In this blog post, we will explore the clash between reality and innocence, the main characters, and Balzac’s life through his “Human Comedy” and the novel “Father Goriot.”

The Connection Between Balzac and Dante

Dante’s “Divine Comedy” is “La Divina Comedia” in the original Italian. Translated into French, it becomes “La Comédie Divine.”
The reason I suddenly brought up Dante’s “Divine Comedy” is that Balzac (Honoré de Balzac, 1799–1850) connected the approximately 90 novels and short stories he wrote into a single vast literary universe and titled it “La Comédie Humaine.” If we translate Dante’s title literally, it would be “The Human Song,” but we translate it as “The Human Drama” or “The Human Comedy.” The reason is simple: while Dante’s work is written in verse and reads like a song, Balzac’s work is written in prose and unfolds like a drama.

Balzac’s Ambition and Realism

Just looking at the title, Balzac’s ambition and audacity are remarkable. If Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ was a work born of the ambition to depict the afterlife—divided into Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven—then Balzac’s decision to gather all his works under the title ‘The Human Comedy’ reveals his immense ambition and self-confidence to portray everything that happens in this world through his writings.
In his works, Balzac boldly declares, “This play is neither fiction nor a novel. Everything is true.” For this reason, he is regarded as the founder of realism. Although Stendhal paved the way for realism by stating that “a novel is a mirror carried along the road,” his novels were deeply imbued with romanticism, leading him to cede the title of founder of realism to Balzac.

A Comparison of Julien Sorel and Rastignac

Stendhal’s ‘The Red and the Black’ and Balzac’s ‘Father Goriot’ are similar novels in many respects. In particular, a comparison of the young male protagonists in the two works reveals many similarities. Julien Sorel from ‘The Red and the Black’ and Rastignac from ‘Father Goriot’ are both from rural backgrounds; they are dissatisfied with their origins and possess a strong ambition for social advancement.
However, while similar, the two characters are distinctly different. Julien Sorel ultimately chooses a path that gives meaning to his life over social success or social climbing. The author portrays him heroically, dying without compromising with the corrupt world. In contrast, Rastignac resolves to confront the world; at the end of the novel, gazing at Paris, he shouts, “Well, this is our duel!” and then sets out to succeed within that corrupt world. If Julien is a symbol of purity, Rastignac is the figure who heralds the end of that purity.

Old Goriot: Purity and Sublimity

Looking at Old Goriot from ‘Old Goriot’, he is a man of the utmost purity. We call such a character—who places all meaning in life on the values he cherishes most and remains unshaken by any temptation—pure. Old Goriot is precisely such a character; he is paternal love incarnate, and the author depicts him so sublimely that he describes him as the “Christ of paternal love.”
He finds his own happiness in his daughters’ happiness and cannot bear their misfortune any more than his own. The scene where his daughters do not come to his deathbed, despite his having sacrificed everything for them, reveals a piercing awareness of reality. The reality where he is betrayed and frustrated because he gave everything—where the most sublime is not respected—is precisely our ridiculous world.

Balzac’s Realistic Perspective and the Message He Conveys to the Reader

In Balzac’s novels, the protagonist is that very ridiculous world and the ridiculous reality itself. He neither simply mocks the world nor avoids it, nor does he romanticize the purity that lies outside it. Rather, Balzac lays bare the philistinism within himself and, more profoundly than anyone else, pierces through the world’s philistinism to portray it in all its nakedness.
He confidently tells the reader: ‘(This novel) is so realistic that readers will easily find events in this drama that could happen in their own homes or within their own hearts.’ To live in the world properly, must we not first truly know ourselves and truly understand the world? It is better to keep our eyes open and see clearly than to live thoughtlessly, swept along by it.
I want to say this to young readers. If you live thoughtlessly, swept along by the world, you will never know success or failure, nor will you gain the will or freedom to take on the world. Balzac’s works do not drive us into despair by starkly exposing the world’s vulgarity; rather, they enable us to reflect on and rediscover ourselves. If this novel serves as an opportunity to look seriously at yourself and your surroundings, that alone is the first step toward a meaningful life.

The Insufficiency of Purity in Perceiving Reality

As we go through life, we encounter scenes we’d rather look away from and face absurd behaviors that provoke anger. Humans possess an instinctive, pure heart that values virtue, but purity alone is insufficient for living a healthy life. Old Goriot was so pure that he actually led his daughters astray. If he had held onto a portion of his wealth until the end and not given it to them, his daughters might have remained dutiful to the very end. However, he failed to recognize the selfish instincts within his daughters’ hearts; ultimately, he simply did not understand the world or people well enough.
Not knowing the world well enough means not knowing oneself well enough. Balzac’s uncomfortable novels reveal our raw, unvarnished selves and make us reflect on ourselves anew. In that moment of self-reflection, we can become healthier.

The View of Marriage in Parisian Aristocratic Society

Another element that makes readers uncomfortable while reading this novel is the relationship between men and women in Parisian aristocratic society. Scenes appear that are utterly incomprehensible by today’s standards. How could people with families openly engage in romantic affairs, with their spouses acknowledging it and the entire social circle tolerating it?
The answer lies in the fact that the aristocracy’s view of marriage at the time differed from today’s. In aristocratic society, marriage was a kind of contract, a means to acquire social status and wealth. In the ‘Memoirs of Casanova’ I read, there is an even more shocking scene. There is a scene at an aristocratic gathering where children are running around, and the host points to them, saying, “That child is the product of my wife and so-and-so, and that one is the product of my wife and so-and-so.” Since it is a memoir, we have no choice but to accept it as fact. In short, marital relationships in that era were merely contracts; the absence of affection was irrelevant, and it was a society where romantic exchanges with people other than one’s spouse were tacitly tolerated. I should add that Balzac did not deliberately portray the world as corrupt.

The Recurrence of Characters and the Structure of the ‘Human Comedy’

Balzac’s novels are famous for characters reappearing across multiple works. However, this does not mean that the ‘Human Comedy’ is an epic novel or a series of novels connected by a single overarching plot. Each work is an independent novel, yet they are interconnected.
Rastignac, the young protagonist of ‘Father Goriot’, had already appeared in the previously published ‘The Skin of Chagrin’ (La Peau de Chagrin), and he, along with Vautrin, Madame de Nucingen, Madame de Beauséant, Bianchon, and the Duchess of Langeais, continues to appear in novels published after ‘Father Goriot’. ‘Father Goriot’ can be viewed as the prologue that opens the entire ‘Human Comedy’. If there are characters from this work whom you would like to encounter again, you can find them in Balzac’s other works.

Balzac’s Life and Writing Career

Balzac was born in Tours, a city in the Loire Valley often referred to as the “Garden of France.” His original surname was Balssa, but starting with his father, the family adopted the aristocratic-sounding surname de Balzac. His mother came from a merchant family in Paris, while his father, though originally a peasant, rose to become a civil servant by taking advantage of the chaos during the Revolution; Tours was his post.
Balzac’s childhood overlapped with the period when Napoleon dominated Europe. By the time Balzac turned 16, Napoleon had already stepped down from power, but Balzac continued to revere him. Deep down, he harbored the ambition to achieve with a pen what Napoleon had failed to accomplish with a sword.
At his father’s urging, Balzac began studying law at the Sorbonne in the fall of his 17th year and spent three years gaining practical experience at a law firm and a notary’s office. However, his ambition lay in literature. Shortly before graduation, he dropped out of university and shut himself away in a attic room on the outskirts of town to devote himself to writing. He wrote poetic tragedies and several novels, and even dabbled in printing, publishing, and type casting, but achieved no great success.
The one who comforted and encouraged him through these hardships was Madame de Verny, a devoted lover some twenty years his senior. The novel ‘Le Lys dans la Vallée’ (1835) is a lyrical work based on his love for Madame de Verny. After Madame Berny’s death, Madame Hanska, a Polish noblewoman, dominated the remainder of Balzac’s life, and he married her shortly before his death.
After making his literary debut in 1829 with the novel ‘Les Chouans’, Balzac embarked on a period of explosive productivity. He devoted himself to writing for more than ten hours every day, without fail, starting at midnight. He spent his mornings dealing with demands from publishers and creditors and revising proofs; after lunch, he proofread manuscripts; in the evening, he dined out and met with people before taking a short nap. He repeated this pattern, immersing himself in writing again at midnight, and his body was worn out from excessive labor.
In March 1850, he married Madame Hanska, who had been his patron and lover for 15 years, in Ukraine, and the couple returned to Paris in May. However, on August 18 of that same year, she died just a few hours after receiving a visit from Hugo. She was 51 years old.