The novel emphasizes the unjust social isolation of illegitimate children, exaggerating some of the details of Giardin's own experience as the bastard of the Count of Girardin.[3] The titular character Émile is unable to find a place among the aristocracy or among the working class; after a series of rejections, he is placed in a mental hospital, and at his death is buried in a common grave.[3] A recurring character in the novel is Mathilde, an object of romance for the protagonist; when Girardin later married Delphine Gay, she published an elegy from Mathilde's point of view.[4][5]
The novel was highly praised by Jules Janin in his newspaper Le Figaro,[6] and was described as receiving "a merited success" ("un succès mérité").[7] The positive reception of the novel launched Girardin's social reputation, earning him entry to fashionable literary salons.[8]
