Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac

How hard is Père Goriot to read?

Père Goriot scores 55 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.

Vocabulary: 68 out of 100

Balzac's narrative employs a rich, formal vocabulary with many literary and somewhat archaic terms (e.g., 'dolorous literature,' 'cicerone,' 'hypotaxis,' 'posset dish,' 'maccaboy,' 'morganatic couple'). The translation maintains this elevated diction, requiring a reader to be comfortable with a broad range of words, though rarely resorting to true obscurity like 'Ulysses' or 'Finnegans Wake.' Specialized terms are primarily related to social strata and Parisian life of the era.

Sentence structure: 75 out of 100

The text features long, multi-clause sentences with frequent subordination and parenthetical remarks, characteristic of 19th-century French realism. Balzac often builds intricate descriptions and complex psychological observations within single sentences, demanding sustained attention from the reader. While not reaching the extreme lengths or experimental structures of a 'Ulysses' or 'Absalom, Absalom!', the prose is significantly more demanding than contemporary fiction.

Abstraction: 65 out of 100

While grounded in a vivid, detailed depiction of Parisian society and character, 'Père Goriot' frequently delves into philosophical and sociological observations. The narrator often pauses to generalize about human nature, society's mechanisms, and moral dilemmas, elevating the narrative beyond a purely concrete story. Vautrin's lengthy monologues, in particular, introduce explicit philosophical arguments about ambition, virtue, and corruption.

Information density: 70 out of 100

The narrative is dense with character introductions, social commentary, and intricate plot developments, even within a short excerpt. Balzac meticulously details the setting, the characters' appearances, their social standing, and their inner thoughts, often layering multiple pieces of information in single paragraphs. This requires constant attention to absorb the nuances of the social world and the motivations driving the characters, though it lacks the sheer encyclopedic scope of 'Ulysses' or 'War and Peace'.

Narrative indirection: 40 out of 100

The omniscient narrator frequently interjects with explicit social commentary and psychological explanations, directly telling the reader what to think about characters like Mme. Vauquer or the nature of Parisian society. While initial events, such as Goriot melting silver, present a mystery, the narrative quickly provides context or character speculation to guide interpretation, making deep inference less necessary.

Symbolic density: 55 out of 100

Balzac employs clear, often explicitly stated, symbolic elements to underscore his social critique, such as the 'blistered and disfigured' Cupid representing Parisian love, or the 'slough' metaphor for society. Objects like Goriot's silver posset dish carry emotional weight, symbolizing his past and sacrifice, but their meaning is generally direct rather than deeply allegorical, placing it above simple realism but below heavy symbolism.

Ironic distance: 50 out of 100

The narrative voice often employs explicit irony and satire, particularly in its scathing descriptions of Parisian society and characters like Mme. Vauquer, but this is typically a direct authorial critique rather than a subtle, unreliable perspective. The gap between what is presented and what the author intends is minimal, as the narrator frequently clarifies the moral implications of events and characters.

Resolution withholding: 60 out of 100

While the immediate plot points and character backstories are largely revealed or foreshadowed, the narrative leaves the ultimate moral and ethical dilemmas faced by Eugene de Rastignac unresolved. The ending of the excerpt, with Eugene's internal conflict and Vautrin's cynical proposition, resists easy closure on the question of how one should live in a corrupt society, similar to 'The Great Gatsby' where the plot resolves but thematic meaning remains open.

Structural complexity: 40 out of 100

The novel employs a traditional, largely chronological narrative structure, primarily following Eugene de Rastignac's perspective while incorporating clear, delineated flashbacks to provide character backstories. Although there are shifts in focus to other characters and their internal thoughts, the overall progression is linear and does not feature complex formal experiments or fragmented timelines, making it straightforward to follow.

How Père Goriot is regarded

Père Goriot holds a literary regard score of 87 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.

About the author

Honoré de Balzac