Maxime Saccard

The son of Aristide and Angèle. He was sent to college with the fees being paid for by his grandmother Félicité.
One of the main male characters in La Curée, he is the son of Aristide Saccard (prev. Rougon) and his first wife Angèle. Having spent his early years with his grandmother in Plassans he moves to live with his father and step-mother in his teens. He is brought up by his step mother, Renée, in the company of the ladies of the second empire and is treated in many ways as their amusement. At the age of 17 he gets Renée's chambermaid pregnant. His central role in the plot comes about as the result of the incestuous relationship he has with Renée. To him it is just one of those things and exclaims at one point that “it was bound to happen sooner or later”. While all this is going on his father arranges for him to marry a rich young woman called Louise Mareuil. He marries her after breaking with Renée but she dies while on their honeymoon in Italy. He returns to Paris after six months and takes up quarters in the avenue de l'Impératrice and takes up horse racing. He is a shallow character who only occasionally shows any emotion and stands as an emblem of the dissolute elements of the second empire.