The Debacle of Society in Le Pere Goriot, a Novel by Honore de Balzac

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The Debacle of Society as Revealed in Le Père Goriot Throughout history, humanity has chased after the notion of achieving success, believing it to be the definition of a meaningful existence. However, the vague idea of success is as fruitless as it is unattainable. In a perfect world, success would rely solely on one's personal achievements with no other influences. However, this is not the case as the world is obviously not a utopia and there are numerous factors affecting success, one of which being society.

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Honoré de Balzac's novel Le Père Goriot, is an excellent example of the impact society has on the definition and attainability of success. Early 17th century Parisian society was easily one of the most corrupt and turbulent in nature with the uprising of the bourgeoisie class. Most importantly, however, was the absolute corruption of human nature through the creation of false perceptions of success due to a change in the value of wealth and social status, the definition of personal achievement and the importance of love.

Before understanding how society has corrupted individuals, one must first take a look at the nature of society in a post-Napoleonic France. While Le Père Goriot was published in 1835, the novel is set in 1819 during the Bourbon Restoration. After the overthrow of King Louis XVI during the French Revolution in 1792, Napoleon Bonaparte declared himself the Emperor of the First French Empire. During his reign, he led a 10-year military campaign across Europe during which he seized control of the numerous countries surrounding France.

His defeat at the Battle of Waterloo in June 1815 by the Seventh Coalition (England, the Netherlands, Hanover, Nassau, Brunswick and Prussia) led to the end of the First French Empire and to the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy with King Louis XVIII as ruler of France. However, while the royal family was brought restored to power, French society had changed drastically during Napoleon's rule.

The French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars spread nationalism and anti-absolutism throughout Europe which heavily influenced the people of France. Not everyone was pleased to have the old monarchy back; many people now supported the semi-democratic ways of Napoleon. France was in a social upheaval as tensions were high between the aristocracy who had returned with the king and the bourgeoisie who had made their fortunes through the Industrial Revolution due to the social mobility and fluidity of climbing up the social ladder. The introduction of the notion of capitalism meant that money was now more important than ranking and titles. Thus, the upper class was forced to accept the ‘nouveau-riche' while all at the same time looked down upon them. On the other hand, the bourgeoisie were both jealous and scornful of the aristocracy who had never worked for their titles which still held some merit in society. Societal values were changing and along with the change came the distortion of the values of money, personal achievement and love.

The biggest and most obvious corrupter of human nature is the desire for wealth and social status. Viscomtesse de Beauséant describes French society perfectly when she tells Eugène, the novel's protagonist, that he “will have a success, and in Paris success is everything; it is the key to power" (94). Society has created a perception that money and social status are the sole definitions of success and that one must be willing to do anything to achieve it. The desire to join the upper-class is what drives Eugène de Rastignac, a young student with aristocratic connections, to Paris to seek his fortune. He quickly learns that the most important factor of success is money and that he will need to abandon many of his moral principles in order to be accepted by high society. The quest to climb the social ladder also affects Goriot's two daughters, Comtesse Anastasie de Restaud and Baronne Delphine de Nucigen, as they marry into loveless marriages for money and power. A divide between the older generation and the rising new generation is also created due to society's notion that money and power is more important than anything. Anastasie and Delphine, in their quest to achieve 'success’, abandon their father as soon as they realize that his penniless bourgeoisie state is damaging and jeopardizing their high class image within Parisian society and their social circles. His only value to them is that of a source of income and when he runs out of money, they have no further use for him. Because of this, they refuse to be seen with him in public and eventually even shut him out of their homes, only visiting him in his destitute room at Mme. Vauqer's boarding house. This ultimate betrayal of family shows the complete abandonment of morals; Anastasie and Delphine value their social images over their own flesh and blood. This is even more shocking as the reader soon learns that Goriot has sacrificed everything, including a comfortable retirement, to provide for them.

However, the pressures to disregard one's moral conscience are lost on Eugène since his "dilemma is to choose his own path in life. He faces three options: Struggle, Revolt and Obedience” (Adamson xvii). Unlike Anastasie and Delphine who have been immersed in Parisian society for so long, Eugène’s saving grace is that he is untouchable due to his wavering loyalties between his morality and his desires to be a member of the upper-class. Having disregarded Obedience, which is following society's rules, he must now choose between Struggle (“fighting of society from within: the exploitation of emotion, feminine passion, the paralysing of human heart") and Revolt ("challenging of those codes and norms... because the law of the land is a hypocritical device whereby the rich and powerful keep in subjection the poor and the weak”) (Adamson xvii-xviii). Thus, Eugène is unable to be corrupted because he has made a conscience decision to achieve success without following society's rules. Nonetheless, society's corruption of the idea that money and power equate to success follows Eugène throughout the entire novel as he is continuously enticed to abandon his morals and to succumb to society's will.

Not only has society corrupted the value of power and wealth, it has also redefined the meaning of personal achievement now that success is linked to money and success. Because of this, personal satisfaction will never be achieved as there is a constant pressure to constantly want and need more money and power. Therefore, success can never truly be achieved, which leads to an unsatisfying perception of self. This means that instead of building oneself up, society causes individuals to bring others down in order to elevate one above the masses. "Perhaps is it only human nature to inflict suffering on anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuine humility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness. Do we not, one and all, like to feel our strength even at the expense of something or of something?” provides an explanation towards the boarders' cruelty towards Goriot since he has essentially fallen from grace in terms of social position and wealth. Rather than trying to achieve success themselves, the other boarders ridicule Goriot for his destitute conditions in an attempt to appear higher on the social ladder than him (22). This has absolute disregard for others has produced an ideology based solely on personal gain: the idea that one will only do something for someone else if it benefits the helper in any way. This is shown by Anastatie's initial rejection of Eugène and her eventual acceptance of him due to his connections his cousin, the very influential Viscomtesse de Beauséant. Vautrin is a prime example of this when he senses Eugène 's ambition and offers him a deal: if Eugène can get Victorine Taillefer, who has been disowned by her wealthy father, to fall in love with him, then Vautrin will kill her brother Frederic to give Victorine access to her father's fortune. Of course, Vautrin is not doing this out of the kindness of his heart, but rather because he knows that, in return, he will be able to start a new life in America with the money Eugène will give him for killing Frederic.

Vautrin's character, however, differs from that of the upper-class as it is evident that despite looking out for himself first, Vautrin is genuinely interested in Eugène and wants him to succeed in the world. In a sense, Vautrin is seen as a fighter who rebels against society's strict social restrictions and expectations. He uses Eugène as an instrument to rebel against society: by having Victorine inherit her father's fortunes, he is degrading the man who has degraded the innocent Victorine. Because Vautrin is acutely aware of the misconceptions society puts forth, he is able to abandon all perceptions of money, wealth, power, law and success and to create his own sets of values and morals. His sense of personal achievement remains uncorrupted which he uses to expose society's rottenness. In the end, Vautrin finds that he cannot escape society's corruption; he is betrayed by his fellow boarders Mlle. Michonneau and Poiret in exchange for money. The two boarders believe that by turning Vautrin in, they will be doing their duty to society have a dangerous criminal arrested. In turn, they will have achieved some sort of personal achievement in their otherwise meaningless lives because of their material gain and miniscule climb up the social ladder. Despite Vautrin's kindness towards them, they have chosen to be led astray by society's conception of success and meaning in life.

“And if you ever should love, never let your secret escape you! Trust no one until you are very sure of the heart to which you open your heart. Learn to mistrust everyone; take every precaution for the sake of love which does not exist yet" is the advice Viscomtesse de Beauséant gives Eugène after he tells her that he has failed to make Anastasie accept him (93). Her advice reveals the true extent of society's treachery as not even love, humanity's rawest form of emotion, is safe from corruption. Love in Le Père Goriot is virtually nonexistent: Victorine is disowned by her father, Mlle. Michonneau is an ex-mistress, Delphine and Anastasie do not love their husbands, their husbands do not love them and Viscomtesse de Beauséant does not truly care about Eugène, which is made evident when she calls him the wrong name. Thus, love in a post-Napoleonic France is no longer pure but rather a means of achieving success, power and money. The only person in the novel who truly and genuinely loves is Goriot. However, his love makes him weak as his daughters easily prey upon his affections when they suck him dry of his money and dignity. Goriot's one fatal flaw is his "Christ of paternity" as he lives through his daughters by sacrificing everything for them. Because of Anastasie and Delphine's corruption by society and their loveless nature, they do not hesitate to take advantage of their father. The younger generation has created a gap between the older generation where the family unit is seen as a source of income and power and not a means of love and support. This corruption of the family unit propels Eugène to ask his mother, aunt and sister for their savings despite knowing that they have almost nothing. While Eugène feels a significant amount of guilt over his request, in the end he rationalizes his decision by claiming that he will use the money to achieve success and elevate the family name. Goriot's daughters also add to the fracture between society and family relations as they marry for power, wealth and social status rather than love. Their loveless marriages force them to find affection elsewhere in the form of affairs that Anastasie has with Maxine de Trailles and Delphine has with Eugène. The notion that love is worthless in society is further reinforced with Anastasie's grave mistake in loving Maxine when it is revealed that he has only started an affair with her to pay off his debts. When Anastasie's husband finds out about her affair, he uses it to blackmail her for more money, which she does not have. In turn, she looks to Goriot who blames himself for her misfortunes. This downward spiral caused by her single moment of weakness essentially leads to her own downfall; thus proving that love is weak and weakness in such a corrupt society will be exploited. Balzac's portrayal of the corrupt 17th century society is not as dated as one would think.

The changed societal values and beliefs have carried on to even some modern day ideas with misconceptions of power, wealth, personal achievement and love. The desires that controlled the lives of the characters in Le Père Goriot can be found in today's society where the corruption of human nature can be attributed to false perceptions of success. Eugène's decision to choose both Struggle and Revolt against Parisian society is his way of “throwing down the glove to Society”; it is his way of redefining success as what he deems it to be (328). Only when one has become aware of the misconceptions society creates, like Vautrin, can one be truly free to live without its corrupted influence on one's desires and subsequent actions.

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