From the most present (Horace Bianchon, 24 appearances) and most connected (Lucien-Chardon de Rubempre, 79 relationships) to the walk-ons…

From Lost Illusions (624 pages, 148 characters recorded, 76 of them recurring) to a Study of a Woman (10 pages, 5 characters).

The Faubourg Saint-Germain (Grandlieu, Maufrigneuse…), the rising classes (Nucingen, Camusot…), the lower-middle-class clans (Rabourdin, Baudoyer…), the provincial dynasties (Grandet, Cruchot, Tonsard…).

Ties of kinship, attachments (loves, friendships); the professional world (colleague, subordinate…) or the economic one (creditor, tenant…).

Journalists (Lousteau, Nathan), doctors (Bianchon, Haudry), magistrates (Granville, Popinot), notaries (Crottat, Roguin), attorneys (Desroches, Derville), merchants (Birotteau, Cardot), authors (Vignon, d'Arthez), politicians (Marsay, Canalis), soldiers (Montriveau, Aiglemont)…

The settings of Parisian life (the Faubourg Saint-Germain, the rue Neuve-Sainte-Geneviève, the Latin Quarter), the provinces (Tours, Issoudun, Alençon, Angoulême), abroad (Venice, Lake Geneva, the Indies).