Love stories end badly

This story, which opens the Human Comedy, begins like that of Eugenie Grandet, except Augustine Guillaume is not the daughter of a Cooper Saumur, but the daughter of a Parisian merchant. The father William is also nicer than Felix Grandet, but just as strong in business. In short, Augustine falls for a fashionable painter, who married, but the marriage will be unhappy because of the difference in sensitivity and character between spouses (more than social class in my opinion). Through the experience of the painter Théodore Sommervieux Balzac probably describes what an artist feels with a woman having the sensitivity of an anvil, and used it to criticize the narrow-minded people who are dedicated to business "no he came face to those brave ant to ask: What for?". It is also an opportunity to portray Parisian society under the Empire (although no date is given, a remark Master Guillaume suggests conscription 1808).