One could easily argue that portrayal of literary realism rests in the author’s purpose of conveying verisimilitude. But is realism just the representation of ‘appearance of being true or real’? Raymond Williams argues that realism is not just a static appearance but a conscious commitment to understanding psychological, social, historical or physical forces. (p262). Balzac’s Old Man Goriot, depicts realism through its setting and characters that are not just mere representations of something real but provide a sense of concrete, an underlying truth that cannot be refused. In his need to depict realism, Balzac creates an entirely plausible setting in ‘Old Man Goriot’, submerging the reader in the reality of a semi mythic Paris-‘a forest in the new world’, diseased with ‘savage tribes’ (p101) indicative of the historical change in France. The tragic situations faced by his characters show deliberately degrading scenes in the most realistic of settings. Balzac’s relentless description of fictional setting of places like Maison Vauquer, Hotel de Beauseant, Restaud Home and Eugene’s apartment hypnotise readers into believing their concreteness. The opening scene of Maison Vauquer, the boarding house, is an excellent example literary realism. The fictitious house is described from the outside, with a new exhaustiveness of detail – its ‘garden patch, right angled position, geraniums and oleanders, its blistering coat of varnish’ (p6-7). The lengthy accumulated descriptive of the inside makes the surroundings more palpable and factual (Williams p258). The reader witnesses the squalor and ‘not yet filthy but stained’ (p10) poorhouse in a succession of adjectives like stale, mildewy, rancid cracked, rotten, shaky (p6-10). Balzac’s realism seems more magnetic as he uses second person narration, directly addressing the reader,– ‘it chills you, clings to your clothes’ (p9). Comparison and juxtapositio