The Family and Social Drama in Father Goriot of Balzac

Balzac, in his novel with the title Father Goriot, tells about the gap between the noble and the lower class, the life style of the people in Paris, and class discrimination in French community in 1820s. While hard living conditions of the poor are presented through the detailed description of Vauqer pension, the places where the noble live are presented through magnificent houses where Rastignac went. The writer uses Father Goriot as a figure the show the corruption in family relations in the society, and the story of a father who passed away in a dramatic way because of the sorrow he felt due to lach of interest and love he was supposed to get from his daughters. Rastignac ambition chimp up in the society, who had come to Paris to study law, and Father Goriot’s getting poorer and poorer makes up two mains themes of the novel. Throughout the novel, the writer draws attention to the power of money which influenced human relations deeply while the events taking place in the Vauqner pension center around Father Goriot and Rastignac, the events of secondary importance center around Father Goriot is not only a formational novel, including realist elements in it, it is also a philosophical novel with the dramatic life story of Goriot. This study deals with the writer’s view of the social problems of French society, taking an objective approach based on the analysis of character and novel.

Keywords

Balzac, Father Goriot, Sense of Fatherhood, The relationship between family and society