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Megan Nanovic Blog Three

To be respected in society, a person must follow unspoken rules.  If a person has money, he or she may get away with not following all of these rules.  Money plays a large role in society.  A person's possession of money can affect how he or she acts and it can affect how this person is treated by others.  Ideally this would not be the case, and all people would treat each other equally.  In Pere Goriot, Eugene came to realize that he was not exposed to these rules, which caused him to receive judgement from members of the higher class.  Initially Eugene was judged because he arrived at Comtesse de Restaud's home on foot, and based on his outfit, people could assume that he was not accustomed to a wealthier lifestyle.  Each person that met him looked him up and down, and then proceeded to look at him arrogantly.  This expression stopped in the Restaud home when it was discovered that Eugene had an impressive heritage and one of his ancestors was acquainted with Monsieur de Restaud's ancestor.  Although this is not a particularly strong connection, it binds the two men together on common ground which allows Eugene to find a place of comfort at the home.  Unfortunately for Eugene, he still did not realize that one must watch what he says in high society.  Knowing the right thing to say can inflate a person's social status, while saying the wrong thing can drastically hurt a person's social status.  While we may not be exposed to this same type of situation, it is clear that people today still follow certain unspoken rules in order to fit into society's idea of how one should act.

Comments

  1. jdoutMarch 4, 2018 at 5:51 PM

    This essay is ok but could be considerably better if you inserted quotes or more specific details to "grab" the reader. The fact that people are conventional is not a newsflash: consider choosing more un-conventional lines of reasoning and analysis to bring out your own original insights on the book.

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