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The Belly of Paris (Oxford World's Classics)

Emile Zola, Brian Nelson

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Unjustly deported to Devil's Island following Louis-Napoleon's coup-d'etat in December 1851, Florent Quenu escapes and returns to Paris. He finds the city changed beyond recognition. The old Marche des Innocents has been knocked down as part of Haussmann's grand program of urban reconstruction, replaced by Les Halles, the spectacular new food markets. Disgusted by a bourgeois society whose devotion to food is inseparable from its devotion to the Government, Florent attempts an insurrection. Les Halles, apocalyptic and destructive, play an active role in Zola's picture of a world in which food and the injustice of society are inextricably linked.
This is the first English translation in fifty years of Le Ventre de Paris (The Belly of Paris). The third in Zola's great cycle, Les Rougon-Macquart, it is as enthralling as Germinal, Therese Raquin, and the other novels in the series. Its focus on the great Paris food hall, Les Halles--combined with Zola's famous impressionist descriptions of food--make this a particularly memorable novel. Brian Nelson's lively translation captures the spirit of Zola's world and his Introduction illuminates the use of food in the novel to represent social class, social attitudes, political conflicts, and other aspect of the culture of the time. The bibliography and notes ensure that this is the most critically up-to-date edition of the novel in print.

Germinal (Penguin Classics)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 50 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Accurate: Captured the Spirit! 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This was my first read of Zola, an author who is FAR too unknown in the US. He captured, fully, the essence of a labor dispute. I've been around an industrial area my whole life, and have been through many strikes, plus have been the target of those who don't like you crossing their lines. Zola brought all this to life; he told it just as it really is. Incredible!

Editorial Review:

The thirteenth novel in Émile Zolas great Rougon-Macquart sequence, Germinal expresses outrage at the exploitation of the many by the few, but also shows humanitys capacity for compassion and hope.
Etienne Lantier, an unemployed railway worker, is a clever but uneducated young man with a dangerous temper. Forced to take a back-breaking job at Le Voreux mine when he cannot get other work, he discovers that his fellow miners are ill, hungry, and in debt, unable to feed and clothe their families. When conditions in the mining community deteriorate even further, Lantier finds himself leading a strike that could mean starvation or salvation for all.

Nana (Oxford World's Classics)

Emile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A review of the translation 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

The book is wonderful, of course. I found the "Britishism" in the translations to be a distraction: "bloody" this, "Old Chap, " Upon my word, old chap, etc."
That said, as I read more English translations from French, and Russian, (and other reviews of French to English novels) this seems to be a generic problem. I forget now which translation contained the "Blimey!" I don't know the solution, but it makes me wish again that I had learned French.
I would say, if you can find another translation of this fine novel, do so.

Oooooooh Nana.. The original Paris party girl! 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

"Sex is like money; only too much is enough." John Updike

Emile Zola was a writer way ahead of his time, and I mean WAAAAY ahead. Talk about a salacious, racy novel! I can't imagine an American author before the mid-20th century penning such prurient prose like Zola's "Nana" which was published in 1880: "... she wished to share her last piece of pear, and held it out to Nana between her teeth, and their lips touched as they finished the fruit in a kiss." Long before Anais Nin, Holly Golightly, and yes even Paris Hilton there was Zola's "Nana" a young, gorgeous, voluptuous vixen who makes little Ms. Hilton look like a Carmelite Nun. She uses sex as her main weapon of choice to manipulate, exploit, and then eventually destroy her many suitors (and believe you me, there are many!):

"Her wish was to possess everything merely to destroy it. Never before had she felt so strongly the power of her sex."

When we are first introduced to Nana in the beginning of the story, she is employed as a comedic actress and is the talk of all of Paris for her stunning beauty and unassertive charm. However, acting is not where Nana makes all of her hard earned dough, on the contrary, she lives a queen-like existence only by openly operating as a high-class prostitute. There isn't a whole lot of plot to Nana's story, which isn't that big of a surprise when it comes to Emile Zola's style. Most of the chapters are essentially short tales describing all the different ways Nana's male conquests make complete idiots of themselves while under her spell. And trust me folks, when they do, she enjoys every second of it! Her disdain for the male sex just continues to build and build with seemingly every page turned, and despite her playful, engaging, superficial appearance to the Paris elite (which just can't seem to get enough of her); internally not only does she abhor men, she's out to destroy and also "pollute them" (as she so eloquently puts it).

There is no doubt about it, reading "Nana" was for me, quite a unique and enjoyable experience. I couldn't believe what I was reading at times, it was extremely lewd and suggestive, especially if you take into account when it was written. Zola definitely was a man with quite a lot of courage and distinctiveness, and this novel is one small example of why. He does have a tendency to be a bit long-winded and overly descriptive, but so do I, so I'm not complaining just making note of it for the rest of you out there. This is a tough book to put down once you get into it, mostly because of how humorous the story is, especially the character of Nana herself. You just can't wait to see what crazy, comical scene was awaiting her next. As much as I loathed her, I still couldn't lose interest in her story no matter how hard I tried. There is something about Nana you can't help but like and despite all of her many shortcomings and sins, you still can't help but to admire her independent and spirited nature. She was what she was, and she made no pretensions or excuses about it. She is a user who is used, a thief who is stolen from, an abuser who is abused, etc... etc...

And this is just a small peek into the life of one of the most fascinating femme's in fiction... You definitely need to pick this one up! 4.5 STARS

An important aside; one of my main (but very few) knocks about the novel is that the first chapter is tough to get through. It not only is a tad boring, but Zola introduces us to so many different characters right off the bat (ala Dostoevsky), that it's difficult to remember so many names and nicknames so quickly (if you don't have an amazing memory, then I suggest having a pad of paper and pen in hand to take notes).

Editorial Review:

Nana opens in 1867, the year of the World Fair, when Paris, thronged by a cosmopolitan elite, was a perfect target for Zola's scathing denunciation of hypocrisy and fin-de-siecle moral corruption. In this new translation, the fate of Nana--the Helen of Troy of the second Empire, and daughter of the laundress in L'Assommoir--is now rendered in racy, stylish English.

The Beast Within (Penguin Classics)

Emile Zola

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Editorial Review:

A superb new translation of one of the most intense and explicit works of the nineteenth-century French master Émile Zola considered The Beast Withinalso known as La Bête Humaineto be his most finely worked novel. This new translation finally captures his fast-paced yet deliberately dispassionate style. Set at the end of the Second Empire, when French society seemed to be hurtling into the future like the new railways and locomotives it was building, The Beast Within is at once a tale of murder, passion, and possession and a compassionate study of individuals derailed by the burden of inherited evil. In it, Zola expresses the hope that human nature evolves through education but warns that the beast within continues to lurk beneath the veneer of technological progress.

L'Assommoir (Oxford World's Classics)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 28 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

This is the Zola novel to read first. 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 6 people found this review helpful.

If you're seeking an introduction to Zola's 'Naturalism' but don't know where to begin among the multitude of his novels, this is the best place to start. "L'Assommoir" (which translates poorly into English as 'the boozer' or 'the beer joint', a lower-class drinking establishment) is the story of the laundress Gervaise and her descent into alcoholism. It is also, more importantly, a brilliant panorama of lower-class Paris during the time of Baron Haussmann's redesign of the city. With a cast of memorable characters and several unforgettable scenes that showcase the extent of Zola's research and his empathy for his characters, this is probably his greatest achievement. It deserves to be considered one of the greatest French novels of the 19th century.

Editorial Review:

The seventh novel in the Rougon-Macquart cycle, L'Assommoir (1877) is the story of a woman's struggle for happiness in working-class Paris. At the center of the story stands Gervaise, who starts her own laundry and for a time makes a success of it. But her husband soon squanders her earnings in the Assommoir, a local drinking spot, and gradually the pair sink into poverty and squalor.. L'Assommoir was a contemporary bestseller, outraged conservative critics, and launched a passionate debate about the legitimate scope of modern literature. This new translation captures not only the brutality but the pathos of its characters' lives.

Money (Rougon-Macquart)

Emile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

From the Rougon-Macquart Series: Money (L'Argent): After a disastrous speculation, Aristide Saccard was forced to sell his mansion and to cast about for means of creating a fresh fortune. Chance made him acquainted with Hamelin, an engineer whose residence in the East had suggested to him financial schemes which at once attracted the attention of Saccard. With a view to financing these schemes the Universal Bank was formed, and by force of advertising became immediately successful. Emboldened by success, Saccard launched into wild speculation... --- "Judged by the standard of popularity, 'Money' may be said to rank among M. Zola's notable achievements... This is not surprising, as the book deals with a subject of great interest to every civilized community. And with regard to this English version, it may, I think, be safely said that its publication is well timed, for the rottenness of our financial world has become such a crying scandal, and the inefficiency of our company laws has been so fully demonstrated, that the absolute urgency of reform can no longer be denied." (Ernest Alfred Vizetelly)

The Earth: La Terre (Penguin Classics)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The second best novel of all time? 5 out of 5 stars.
10 of 10 people found this review helpful.

This book is a masterpiece. Had Zola not written the awe-inspiring Germinal, this would clearly be his greatest work. Zola does his best writing when he focuses not on Parisian society but rather on the lower classes: the laborers, the peasants, the working stiffs. In this case, his subject matter is the farmers of the Beauce, an agricultural region between Chartres and Orleans. Here, families have cultivated the same plots of land for generations. In fact, land itself is everything to these people, and they will do whatever they can to protect the earth they have, and to acquire as much more as they can before they die. When Old Fouan decides to divide up his holdings among his three children, no one is happy with the portion they receive. Their avarice of earth leads to mutual animosity and eventually to treachery. Jean Macquart, an affable, hard-working farmhand, is, like us, an outsider in this hermetic world, until he falls in love with a farmer's daughter and becomes a participant in their private war.
The scope of the book is wide, and looks beyond the Fouan family to examine political and social issues of the time, including the effect of the impending Franco-Prussian War, the triumphs and failures of modern scientific farming methods, and how the market's regulation of prices damns the farmers to eternal poverty. Zola's description of the agricultural life, its rewards and its hardships, is vivid and moving. He neither romanticizes nor denigrates the farmer's relationship to the land, but rather paints a realistic picture of dirty, exhausting toil that nonetheless has its physical and spiritual rewards.
The book achieves a tremendous range of mood. It's like an emotional roller coaster. There are passages in the book which are downright terrifying. Elsewhere there are moments which are laugh-out-loud funny. Zola obviously had a lot of fun writing the more light-hearted scenes in the book. He includes everything from a farting contest to a vomiting donkey. Overall, however, this novel is a dark portrayal of human greed and selfishness, and the brutal lengths to which people will go to satisfy their hunger for property. This book should be read by all.

Editorial Review:

When Jean Macquart arrives in the peasant community of Beauce, where farmers have worked the same land for generations, he quickly finds himself involved in the corrupt affairs of the local Fouan family. Aging and Lear-like, Old Man Fouan has decided to divide his land between his three children: his penny-pinching daughter Fanny, his eldest son - a far from holy figure known as Jesus Christ' - and the lecherous Buteau, Macquart's friend. But, in a community where land is everything, sibling rivalry quickly turns to brutal hatred, as Buteau declares himself unsatisfied with his lot. Part of the vast Rougon-Macquart cycle, "The Earth" was regarded by Zola as his greatest novel. A fascinating portrayal of a struggling but decadent community, it offers a compelling exploration of the destructive nature of human ignorance and greed.

The Debacle: 1870-71 (Penguin Classics)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Classic Tale of War 5 out of 5 stars.
7 of 7 people found this review helpful.

This was an amazing story about the Franco-Prussian war, but it could have been about any war and the destructive influence it has on men and women, and on all human relationships. Zola tells the story, in vivid, sometimes gruesome but always very compassionate and heartbreaking detail (most of the plot is based on real historical events), of the absolute disaster that was the Franco-Prussian "debacle" of 1870-1.

For anyone interested in French history, it is required reading. This was an absolutely pivotal event in the formation of the Third Republic and the death of the Second Empire, an Empire which Zola had already suggested in his previous novels was rotten to the core. Writing twenty years after the event, Zola was describing a memory still vivid in the minds of most of his readers.

The Franco-Prussian war was truly a debacle. Not only had Napoleon III provoked the French into a doomed war with the Prussians, who with their superior artillery and military tactics ended up invading France and slaughtering and starving thousands upon thousands of men, but he ultimately set the French against each other when, at the end of the war, some Frenchmen and women wanted to surrender the hopeless cause-and some wanted to fight to the death-their deaths-on principle. Many of the French showed amazing bravery and refused to surrender, even after Napoleon III was taken prisoner and a new French government acted to conclude the war.

In a famous and tragic episode, after the war was lost and many French were working to effect a surrender, political radicals staged a hopeless but heroic last stand in Paris, electing an independent municipal government-the famous Paris Commune-and holding the city. Eventually other Frenchmen were finally set against their brothers to force them to wave the white flag. In their determination to not yield one inch of the soil to the Prussian invaders, in one of the most powerful and haunting scenes in the novel (and in history), the Commune sets Paris on fire and Zola describes the entire city of lights roaring with fire, gone up with smoke and having turned the sky red.

If you've ever been in Paris it's a compelling scene and you'll remember all the places he mentions if, like me, you've spent some time there. It's odd to think that the Pere Lachaise cemetery, where so many of us go to see the graves of Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, Jim Morrison or Abelard and Heloise (a site featured on an episode of America's Next Top Model no less!) is where thousands of French radicals-and uninvolved Parisian civilians as well- were lined up against the wall and shot point-blank in summary executions-by their own countrymen-something that Zola and others would never forget. I think it's very important that Zola dealt with these crimes in his novel.

Although Zola doesn't pretend that some of the Communards were not, in fact, war profiteers or criminals, he has much sympathy with some of them and their sincere political committments; as a man of the left he cannot help but find common ground with some of their arguments or with their feeling of betrayal by their own government. He is also disgusted, as so many French were, with the brutal way in which they were liquidated.

The hero of the story is Jean Macquart. You definitely don't have to have read any of the other books in the Rougon-Macquart series of twenty novels (!) to appreciate this book, however if you have read La Terre (The Earth) you will already like Jean for his general kindness and sensible nature. He is a sweet man who has an unlikely friendship with Maurice, the young radically-inclined soldier who ultimately joins the Commune. The introduction to my book was a bit heavy handed, (I suggest reading it after you've completed the novel since it gives all major plot points away) claiming that they represent the two "eternal sides of France", but there's a real human relationship here.

By today's standards this friendship would seem over the top and overly sentimental, but taken in the historical context it's quite a beautiful friendship. More than anything we get a sense of the senseless slaughter of a pointless war, the deep fraternal divisions it causes, and these are embodied in two very appealing characters, Jean and Maurice. Zola makes it clear that it makes sense, obviously, that Maurice would be furious and feel betrayed. I'm a pacifist, but if the invaders are at your door-which they literally were in this case-it's hard to know how you would feel.

On the other hand Jean's view is portrayed with sympathy-he's endured tremendous suffering due to this ridiculous war, and like Maurice he's shown tremendous bravery and courage, like so many Frenchmen did at that time (take that everyone who makes fun of the French tendency to surrender-I wish all of you had to read this book!) but he is an ordinary person who would like to get back to ordinary life-which really is a normal emotion to have. He also hates to see Paris burning-it's the epitome of craziness to him, and to us, even while we also see Maurice's view, that no one should care anymore, France is dead and defeated.

At the end, when Jean perseveres and goes on to build a new France, we're hopeful for him. But we can't help feeling the looming shadow of two World Wars to come, and it's also a sad book, reminding us of the vast physical and emotional wounds war leaves behind.

An absolute masterpiece!

Editorial Review:

Conservative and working-class, Jean Macquart is an experienced, middle-aged soldier in the French army, who has endured deep personal loss. When he first meets the wealthy and mercurial Maurice Levasseur, who never seems to have suffered, his hatred is immediate. But after they are thrown together during the disastrous Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71, the pair are compelled to understand one other. Forging a profound friendship, they must struggle together to endure a disorganised and brutal war, the savage destruction of France's Second Empire and the fall of Napoleon III. One of the greatest of all war novels, "The Debacle" is the nineteenth novel in Zola's great Rougon-Macquart cycle. A forceful and deeply moving tale of close friendship, it is also a fascinating chronicle of the events that were to lead, in the words of Zola himself, to the murder of a nation'.

The Conquest of Plassans (Rougon-Macquart)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The best book of the Rougon-Macquart series 5 out of 5 stars.
8 of 8 people found this review helpful.

FROM THE PUBLISHER
The Conquest of Plassans (Rougon-Macquart): The Rougon family, in M. Zola's narrative, rises to fortune, and the town of Plassans (really Aix-en-Provence) bows down before its power. But time passes, the revolt of the clergy supervenes, by their influence the town chooses a Royalist Marquis as deputy, and it becomes necessary to conquer it once again. ---Abbé Faujas, by whom this conquest is achieved on behalf of the Empire, is a strongly conceived character, perhaps the most real of all the priests that are scattered through M. Zola's books. No other priestly creation of M. Zola's pen vie with the stern, chaste, authoritative, ambitious Faujas, the man who subdues Plassans, and who wrecks the home of the Mouret family, with whom he lives. The book largely deals with the matter of 'the priest in the house,' and towards the end of the volume Mouret, the husband who has been driven mad and shut up in a lunatic asylum, returns home and wreaks the most terrible vengeance upon those who have wronged him. --- The pages which deal with the madman's escape and his horrible revenge are certainly among the most powerful that M. Zola has ever written, and have been commended for their effectiveness by several of his leading critics. --- (Ernest Alfred Vizetelly)

La Bête Humaine (Penguin Classics)

Émile Zola

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

A thriller with depth 4 out of 5 stars.
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.

In this book, Zola dives headlong into his fascination with "the human beast" by examining the psychology of murder. The novel is also a detailed portrait of the lives of railroad workers. The main character is Jacques Lantier, son of Gervaise Macquart (of L'Assomoir), a railroad engineer who works the line between Paris and Le Havre. Jacques feels a nagging compulsion to kill every woman he's attracted to. Fortunately, up to this point he has been able to control himself, but who knows how long he will be able to restrain the killer inside? Jacques is not the only character with murder on his mind; in fact, everyone in the book seems to be plotting to kill someone. Murder for love, murder for greed, murder for revenge are all represented. Zola has crammed so much violence and suspense into the plot, that on the surface he's written a fabulous piece of pulp fiction. Though the book pushes the boundaries of believability, it's also a fascinating study of human nature. The reader gains a window into the minds of the characters that reminds one of Poe's best tales. Underlying the criminal plot threads is a deeper level of social commentary, scientific inquiry, and philosophical debate. Zola shows how the rise of industrial technology contributes to the moral degeneration and dehumanization of the populace. He portrays Jacques' relationship with his engine as a symbiotic, almost romantic relationship. Meanwhile Jacques' Aunt Phasie and her family operate a crossing/switching station in the middle of nowhere, where their only interaction with the outside world comes in split-second views of nameless passengers being carted off to unknown destinations. While the railroad provides speed and convenience, it also generates social isolation and anonymity. Fans of Zola or readers of classical literature in general will certainly enjoy this book. Even fans of contemporary suspense fiction should find it entertaining and thought-provoking.

Editorial Review:

La Bete Humaine (1890), the seventeenth novel in the Rougon-Marcquart series, is one of Zola's most violent and explicit works. On one level a tale of murder, passion, and possession, it is also a compassionate study of individuals derailed by atavistic forces beyond their control. This new translation captures Zola's fast-paced yet deliberately dispassionate style, while the Introduction and detailed Notes place the novel in its social, historical, and literary context.

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( Z ) Books

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Emile Zola, Brian Nelson

Émile Zola

Emile Zola

Emile Zola

Émile Zola

Emile Zola

Émile Zola

Émile Zola

Émile Zola

Émile Zola