Father Goriot
1835
Honoré de Balzac's 1835 masterpiece dissects the anatomy of a father's ruin. Jean-Joachim Goriot, once a prosperous noodle merchant, has squandered his fortune on two daughters who have married into aristocracy and now regard him with embarrassment and disdain. When young Eugène de Rastignac arrives at the shabby Maison Vauquer boarding house, a young man hungry for success in Paris, he witnesses something that will haunt him: the old man's pathetic devotion, his midnight visits to deliver money his daughters won't accept in person, his slow descent into poverty and death. This is Balzac at his most ruthless, excavating the tender horror of unconditional love repaid with contempt. The novel pulses with the desperate energy of a city where everyone is climbing or falling, where youth sells itself for connections, and where a father's heart can be broken on the altar of social ambition.
Editions
X-Ray
“It is always assumed by the empty-headed, who chatter about themselves for want of something better, that people who do not discuss their affairs openly must have something to hide.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Women are always true, even in the midst of their greatest falsities, because they are always influenced by some natural feeling.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Some day you will find out that there is far more happiness in another's happiness than in your own.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“I'm a great poet. I don't put my poems on paper: they consist of actions and feelings.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Ah! What pleasure it must be to a woman to suffer for the one she loves!””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Who is to decide which is the grimmer sight: withered hearts, or empty skulls?””
— Honoré de Balzac
“A letter is a soul, so faithful an echo of the speaking voice that to the sensitive it is among the richest treasures of love.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness.””
— Honoré de Balzac
“Our heart is a treasury; if you pour out all its wealth at once, you are bankrupt.””
— Honoré de Balzac
