High Old Man - World Literature Classics Collection (Complete Translation)

Author: Honoré de Balzac (France)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-09-01
Features: Mademoiselle Vauquer (maiden name Gouffier) is already advanced in years. She has been running an apartment with meals on Saint-Germain-des-Prés Street for forty years between the Latin Quarter and the outskirts of Saint-Martin. The neighbors call her apartment the Hotel de Vauquer, where people of all ages live, yet she has never received a single accusation of immorality for it. However, for over thirty years, no female lodger has stayed there. If a young man comes to stay, no matter how long he stays, it is enough to show that he is penniless. Despite this, when the tragedy of 1819 begins, Mademoiselle Vauquer’s apartment still houses a nearly destitute young girl. Now, the term "tragedy" is overused in sentimental literature, its meaning distorted and unbelievable; yet it must still be used here. It is not to say that the story will be as dramatically meaningful as the word suggests, but because at the end, readers in Paris and the provinces may shed a sympathetic tear for the outcome. Can people outside Paris understand this story? That is indeed a question. The story contains many details and descriptions of local scenery, only those living between Montmartre and Montroger Hill can fully grasp them. This basin has a pitch-black mire river, the lime on the walls always damp and peeling, filled with real hardship, yet without a trace of joy. However, readers are already accustomed to such miserable descriptions, only the grief that is unimaginable and almost impossible to exist can leave an imprint in their minds. Horrible tragedies occasionally occur here, yet they appear great because they are mixed with vice and virtue, compelling even selfish people to pause and feel sympathy; but their reflections vanish as quickly as they swallow a delicious fruit hastily, savoring it without truly tasting it. Civilization is like India’s chariot of gods, which, when encountering an unbreakable heart on its path, pauses imperceptibly and then crushes it to continue its journey. You readers are no different: with pale hands holding the novel, comfortably nestled in a chair, murmuring to yourselves, "Perhaps it will entertain me." Reading the hidden pain of Le Père Goriot will not affect your appetite for dinner at all, and you blame the author for being overly dramatic or inventing lies. Ah! But this drama is neither a novel nor a fiction! Everything is real—so real that everyone can find these elements of tragedy in their own surroundings or deep within themselves. The apartment under Mademoiselle Vauquer’s name is located on the lower part of Saint-Germain-des-Prés Street, sloping steeply down toward the Rue des Arquebusiers. The road is steep and full of gravel, so it is rarely used by carriages, making the small street between the Val-de-Grace military hospital and the Panthéon particularly quiet. Under the shadow of two prominent public buildings, everything takes on a yellowish hue; in the shade of the lead-gray towers, the street feels even more somber. The streets here are cold and dry, without mire or drains, and the roots of the walls are overgrown with weeds. In this place where even the sound of a passing carriage can cause a stir, passersby who happen to walk by will also be infected by the oppressive atmosphere; the houses are lifeless, and the garden walls resemble high prison walls. A lost Parisian in this area can only see apartment buildings or public institutions, poverty or sorrow, elderly people on the brink of death, and young people working in anger. This is the darkest corner of Paris—and even more, an unknown place. Yet none of this matters. Saint-Germain-des-Prés is like a bronze frame, perfectly matching the somber tone and indifferent characters of this story. Just as tourists visit Christian tombs, descending step by step into the darkness, sunlight fades, and the guide’s voice grows hollow. How fitting an analogy! Who can say for sure, whether a pale skull or a withered heart is more terrible? P1-2