Emile Zola

[Ian b]

Has anybody here read any of Zola's books? What did you think of them. He has written 26 novels, I have read 22 of them!

[Clanad]

It's been a few years, and I certainly can't match you zeal for Emile, I did, for the most part, enjoy The Kill. The period piece (Paris, 1850's), is typical Zola. Intriguing, but somewhat overdone.... rather like a souffle cooked to the point of falling. His studied description of the principal character Aristide paints a picture of a self-absorbed individual with but a singular goal in life... money, regardless of the cost.

Several chapters and parts of chapters (especially the steamy scenes of the denouement of Aristide's second wife Renee', by Aristide's young son, Maxime, or vice-versa depending on ones view) are riveting, only to interspersed with lengthy descriptions of scenery!...

The characters are intentionally shallow, as they surely are. Zola does an excellent job of drawing the reader into the Parisian culture of the times. Of course, being written in 1871 causes one to slowly digest some of the stilted (by today's standards) language and dialogue (Loved Renee's description of Maxime's fiancee', Louise "...Misshapen, ugly, and adorable, she was doomed to die young...").

Although well written, I found the ending with the descent and destruction of Renee' actually painfull, regardless of the eroticism inserted by Zola...

[Senga 2]

I've read Nana and The Earth about 30 years ago. enjoyed them at the time but don't remember much about them now.

[Quizmonkey]

Germinal remains one of my all-time favourite novels. The only other Zola I've read is Th�r�se Raquin - enjoyable but without the epic sweep of the former.

[Ian b]

Clanad

The kill is one of my favourites, it was basically the 'phaedra' story from greek mythology. Aristides' greed was extreme (he sat scribbling figures while his first wife lay dying) planning is new fraudalent scheme, Zolas' description of cafe life and the general womanising was good. I agree that the ending was poor, alot of Zolas' stories end weekly.

Senga 2.

The Earth was banned when first published in Britain, because of the description of the bull being put to the cow in the first few pages. It was considered to much for the prim Victorians!! A good story though all about greed (again), and set in the farming community. Very coarse, another one of my favourites.
Nana started out in L'assommoir being the errant daughter and getting her own chapter. Her story was then continued in 'Nana'. I thought it was good.

Quizmonkey.

Germinal is a good story. When he was writing the Rougon/Maquart series of novels someone suggested to Zola that he wrote about the coalmines and the plight of the miners (there was a strike on at the time somewhere). I would say it was another one of my favourites.
Teresa Raquin is the most recent Zola I have read. I found the act of the murder and the following behaviour of the two lovers cold and impasive, obviously intended, but it did not do anything for me. Although I did think the description of the morgue was an eye-opener!

My top favourites are Pot Pourri (pot luck) and La bete humaine (the beast in man). I have read them both twice
Pot luck takes place in a newly built apartment block, and the stories are about all the people who live there, from an eminent MP to the scullery maids.
The beast in man takes place in the railway community and deals with rape.

Thank you all for your replies and comments, it was very interesting.

Ian b

[frances28]

Hi, I've only just read your question and felt I should register my support for Zola too. I have been reading through the Rougon Macquart series for the last 30 years (!) and still have 3 to go. I was interested that you liked Pot Luck. I really liked it too but I've never heard anyone else praise it in the way they praise Germinal, Nana, L'Assommoir etc. And La Bete Humaine was magnificent. And Ladies' Delight was really informative! The other one in the series which stayed with me for a long time was La Joie de Vivre. I can't remember much about it now - did the 'hero' have OCD? - and I think it's pretty depressing but like an awful lot of his work absolutely gripping. Reading him I think you experience exactly what it was like to live in that time and in whatever circumstances he's writing about - and what a variety of subjects he covered!

[Ian b]

Hello frances28. I've just found your message. It took me about 6 years to read through the Rougon/Macquart series. I was reading other books in between.

I set out to read the series 'Properly', having already read three of them some twenty years ago. I needed to find the order that the books went in, so the first thing i did was to get a biograghy on Zola and read that. Of course, I had to miss out all the discussions about each book! I am interested in family trees, and so I kept a family tree as I went through the books. I also kept notes on all the places in Paris that were used in the stories, as I knew that they would be genuine locations - Zola was fastidious in his preporations before starting any of his books.

There is the other matter of translation, I don't know which you would have read. Vizatelly (son and father) translated all of the novels at the time they were written, however, they were heavily censored and alot of the 'essence' was lost. - I was in touch with the Zola society in London which is run by a french lady who has done a thesis on 'Zola in english' no less! - and she explained all this to me. So as far as was possible I tried to get modern translations.

I'll let you digest all this for the moment, and if you want to discuss it further, I'd be happy to. If you prefer to email you can reach me at [email protected]