balzac combines formidably cunning writing strategies to keep the reader on the edge of his seat, while at the same time painting extraordinary vivid and highly emotional scenes of the human `comedy'.
This novel is a must read for all lovers of world literature.
Through his mouthpiece, Vautrin, he shouts loudly his view on human society and the bold strategies needed to survive in `an ocean of mud'.
Characters, not types
Balzac doesn't work with `types' (G. Lukács) but with `characters': Père Goriot's loving daughters become harpies in the hands of their husbands, who squeeze the juicy orange and throw away the peel in the gutter.
Mankind and society
The author's mouthpiece, the criminal Vautrin, describes `the world as it is: laws and morality powerless against wealth, and success the ultimo ratio mundi. Wealth can buy everything. At the bottom of every great fortune without apparent source, there's always some crime - a crime overlooked because it's been carried out respectably.' `How corrupt are women here, and how despicably vain the men.'
Strategies
At the bottom, there are only two strategies to survive: stupid obedience or revolt.
`The poor drones which do the hard work without getting the slightest reward for their labors, the ones I call the Brotherhood of God's Down-at-Heels. To be sure that's virtue at the height of its stupidity.'
The right strategies are: `the more coldly you calculate, the further you'll go. Strike without pity; and you'll be feared. Look at men and women simply as post-horses, and leave them behind as soon as they're exhausted. And if you have any feeling, hide it like treasure.'
In this superbly built novel, Balzac combines formidably cunning writing strategies to keep the reader on the edge of his seat, while at the same time painting extraordinary vivid and highly emotional scenes of the human `comedy'.
This novel is a must read for all lovers of world literature.
7 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Whilst the I would go along with many of the other reviewer's comments, particularly the similarity to the story of King Lear, I would not hold with this work, amusing as it is, to be comparable to Shakespeare!! However, as an introduction to Balzac's work, it is a good start and shows the Frenchman to be writing in his typically affected style in a tale that perhaps evokes some aspects of Dickens.
Like the Englishman, Balzac had the gift of defining the characters of the people within his novels through their dialogue which if often very amusing, particularly when the reader is aware of something of which the speaker is ignorant.In my opinion, the novel is worth reading for the presence of one such character, his greatest creation, the criminal mastermind Vautrin. I always picture Vautrin as being rather like Long John Silver with his ability to charm his acquaintances when his motives are clearly less than good intentioned and , frequently evil. Cerainly, the best parts of this book are when Vautrin makes an appearance. Luckily, the central character of the book Rastignac is too wise for him. Elsewhere, the story concerns the fate of another character who lives within the Parisian boarding house of Madame Vauquer, the unfortunate M. Goriot who we learn has sacrificed everything for the well being of his daughters.
This is one of the better books by Balzac but readers wishing to explore more of his work should be warned that, unlike the far superior Charles Dickens, there is not alot of variety amongst his many works. (This can probably be due to the fact that his publishers paid him by the line with the consequence that the quality is somewhat diluted.) However, if you are a newcomer to Balzac, this is an excellent introduction that will keep you amused with it's superior storyline and , of course, the gallic wit.
Like the Englishman, Balzac had the gift of defining the characters of the people within his novels through their dialogue which if often very amusing, particularly when the reader is aware of something of which the speaker is ignorant.In my opinion, the novel is worth reading for the presence of one such character, his greatest creation, the criminal mastermind Vautrin. I always picture Vautrin as being rather like Long John Silver with his ability to charm his acquaintances when his motives are clearly less than good intentioned and , frequently evil. Cerainly, the best parts of this book are when Vautrin makes an appearance. Luckily, the central character of the book Rastignac is too wise for him. Elsewhere, the story concerns the fate of another character who lives within the Parisian boarding house of Madame Vauquer, the unfortunate M. Goriot who we learn has sacrificed everything for the well being of his daughters.
This is one of the better books by Balzac but readers wishing to explore more of his work should be warned that, unlike the far superior Charles Dickens, there is not alot of variety amongst his many works. (This can probably be due to the fact that his publishers paid him by the line with the consequence that the quality is somewhat diluted.) However, if you are a newcomer to Balzac, this is an excellent introduction that will keep you amused with it's superior storyline and , of course, the gallic wit.
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