3rd Reading of Germinal by Émile Zola #Zoladdiction2024

❤ Time and again I have mentioned that Germinal is my all time favorite book. I haven't yet found any other which is as compelling and eloquently written as this Zola's chef-d'œuvre - magnum opus. This was my third read (listen, actually) of it, and I still hold on to my conviction, that Germinal is the most magnificent work I've ever read.

❤ Germinal is about the life and struggles of mining workers in a small town of Montsou, where Étienne Lantier (offspring of the Macquart line, with history of drunkards in the family), is looking for a job. He serves as the outsider's point of view of the local struggles (this is Zola's usual trope - a newcomer who changes or stirs the existing ground). Germinal has quite many facets of the story, the social injustice towards the working class; their hatred to the bourgeoisie; the struggles of the bourgeoisie - sandwiched between their inferior and superior of the "bosses" in Paris. It also touches on the socialism dream, and, of course, Zola's pet topic: naturalism.

❤ The strong point of Germinal lays in, as are with Zola's other books, his vivid narration of the landscape. You'd feel suffocated just by reading about the condition in the coal mine, hundred meters below the earth, which Zola brought to life through his magnificent research and detailed description. Another strong point is the eloquent prose with which he told this drama of human nature with its raw emotion. You'd feel the characters' anguish as if you are their kin.

❤ I think Germinal is one book that has to be read, not listened to. Either the audiobook I listened to uses edition with less qualified translation, or Zola's words are more eloquent read inside my head, rather than narrated. I don't blame the narrator, though, Leighton Pugh do a great job. I have listened to his narrating The Ladies Paradise, and really liked it. Germinal is just too eloquent to be narrated, that's what I think. Other than that, I think I wasn't supposed to read this book during my current mental condition. It conveys a huge amount of sorrows and helplessness (though with a little sparks of hope of brighter future in the end), and now just isn't a good time to read about these dark elements. Thus, I decided to give Germinal a rest for at least five or ten years before taking it again for the fourth time. Or maybe.... a great book is supposed to be read not more than twice, to preserve its magnificent quality? I don't know... 

Read this book for:

Zoladdiction 2024

The Miller's Daughter and Captain Burle by Émile Zola #Zoladdiction2024

Starting this year I will try to read more of Zola's short stories, as I have read all but one of the Rougon-Macquart series. For #Zoladdiction2024 I have read two stories, with mixed outcome.

THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER

🔷️ This one is set in a small French village of Rocreuse during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. Pere Merlier, the miller, is the mayor. He owns a picturesque Mill which he loves almost as much as his love for his daughter, Françoise. When the German troops entered their village, the French army picked the Mill as their fortress. It breaks Pere Merlier's heart while his beloved mill received shots after shots. Françoise' fiance, Dominique, is not a French; he came from Belgium. But he shoots the German to protect Françoise, and that's why the German captured him to be executed. I won't tell you the end, but it's quite suspenseful.

🔷️ But what made me fell in love with this story is Zola picturesque description of the Mill and its surrounding. I imagine he really found that beautiful corner, and captured it just as a painter would paint it, Zola painted it using his pen as brush. And he presented that artful and poignant suspenseful story in just 40-ish pages. Just amazing! Writers... that's how you do a short story!

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐


CAPTAIN BURLE

🔷️ Compared to the above first story, this one is, unfortunately, rather flat though quite interesting, and of a different vibe. Captain Burle had had a brilliant military career before he resigned to do administration job as a Quartermaster. But one thing never changes, his nickname is "Petticoat Burle" and women is his weakness.

🔷️ Major Laguitte has served under Captain Burle and maintained a friendly terms with the family. He witnessed how the Captain was more and more captivated by the widowed owner of a "cafe". Then one day he found discrepancies in the Captain's bookkeeping. And that would be the downfall of the honor of the family's name as well as the army's. Something must be done, but what?

🔷️ This story talks about respect, honor, dignity, and friendship; expectation as well as disappointment. Madame Burle, who had high expectation of her son to marv on military career, was hugely disappointed, and so she put her efforts into making her grandson Charles - a tender child - to be what his father failed. Poor Charles! I really admired Laguitte's loyalty to the Burles. And Zola really excelled in manipulating emotions in each character. Not a bad story, but not as poignant as I have expected.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐1/2

Six Books Saturday #8: Favorite Émile Zola's Books

#SixBooksSaturday is my personal monthly bookish meme, inspired by Six Words Saturday, which I've stumbled upon @ Travel with Intent. It's basically to list six books of random category, which I'd decided on the spot. Anything is possible according to my whim. I post Six Books Saturday on last Saturday of each month. If you're interested, you are, of course, welcomed to join me. There's no rule, really. You can post six anything about books.

As Zoladdiction 2024 will begin in two days, it's more than appropriate, methink, to soft-kicking it off by sharing some of my favorites from the Rougon-Macquart cycle. I have read all but one from the series (I couldn't get through with Doctor Pascal - yet) - and even read some of them more than once. So, without further ado, here's my...

SIX FAVORITES FROM ÉMILE ZOLA

1. Germinal

I might have said this over and over again, that Germinal is my all time favorite - not only of Zola, but of all. It has all the elements of what a good book is supposed to be. Here's my first and second review. I'm currently listening to the audiobook for Zoladdiction, let's see what I'll think of Germinal after the third read!

2. L'Assommoir

This one is the most mind-blowing for me. Maybe because it was my first introduction to the Rougon-Macquart. But L'Assommoir is also the most picturesque in the series.

3. La Bete Humaine

Another picturesque book from Zola's bibliography, so vivid and beautiful! And it is dear to me especially since is talks about kind and evil in human being, a topic which I have interest in. Here are some posts which I have dedicated for this book.

4. The Conquest of Plassans

Another masterpiece from Zola, with a surprising twist in the end and a great momentum building. My review.

5. The Ladies Paradise

Who would have thought that Zola would write something with a love story, and a happy ending? Yes, a happy ending - a rare occurrence if you read Zola's. It is the lightest of the Rougon-Macquart and actually quite a fun read! Review of my second reading (listening from the audiobook).

6. The Fortunes of the Rougons

It's the first of the series/cycle, and you know how it usually is - laying the background, foundation, and all. It is also a remarkably entertaining story with various plots following several characters. Some of them would also appear in later books. I have read it first in 2015, then reread it in 2020.


Have you read any of them? Which one is your favorite? If you haven't, which one would you like to read first? You can join us in Zoladdiction 2024 and read it to celebrate Zola's birthday!


Next Six Books Saturday: 27th April 2024.

The Ladies' Paradise by Émile Zola: A Reread from Audiobook

👗The Ladies' Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames) is one of my favorites from Zola. It is less "raw" than the others in Rougon-Macquart cycle, so obviously, more cheerful. In this second reading, I realized that this book is the one where Darwinism struggle for existence is most strongly applied.

👗 Ladies' Paradise is the first department store in Paris (inspired by Le Bon Marché). It was first founded by Madame Hédouin (told in previous novel in Rougon-Macquart novel - which I didn't review - Pot-Bouille), where Octave Mouret has worked as a salesman. He was a charming womanizer, and at the end of Pot-Bouille, he married the widowed Madame Hédouin.

👗 The Ladies' Paradise begins a few years after Madame Hédouin died, leaving the store to Mouret. Besides being charming, Mouret was, apparently, a visionary and innovative business man. Under his management, Ladies' Paradise doubled its capital in a short time. Mouret's key formula was by 'tickling' women's senses and greedy desires, which was achieved through colossal artistic displays, enormous mass gatherings, sensational promotions, and generous discounts.

👗 I could imagine how fascinating it was for the Parisian women. A glamorous building, the adrenaline rush seeing the crowds (let's get those silks before the others take all!), then the beautiful colorful arrangements which makes one buy what she doesn't need. And the cheap prices too! It's enough to lure any woman to buy impulsively.

👗Moreover, Mouret strategically placed relatable departments far away from each other. It makes one who needs a dress and a coat, for instance, after buying the dress, must pass furniture, haberdashery, and children departments, before she could reach coat department. It resulted that she might be tempted to buy also a lamp, buttons, and a cute jacket for her daughter, which she didn't plan at all.

👗 Mouret could run those schemes at all because he knew women's character perfectly. Or he thought he knew, until Denise Baudu, a plain country girl who's just arrived in Paris to work, entered his life. His life changed (for the better) when he fell in love with Denise. Now, Denise is an extraordinary character - I have written about her character - she's nothing like common working-class girl, and her dignity surpasses those of bourgeois ladies. Moreover, Denise is intelligent and as visionary as - but more kindhearted than - Mouret. I imagine, if they join forces in the management, the Ladies' Paradise would become a truly formidable establishment!

👗 However, while the Ladies' Paradise enjoys its phenomenal success, many conventional shop keepers in Paris suffered from huge loss. They lost their customers because they couldn't compete with the department store, and many ended up with bankruptcy, or even ruined. This is where the Darwinism struggle of existence theme becomes relevant. These bourgeois have been used to just provide the clothing items on their store and sit relaxed behind the counters; customers would automatically come through their doors. When a rival came, they were indignant; lamenting, even cursing, but did nothing. Some, perhaps, couldn't do anything to compete with Ladies' Paradise, but few of them weren't as hopeless as they've thought. Monsieur Bourras, the umbrella shop owner, for example, could have done something to rescue his business, as I have suggested in previous post. It was, indeed, the struggle of existence - only the fittest would win.

👗 For this second read, I listened from an audiobook, narrated by Leighton Pugh. I'm glad I've done that, because the listening has enhanced Zola's picturesque description of the Ladies' Paradise to another level. Reading from printed copy might have been a bit boring (Zola's descriptions can often be dragging on and on!) But by listening, it surprisingly provided a vivid portrays of the scenes. Far from boring, I enjoyed it imenesely like I were visiting the department store myself. It was very rewarding!

👗 Finally, there is the love story of Mouret and Denise - the only romantic story you would find from Zola's Rougon-Macquart! On the whole, it has been a very satisfying reading!

Rating: 5 / 5

If I were Old Bourras in Émile Zola's The Ladies’ Paradise [Re-posting]

Le Bon Marche by Felix Valloton
The Parisian store which inspired The Ladies' Paradise

This is a post I've published years ago, when reading The Ladies' Paradise for the first time (unfortunately I didn't review it at that time). Now I'm rereading it, this post came back to me, and I thought it quite proper to re-post it.

=======

Reading Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise gives me certain excitement which I have never encountered before from Rougon-Macquart series that I have read so far—it is the business aspect. The growing expansion of Octave Mouret’s first modern department store in Paris has awakened my own business instinct which has grown from my more-than-twenty-years (update: now thirty) of working in trading business.

This is not a proper review of the book (for I am still half through it at the moment), but I was intrigued to give my personal advice to one of the shop owners whose business is threaten to be ruined by the ever expanding Ladies’ Paradise.

Old Bourras owns an umbrella shop. He used to have employees worked for him, and his specialty is carving the handle-knob with artistic subjects, which, I believe, gives his umbrellas a personal touch. But then Ladies’ Paradise opened its umbrella and sunshade department, selling umbrellas in much cheaper prices, and stealing Bourras’ loyal customers away. It gave old Bourras a terrible blow, but, does it really have to end that way? I personally do not think so.

If I were in Bourras’ place—instead of spending my passion and energy with condemning the department store, or by wasting my capital to compete with it—I would offer an attractive scheme of partnership to Mouret. I would persuade Mouret to sell my umbrellas IN his department store. Oh, Mouret would certainly laugh at me... at first:

Mouret: “What? Buying umbrellas from you, while I could buy from our manufacturers in larger quantity and with much cheaper price? How do you think your umbrellas could compete with ours?”

But I would calmly smile to him, and say: Me: “Of course not, sir. I know I won’t be able to compete with your big store, if I sell the SAME umbrellas as yours.”

Mouret (still chuckles): “What do you mean? Umbrella is umbrella; people buy it to shade themselves from sunlight or rain. If they could get ours cheaper, why on earth would they pick yours?”

Me: “But what I am offering you now, sir, is not the same product that you are selling in one of your departments.”

Mouret (his business instinct being awaken): “Go on...”

Me: “You see, sir, I am more an artist than a businessman. You might say that I sell umbrellas, but for me, these umbrellas are my artworks. I love carving, and it gives me utmost happiness to sit in my quiet shop, carving the handles with beautiful subjects: flowers, animals, fruits, etc. I’m happy to see that my customers love them, and it gives them satisfaction, knowing that their umbrellas were carved specially for them. And, of course, in the end it gives me money to buy my bread and lodging.”

Mouret: “So, you were saying that…”

Me: “Yes. I am offering you a new concept of umbrella. It’s not just means of shading one from sun and rain. Umbrella can be a fashionable item. Just imagine a luxury umbrella with finely carved ivory handle and elegant design, in the hand of a charming lady on a rainy day outside The Opera. The lady’s friends would have adored it, and the lady would answer proudly: ‘Oh, I have ordered it at The Ladies’ Paradise the other day. They allow us to choose our own design, you know, and pick our own subject to be carved on the handle!’ And soon enough, these ladies will queue up to order such elegant personalized umbrellas at your store, sir!”

Mouret (now quite bought up by the idea): “But how can I be sure that you won’t sell it with cheaper price to other stores, or even worse, directly to my customers?”

Me: “I am ready to grant you an exclusive right to sell my umbrellas at whatever price you believe is most profitable, if you consent to appoint me as your sole supplier, and buy my products at reasonable price. I put my trust on your lawyer, sir, to issue the contract which I would be proud to sign to bind our partnership.”

Mouret (amazed and curious): “Do you realize, M. Bourras, that if we had this partnership as your idea, your income will not significantly improve? Because producing personalized goods is different from mass production. In the end, your business will not profit much more than it is now. It would certainly profit The Ladies' Paradise, but what will it do for you?”

Me: “Dear M. Mouret, I have told you earlier, that I am no businessman. With this partnership, I will earn enough money for my business to keep going, and a humble living for myself. But mostly I will have pleasures from making beautiful umbrellas. It’s all what I need in this world.

So…. do we have a deal?”

-----------

In a new turbulence era, we better face the changes with open mind. It is good to keep our principles, but do not let it bar our judgment. Creativity is the key, and always find a win-win solution! When a huge power dominates our society (in this case capitalism), don’t fight back! Or else it will crush you mercilessly. Open mind and creativity will give us better bargaining position.

If only I can get into the story, and give my advice to old Bourras! But then…. It will alter the story. And considering what Zola wanted to say with his Rougon-Macquart series, I think I’d better return to my book and enjoy it. Pardon, Monsieur Zola, for indulging my imagination for a moment in this post! J

==========

What do you think?

For a Night of Love by Émile Zola

💜 For a Night of Love is a collection of three stories with one similar theme: love. But, this is from Zola, so don't expect anything romantic - it's far from it! 😄

💜 Title of this collection is lent by the first story, which is also the longest - it might have been between short story and novella: For a Night of Love (Pour une nuit d’amour). It tells a story of a shy and unattractive young post office clerk, Julien, who lives in a small flat, and loves to play tunes in his flute. Opposite his flat is a large building occupied by a wealthy family with a beautiful daughter. Julien often watches her from his window, plays his flute for her, and eventually falls in love with the girl. But the girl, Thérèse, usually ignores him. One day she throws him kisses from her window, and summons him to come; not out of love, apparently, but to help her getting rid of the dead body of her lover.

💜 This first story sets the tone of the whole book - or at least the first two stories - which is the excessive crave to be loved.

💜 Nantas is the title of the second story, but also the name of its protagonist. He's a poor but intelligent young man with huge ambition, who comes to Paris to reach his dream, but desperately unsuccessful. On the brink of committing suicide, someone offers him a huge sum of money to marry a prominent young girl who is pregnant from a married man. He accepts the "business proposal", makes himself the most powerful man in France, but is unhappy because his wife doesn't return the love he eventually comes to feel for her. This one is my favorite from the the three stories. It is written superbly, and the ending is quite unpredictable.

💜 The last story is rather anticlimactic and rather out of theme. Fasting is about religion hypocrisies. In a church, a baroness seems to be fascinated while listening to her favorite priest's sermon about fasting - except that she is struggling to stay awake. The priest, on the other hand, seems to be preaching earnestly about fasting - except that all he's thinking all the while is going to a concert and having dinner with a countess. It's rather a funny satire, which talks nothing of love. Or, maybe, this whole thing is not meant to be about romantic love after all, but more about unsatiable desire, Zola's main topic in most of his other books.

💜 I am never a fan of short stories, as I always find them lacking of depth. They are usually sharp, yes, but it's like when a thorn is pricking your finger - you definitely feel the pain, but an hour later you won't feel anything, and would completely forget the incident. Though I appreciate Zola's brilliant writing in this collection, I still think his novels are much better.

Rating: 3,5 / 5

A Biography of Émile Zola by Alan Schom

This is the second Zola's biography I've ever read - the first being F.W.J. Hemmings's The Life and Times of Émile Zola - and I'm glad I had picked it. I found it more comprehensive, that, after finishing the book, I felt like I knew Zola more intimately than I've ever had. While quite familiar with his history (his genius civil engineer father's death when Zola was 7 y.o., the family's poverty and struggle in Paris, Zola's failure in Baccalaureate test, etc) from Hemmings', and his involvement (and even exile) in the Dreyfus Affair from Michael Rosen's The Disappeaance of Émile Zola, I've never been intimately "acquainted" with him, in terms of his personal character, his views, or love life, which this book amply provides. Here are some interesting bits I've gathered along the reading:

✔ François Zola (Zola's father) has been involved in "temporary disappearance of 1500 francs of regimental funds" while serving with the Foreign Legion in Algeria. The incident was later brought by Zola's enemies in Dreyfus Affair, in order to defame him. However, Schom argued that it is more likely that the money fraud was caused by François Zola's careless bookkeeping, instead of intentionally. Nonetheless, it's one of the many causes of Zola's depressions during the Affair.

✔ The 19 year Zola dreamed of finding a true love with a "good angel" - tender, kind, loving woman - and worried that he'd never find one. However, his first and only marriage with Alexandrine (neé Gabrielle) was loveless, and only out of convenience. Zola needed a practical woman to support him as writer, while Alexandrine needed security and honorable position. Only in his later life, did Zola meet his true love and his dream woman in Jeanne Rozerot, who gave him two children and the comfort of family life to the middle agwd and lonesome Zola.

✔ Zola was a hardworking man. Though he was forced to take a clerical job for a living in his early 20s, he still managed to write. Then, a small inheritance from a deceased grandfather helped him to choose journalism as his main job, paving his way to financial freedom to pursue his dream of writing fiction. And after he became a successful writer, Zola still worked hard, often working on more than one task at a time, that he sometimes must engage his friends to do researches for him, so that Zola later could use their notes as his writing material.

✔ Do you know that Zola was quite a successful librettist? His earlier career as playwright might be quite disastrous, but later on his L'Assommoir has been staged as a successful play. But his best achievement in theater was perhaps his collaboration with Alfret Bruneau, the French composer. Zola provided some of his works for Bruneau's operas, and he even acted as librettist for at least two operas: Messidor (1897) and L'Ouragan (1901).

✔ I'm familiar with the fact that L'Assommoir was Zola's first successful book, that launched his career as a respected writer in France. But La Debacle was in fact his most successful and best selling book. Even Nana has surpassed L'Assommoir in sales number!

✔ As a human being, Zola is actually a sensitif, patient, loyal, persistent, and generous man. He strongly held on his principles (truth and justice), never hesitate to sacrifice his comfort to fight injustice. But he could also be indecisive, especially when it comes to his marriage. Schom criticized Zola for never divorcing Alexandrine and marrying Jeanne, as the triangle love later proved to bring sorrow for all parties. But I think Zola was too kind and loyal to leave Alexandrine, who has supported him through their ups and downs, though he could hardly stand Alexandrine's emotional temper and headstrong. He also proved to be loyal to his whiny and parasitic friend: Henry Céard. But only in Alfred Bruneau, I guess, that Zola found a true friend with mutual affection and respect.

✔ From Zola's portrayal of the Jews in L'Argent (Money), Schom concluded that Zola was anti-semitic, though later he would change his views while defending Alfred Dreyfus (why, though? This isn't in accordance with his consistency). I personally didn't see Zola as particularly anti-semitic. His portrayal is only describing characteristic of Jews as he might have seen or known, just like in his portrayal of priests in The Sin of Abbé Mouret. Did he hate priests or Jews in particular? Not necessarily, he's just presenting the facts - whether he liked it or not.

There are still a lot of small bits about Zola which I could not write all here. You simply must read the book to understand more about Zola as a person. Had I lived in 19th century France, I would have honoured to be one of his friends, or better still, his protegés (for he's so generous towards them, always encourage them to be successful). All in all, Émile Zola is an amiable human being, when he's not depressed or indecisive. And I'm so grateful to Alan Schom to have written this biography in so intimate and personal way.

As a bonus, here's from Denise's memory (Zola's daughter) - the last time Jeanne and the children were to see Zola alive - and it's so heartbreaking!

"On 27 September, he [Zola] came to Verneuil to kiss us goodbye, and we were all to return [separately] to Paris the following day. I no longer remember why, but we did not accompany him, as we usually did, to within a few hundred feet of his house, going via the village streets where, so often during the [Dreyfus] Affair, women would throw their dirty dish water over us as we were passing. Now, instead, we stood at the front door, watching him walk away, turning to look at us once more, and then continuing, finally disappearing round the corner."

Rating: 5 / 5

The Sin of Abbé Mouret by Émile Zola [Second Read]

I read The Sin of Abbé Mouret for the first time three years ago, in Zoladdiction 2018. If you want to know what the story's about, you can click the link above, which will bring you to my first posts of the book. On this second post, therefore, I will talk less about the story, but dig deeper onto the nature-vs-church theme, and Zola's own aim on writing this book.

Only on this second read did I see how this book plays an important role on Zola's Naturalism. If you are curious about Naturalism as literary movement, this book will throw you some lights. Naturalists hold on the power of Nature as supreme, and distrust any institution that (they think) restrain it - Church (and religion) is one of these, though I don't see why they thought so, while the Bible (Book of Genesis) says that men are created by God to manage the earth and everything in it. Of course I realize that the 19th century Catholic Church held different views from our modern Church (maybe after the Second Vatican Council in 1962? - I'm not sure - but I know that the Council did bring huge change on the Church). Nature and Church should not have been separated.

Zola's hatred of clerics
I think Zola's hatred of Church might have been, first, triggered by its clerics. There are two kinds of clerics in this book: The pious, calm Abbé Serge Mouret who denounces physical pleasure which he believes hindering him to the utmost communion with God; and the coarse, hypocrite, cruel Brother Archangias with his love of worldly pleasure, and hatred of women. Did Zola make Abbé Mouret "triumphed" over temptation and sin at the end as a warning to the Church of France? That it should be concerning its "own business", i.e. religion and morality, rather than interfering in politics and state business?

Zola's second reason of hating priests is perhaps related to his believes in procreation and fertility. He hated celibacy and might regard it as unnatural. But I think he's overreacting here. How many priests were there compared to the whole population? So what if few of them chose celibacy? It won't make any significant change...

What I still didn't get is, if Zola disliked the Church that much, why did he make it triumphed in the end? Abbé Mouret finally conquered his weaknesses, Albine was chocked to death by the nature, and the church, though in dilapidated condition, was still intact. Again, this book might have served as a warning to France, because Zola believed that the Church was opposed to procreation and science (and therefore against nature), so naturally it should or will one day crumble. It shows how Zola, despite his meticulous researches on the Church (the Sacrament, rituals, devotion, etc.), and his vivid portrayal of Abbé Mouret's spiritual struggles (you'd think he experienced it himself); he understood nothing about religion, or particularly, Catholicism. It's a shame that one so genius in writing, could not or refused to see beyond his own principles. I mean, one can disagree with some views other than one's belief, but at least one should tolerate others who believe in it.

Ironically, Zola's vivid portrayal of Serge's spiritual journey has been a sort of inspiration for me. It reminds me to never be proud of my spiritual "achievement" (whatever it is), since we will never be free of temptation. The more we think we are holy/pious, the bigger be the risk of temptation. And that's what made me love Zola. His principles might be far different from mine, but he's so dedicated to his writing, that he could inspire others to hold on a principle that is the very opposite of what he might originally want to aim. If I hadn't known Zola, and this is my first book of his, I might have thought he's a devout Catholic!

So how do I think about The Sin of Abbé Mouret after the second read? Let me see...
- The neverending description of the Mass is boring! It feels like after compiling tons of information about it, Zola'd thought: 'I might as well use it all - not gonna wasting my efforts!' - I am a devout Catholic, but reading it all like encyclopedia is really tedious.
- Abbé Mouret's spiritual journey to true repentance is inspiring.
- This is the best story that explains Naturalism as a movement.

After weighing all aspects, here is my final rating (and thus changed my previous) : 3,5 / 5

The Conquest of Plassans by Émile Zola (second read)

Since this is my second read, I won't write much on what the story is about - this you can read in my first review of The Conquest of Plassans from 2017. To be honest, I forgot how powerful this books is; I only vaguely remember the petty little town politics. So now I will discuss more about the political background and how it awakened the hereditary madness of the characters, which would otherwise have been tamed in its slumbers.

Abbe Faujas came from Bésançon with mysterious background. The mystery is never clearly revealed throughout the book, and that just emphasizes the faux of the priest (see how Zola named him Faujas on purpose?) He was sent specifically to Plassans by "Paris" to conquer the little town. Why Plassans? Who is this "Paris" actually meant? And why did he stay particularly ar the Mourets?

We know from The Fortune of the Rougons that Pierre and Felicité Rougons have conquered Plassans with the aid of their son Eugène, who was an important person in the Louis Phillipe's government of the Second Empire of France. Though the resurrection has been successfully uprooted from the town, the Emperor wants to have a clean sheet, especially from the Legitimists. It's nearly the election time, and it's crucial that whoever elected would be a Bonapartist supporter. By appointing Abbè Faujas as the conqueror, Zola wanted also to criticize clerical hypocrisy and involvement in the French politics at that time.

Who is Faujas' "master" from Paris? It's not clear at first; Faujas' arrival seems very innocent as a priest in a religious little town like Plassans. But it's soon clear that Felicité Rougon has been appointed by "Paris" to aid the abbé to perform his task. So, we can safely conclude that "a friend from Paris" which Felicitè alluded is most probably his son Eugène!

Plassans here served as a miniature of the Second Empire's political life in France. The petit bourgeois, the retired businessmen like François Mouret, have the most vague loyalty in their political views. They use politics rather to serve their own personal interest than to support any leader or ideology. They can easily switch from one party to another if it's more profitable for them.

But why an Abbé, in the first place? Here, Eugène (or Felicité? Or both?) has clearly done their homework. They know how difficult it would be to sway the bourgeois political views, so why not send a charismatic priest to impress the religious wives first? They would, in turn, influence their husbands to trust the abbé much more easily. First woman to be conquered? Marthe Mouret! - a not very religious woman, and wife of a retired oil businessman with neutral political view: François Mouret - whose house is situated in the middle of two important figure of Plassans with opposite views. Excellent!

Speaking about hereditary illness, Marthe is Pierre Rougons' daughter who was married by François Mouret - the son of Ursule Macquart and Mouret the hatter. François was Pierre's clerk - a quiet, sensible, diligent chap - who helped him in the oil and wine business, but then married the boss's daughter and built his own business. Born from the Rougon side, and having an intelligent and strong woman like Felicité as a mother, you would think Marthe will hardly catch the hereditary illness. François is more likely to catch it as he's half Macquart - though he's more of a Mouret with his love of works. But, here, Zola showed that you can't really avoid it. It's there inside you, even if you don't really realize it. Marthe would have been alright had she continues living harmoniously, peacefully, surrounded by her family, like in the opening chapter:

"There was an absorbed silence, warm with an unspoken tenderness in the pleasant golden glow of the sun that, little by little, was fading from the terrace. Marthe cast a loving look over all her three children n the calm of the evening, and plied her needle with long, regular strokes."

There's the air of satisfying existence - enjoying the deserved retirement after long hardworking. Had the Mourets maintain this stability in the house, they would very likely have retired happily. However, one bad decision of renting their second floor to a priest, had plunged them to "the fall of the house of Mouret"!

I was disgusted when I realized that it's Felicité who has brought ruin to her own daughter by placing Abbé Faujas at her house. It might be unintentional at first, but when she saw Marthe's passionate, feverish religious devotion, how could she not see something wrong? Or maybe she thought it's actually directed to Faujas, and it's better than her son-in-law? Whichever it may be, it only proves that Marthe did inherit the family illness - the insatiable desire, and it gets from bad to worse once it is provoked. While in François' case... well, that's an unimaginable crime to put... oh I can't even say it - it's too horrible. I'm half glad that Macquart did what he did in the end.

Should we even talk about the ending?? What was Zola implying by it? Devil clothed in cassock? What an ending, indeed!

Rating: 5/5

The Belly of Paris by Émile Zola [second read]

The third novel of the The Rougon-Macquart cycle introduced us to another field in the modernization of Paris brought by the Second Empire: the newly built great central market of Les Halles.

The leading character is Florent Quenu. He is the brother in law of Lisa Macquart (the eldest child of Antoine Macquart). Lisa's husband is Florent's younger brother: Quenu. The couple married and run a charcuterie business. Florent is an escaped convict from Cayenne (Devil's Island), as he was found by the gendarmes in a "suspicious manner" during the December 1851 coup d'état. Though he's innocent, he's deported nevertheless to Cayenne. Now he returned to Paris, thin and haggard, found for the first time by Madame François, a gardener who sells her vegetables on the pavement outside Les Halles.

The Quenus received Florent in their house, concealing his origin as Madame Quenu's cousin. Florent soon got a job as Inspector of the fish market. He began to feel overwhelmed by the vastness of Les Halles, and felt entrapped and drown by its abundance of food. He, the Thin man, felt lost and disgusted amidst the excessive food provided for the Fat (the bourgeoise), particularly at the Quenu's charcuterie. Zola portrayed the vastness of Les Halles as that of a cathedral, a town, and even a forest:

"Then they turned into another covered avenue, which was almost deserted, and where their footsteps echoed as though in the vault of an empty church."

"As they turned into the broad central avenue, he imagined himself in some foreign town, with its various districts, suburbs, villages, walks and streets, squares and intersections..."

"And high above this phantom town, stretching far away into the darkness, there appeared to be a mass of luxuriant vegetation, a monstrous jungle of metal, with spindle-shaped stems and knotted branches, covering the vast expanse as with the delicate foliage of some ancient forest."

Florent then succumbed to his old republican ideas, after mingling with Gavard and his "political friends". They were designing a resurrection in Paris. Florent, who were already disliked by the fishwives (the stall holders in the fish market), now brought a threat to the Quenus household by his political views. And that's why he must be get rid of. Who's gonna win in the end - the Fat or the Thin? Of course you already know the answer to this.

Les Halles, which is called the belly of Paris, symbolizes the excess of food (luxury) to fulfill the bourgeoise insatiable appetite during the Second Empire. Claude Lantier, a painter, Lisa's nephew (later appeared in The Masterpiece) voiced Zola's views on this subject. He loved to capture the beauty of fresh produce displayed at the market, but on the other hand, he hated the idea that the abundance of food would be swallowed by "those bourgeois bastards", as Claude called it. 

He further invented the irony of the Fat and the Thin. The Fat represents the middle class or bourgeoisie with their passion of luxury, while the Thin is the poor working class. But Claude made an exception for Madame François, who lived modestly and happily in the village, who, according to Claude, doesn't belong to either category. So, I guess, the moniker Fat and Thin works only for the middle class with insatiable desire for luxury, and the working class who dream to get rich, or those with hate, bitterness, envy towards the bourgeois. Florent, Gavard, and Claude are definitely the Thins, but not Madame François. On the other hand, the fishwives with their ambitions are the Fats. 

But the Quenus should have been excluded, because they live contentedly from their own business (which they worked on diligently), never doing harm to others. Their treatment towards Florent in the end is justified, because he is plotting to cause chaos in the neighborhood. The Quenus has received him in their house, even offering him half of Gradelle's money. But Florent, the ungrateful dreamer, had the audacity to plan the revolution from inside the house! He never even thought about what trouble he would bring to his brother. See.. the Thin is equally dangerous for France as is the Fat! If I were in Lisa's position, I would do exactly what she had done.

To sum up, Zola's "treatment" towards Lisa is the only negative point I granted this book. I had enjoyed the reading immensely, and loved every minute of it, especially the daily activities of the fish market and the charcuterie - the fishwives' intrigues, the competition of La Belle Lisa and La Belle Normande. Lisa Quenu has become one of my favorite characters of the Rougon-Macquart, because of her sensibility and intelligence.

Rating: 4,5 / 5

The Belly of Paris Ch. 1: Les Halles and What It Represents

I am currently reading The Belly of Paris (Le Ventre de Paris) as part of my The Rougon-Macquart Project. It's a reread, actually, but I guess I didn't quite captured the book essence on first read, and so is quite astonished to find so many interesting things in only first chapter. So, I might do these chapter posts throughout this book, or maybe it's on this chapter only, who knows? Anyway, here's my random thoughts on chapter one.

= The recurrent themes

The opening line struck me that apparently Zola liked to open his narrative with two themes:

First, the contrast between procession and unmoved inhuman things. As was with The Kill (with congestion of carriages leaving Bois de Boulogne), The Belly of Paris, too, is opened with carts of fruits and vegetables heading to Les Halles (the central food market) in slow procession: "Through the deep silence of the deserted avenue, the carts made their way towards Paris, the rhythmic jolting of the wheels echoing against the fronts of the sleeping houses on both sides of the road, behind the dim shapes of elm." It seems to point out how the corrupt society is dragging the nation towards destruction.

Second, a stranger coming into and then installed onto an existing community (Étienne Lantier to the mine pit in Germinal, Octave Mouret to the department store in The Ladies Paradise, and now Florent to Les Halles).

= Two histories

Les Halles is a symbol of modernism (and the consequences) the Second Empire has brought to Paris in 19th century. Les Halles was a vast structure of twelve pavilions made with iron and glass in the avant-garde architecture, built by Victor Baltard in 1850s. Each pavilion housed different market of foods: fish and poultry, fruit, herbs, and vegetables, flower, meat, butter and cheese, tripe, game, etc. It was located in the district of Le Cimetière des Innocents (Holy Innocents Cemetery), which was decommissioned, and the bones was transferred to the Catacombes, before being replaced by the herbs and vegetables market in 1787.

There were two groups of markets at Les Halles. The stall holders sell their products within the pavilions, while smaller vendors installed their pitches on the pavement around the pavilions, paying lower tax than the stall holders. It was finally demolished in 1971, and nowadays becomes Forum Des Halles, an underground shopping center connected with an underground lines and metro transit.

Following the lead of The Fortune of the Rougons, Florent Quenu, the protagonist, is a Republican who was deported to Cayenne (Devil's Island) after the Louis-Napoleon coup d'état (December 1851). After his escape from Cayenne, he went to Dutch Guiana for several years, before plucking enough courage to return to Paris.

= Cathedral and forest

Brian Nelson, a prominent Zola expert and translator of the Oxford World Classic edition I'm reading, wrote in the explanatory notes, that Zola has suggested that Les Halles are the cathedral of modern life: "He aimed explicitly to play on Victor Hugo's famous novel Notre-Dame de Paris."

What the cathedral represents, then? Is it the hugeness, unreachable, overwhelming (or even oppressive) of the modernization of Paris, that engulfed the working classes? "...the gigantic size of Les Halles, whose heavy breathing - the result of the excesses of the day before."

Zola even made one of the characters (which has not appeared yet on chapter one) as the Quasimodo of Les Halles. Interesting, eh? Nelson also suggested that Zola associated the image of forest with that of a cathedral. "The shadows, in the hollows of the roof, seemed to make the forest of pillars even bigger, and multiply to infinity the delicate ribs, fretted galleries, and transparent shutters. [..] there appeared to be a mass of luxuriant vegetation, a monstrous jungle of metal, with spindle-shaped stems and knotted branches, covering the vast expanse as with the delicate foliage of some ancient forest." That threw new lights on the forest in The Sin of Abbe Mouret... but that's of another book.

= Florent and the excess of food

The character of Florent provided Zola with an unmistakable irony of a thin, haggard, starving man who is entrapped in the midst of overflowing foods in Les Halles. Combining it with his fear that the government will find and catch him, made him the perfect embodiment of the excessive luxury and pleasure of the bourgeoisie, while the working class are struggling with poverty, slum, and injustices.

Claude Lantier made his first appearance in this book, before appearing in as main protagonist in The Masterpiece. He is reflecting Cezanne (physically), and Zola in his enthusiasm and views towards Les Halles. With his painter's eyes, Claude sees Les Halles as a beautiful landscape subject with beautiful colors, however with his heart, he condemns how the nature is abused to serve the uncontrollable appetite of the bourgeoisie: "Those bourgeois bastard eat it all."

That's all I've got from chapter one. I am now in the middle of chapter two, which was picturing the busy, noisy life of Les Halles. Let's see where it would bring us...

The Kill by Émile Zola [second read]

The original title of this second novel in The Rougon-Macquart cycle is La Curée, a hunting term which means the part of an animal thrown to the hounds who have run it down to the ground. Set directly after The Fortune of the Rougons, it tells the story of Aristide Rougon, the unsuccessful local journalist, greedy and money lover, who moves to Paris following his brother Eugène. In his work as a clerk, he learns much about huge reconstruction of Paris about to take place (the real Hausmannization in 1850-1860). He is impatient to take his dream and plans into action, but doesn't possess the capital. Madam Sidonie, the fourth children of Pierre Rougon and Félicité Puech, offers a solution: marrying a pregnant bourgeois girl named Renée, who is desperately seeking a "salvation" to avoid scandal. The "deal" takes place even when Aristide's wife: Angèl is dying. With the dowry from his wife, and support from the Minister - his brother Eugène, he shakes himself from his Plassans origin by assuming a new name: Aristide Saccard, and is now ready to emerge to high society.

We can see from ì, that Aristide possesses a good business instinct. Now he shows it its fullness in his capacity as real estate speculator. From his inside knowledge of the reconstruction, he knows which houses is going to be demolished to be replaced with new boulevards. He buys them cheap, then buys them back through numerous false transactions done by his agent, each time with higher price. When the city is ready to give compensation to the present owner (Saccard), the house values will be much higher than it should be, and 'gold will be pouring down' into Saccard's mansion.

Renée comes from an "old bourgeois" family, and has spent most of her life in a convent. She inherites a family home, over which Saccard knows would be build a boulevard. After marrying Saccard, Renée plunges into the society of nouveau riches of Second Empire of France with its immoral and corrupted way of life. And this is where the term la curée becomes relevant. Renée strongly rejects Saccard's proposal to part with the mansion . So in order to get it, Saccard spoils her with expensive mansion, dresses, and jewelry, and made her drunk with luxury. Every time Renée needs money, Saccard would give it her with pleasure, but asks her to sign promisory notes in return.

After having all the pleasure (including lovers) the society provide, Renée becomes bored, and longed for a new invented kind of pleasure. She finds it in Maxime, her stepson (Saccard and Angèl's only son), an androgynous young man who lives with his father and stepmother. The two soon begin an incestuous relationship, and thus Renée put herself deeper into sinful existence.

However, Saccard has another plan for his son: marrying him to Louise de Mareuil, to get into a huge dowry and higher place in society. Maxime, who gets bored to Renée's obsessive clutch of him, sees a way out by agreeing the marriage. In the attempt to run away with Maxime, Renée finally signed the deeds to her family home (planning to take the cash by herself to pay the journey), but Saccard caught the couple kissing, and took the signed deeds in triumph; stripping Renée, in the end, of happiness and luxury, amidst the pain realization of her sin. Thus Renée - symbolizes individual citizens of France - becomes the part of the animal which was won by the hounds (Saccard and Maxime, who symbolizes the nouveau riches society of the Second Empire).

I think The Kill is placed right after The Fortune not without reason. It presents the clearest and complete picture of the Second Empire's moral-corrupted society:
=Excessive luxury and pleasure
=Collapsing of family structure, changed into commercial ("The idea of a family was replaced for [the Saccards] by the notion of a sort of investment company where the profits are shared equally" ~ p.104)
=General crisis of identification and gender deviance (Maxime the man-woman whom Renée likes to dress as girl; Maxime "had taken [Renée] for a boy" before having sex in the hothouse).
=Massive speculation

All this is the result of modernization brought by Baron Hausmann. After this, Zola will break each "illness" and results down into the next eighteen novels.

On my first read, I've been focusing only to the plot (and its representation to the Second Empire); and so classified it as unimpressive. Now I've had the advantage of reading The Cambridge Companion to Émile Zola, edited by Brian Nelson, which explains a lot of Zola's numerous metaphors, which often seems unrelated when we are reading his books.

The first paragraph that describes the jammed traffic of carriages procession leaving Bois de Boulogne, for example, is not just an opening; it represents Second Empire as "a sticking pit of corruption with toxic impact on people within it". Then the people in the carriages with no name, represents "nothing human matters enough to desire motion"; they are all "standing still in a line that cannot move because it has nowhere to go". So, again, it correlates with the determinism Zola was adopting in his novels. The last chapter of The Kills shows how Renée, now returned to his father's home, wonders how she came to her downfall ("who has stripped her naked?) Renée doesn't realize of her downfall because the corruption exists inside the society - "the impact of a large group of beings has on every smaller group of beings within it". The determinism - the polluted environment in which you live will carry you to its ruin; you don't realize it when you are inside, but once out of it, you'll see it more clearly. Thus, Renée is perhaps the only one of the Rougon-Macquarts (excepting Doctor Pascal) who eventually comes to this revelation (albeit too late).

Reading The Kill during the Covid-19 pandemic brought a mixed emotion to me. I loved the picturesque prose of the first half (description of Bois de Boulogne always wakes up the artistic sense in me), then I struggled with disgust and depression during the second half, but Zola's final beautiful stroke in the last chapters left me breathless (as usual). Well, at least I understand a little more of Zola's genius after this second read.

So, final rating: 4/5

How to Read Zola: A Personal Guide

One of the things I love the most from hosting Zoladdiction is to find new Zoladdicts (readers addicted to Zola's) - either people who have read Zola for some times, or those who read him for the first time. And from my eight years of hosting Zoladdiction, I have been observing that most of those who have read Zola, tend to love him and keep reading his books.

From year to year, people keep asking me almost the same question about how they should read Zola - especially his Les Rougon-Macquart cycle - or which book they should start with. Hence, you can regard this post as a sort of guidance - not from an expert, but just an enthusiastic reader. It's my personal view, and hopefully you will find it useful.

First of all, you need to know how many books Zola had written. The answer is... A LOT! He would be your perfect choice to start an "author challenge" (reading works of certain author) - you won't run out of good materials for years! :) Not only novels of many titles, Zola also wrote some short stories, essays, novella, plays, and in case you didn't know, he even wrote the controversial J'accuse! - an open letter to France President criticizing the unjust anti-semitic accuse of Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish French officer.

Now, back to the main question: Where should I start? There are several entry points which you can chose according to your need.

Start from the best

My common advice to start reading a new author is always starting from his/her masterpiece or most notable work. If it resonates with you, then it's very likely you would love his/her other works. In the case of Zola, it's: Germinal. It is a very thoroughly researched book - Zola took effort to go down into the mine pit and interviewed some workers, and you'd feel suffocated yourselves when reading it, as if you were there! It's so beautifully written with complex plot, and alternately emotionally touching and aggravating. It's also my favorite novel of all time!

The Rougon-Macquart cycle

Have you heard about this monumental project of Zola? There are two possible approaches to start your project:

Chronological order

The best way is starting from the beginning: The Fortune of the Rougons. It's the introduction to the two families (Rougons and Macquarts, plus Mourets) and historical background of the Second Empire of France. It lays the foundation and serves as navigation map to the following novels.

Random order

You have one or two Zolas on your TBR right now, and just want to read it? NO PROBLEM. The Rougon-Macquart's are standalone novels depicting different issues. You can easily pick one randomly according to your whim. In fact, I have started from L'Assommoir myself, then continued randomly through the cycle.

Short Stories Teaser

For some readers (including me), it's not easy to try a new author, especially one whom you're not sure you'll like. Start from his/her short stories! It serves as teaser, and you'd have nothing to lose. Zola wrote quite a lot of short stories, you'd love him after reading few of them, I guarantee! :) You can download/read online, or picking one of Zola's short stories collection.

Mildest Zola's

You might have heard/read about Zola's blunt honesty of writing? Well, in case your reading comfort has been Victorians, and you are a bit worried about raw Naturalism, you might start with Zola's mildest novel (also from The Rougon-Macquart cycle): The Ladies Paradise. At least it won't "blow your head" unexpectedly, and there's a bit... ehm... love story in it! :)

The Rawest

Maybe you are one of the minorities who are always eager to pick the most extreme choice? Then you'd thank me of ever picking The Earth. It's the rawest of all (I have read so far). Though the severity of the "blow" is only second after L'Assommoir, the brutal scenes are the most shocking.

Single Novel

Rather daunted to start The Rougon-Macquart, a cycle of twenty novels, and prefer, instead, a single standalone noncommittal novel? Therese Raquin would be perfect. It's one of Zola's most notable works, and one of my most memorable - it's my FIRST Zola! I remember being hooked from the beginning, and I think I finished it in just two days.

Non-Fiction

If you haven't been impressed so far, maybe you'd prefer his semi political semi humanitarian piece: J'Accuse! and other writings concerning the Dreyfus Affair. I loved especially Zola's last speech before his self-exile. Wait... you do know about Zola's self-exile to avoid jail, right? No? Then perhaps you need first to...

Know Zola from Biographies

This is my last attempt to convert you to be a Zoladdict! LOL.. just joking :D But sometimes, knowing an author - what he valued and how he viewed things - would lead you to love his/her books.

Now I assume you have made your mind of WHICH book to read next from Zola? Next you'd need to decide WHEN. Let me help you...

How about COMING APRIL?

It's Zola's birth month (2nd April is his birthday), and we will have a Zola reading event....

ZOLADDICTION 2020

If you haven't signed up yet, you can still do it at the Announcement post. Don't forget to let me know in the comment or tag me on Twitter/Instagram.

See you on April, then, and prepare to have FUN!

The Fortune of the Rougons by Émile Zola (second read)

o once commented on my first review, that The Fortune of the Rougons won't probably be considered great if it were a standalone novel. Its greatness lies in it becomes the first (the foundation) of The Rougon-Macquart cycle. I can't agree more. Fortune acted as the introduction of the whole cycle. From this book we get to know what Zola was aiming, which is to portray the disequilibrium of Second Empire of France, through the disordered two branched of a family: the Rougons and the Macquarts.

Basically, Fortune interweaves three stories into one frame:

1. The origin of the Rougon-Macquart family.

2. The historical account of the birth of Second French Empire.

3. The innocent love story of Silvère and Miette.

Published in 1871, Fortune takes place in a provincial town of Plassans. Adelaide Foque aka Tante Dide is an orphan girl of a merchant - a queer, nervous, imbalanced, passionate girl. She married the family gardener, the coarse, vulgar Rougon, and had a son: Pierre. However, she also had a lover, a drunkard good-for-nothing poacher: Macquart. Soon her husband and lover died, leaving her with Pierre and two illegitimate offsprings from Macquart: Antoine and Ursule.

Pierre is the perfect combination of his mother and father: crafty, ambitious, with insatiable desire. He married a local merchant daughter (though rumor has it she's an illegitimate daughter of a Marquis) Felicité Puech - intelligent, full of intrigue, envious, and ambitious. They had three sons: Eugène, Pascal, and Aristide. When their oil business didn't give them the wealth and respect they badly craved, they were full of bitterness.

In 1851, the Rougons, in the last attempt to gain respect, opened their yellow drawing room to some merchants and dealers to have meetings and discuss politics. These local conservative bourgeoisies secretly supported the monarchy as they're afraid of losing their privilege against the working class, if France continued to be led by the Republican. When the eldest son Eugène Rougon sent his parents reports about the upcoming coup d'état, Pierre & Felicité saw a brilliant way to gain fast fortune.

Antoine Macquart is almost a duplicate of his father - lazy, cowardly, alcoholic, egoist, hypocrite; while from his mother, he inherited very little - lack of discipline, and insatiable desire for pleasure and comfort. He married a hardworking and alcoholic woman, Fine, and they had three children: Lisa, Gervaise, Jean. Besides heredity influence, Zola also believed that guilty sex produces faulty behaviour in subsequent generations. The strongest result is in Antoine Macquart's family. Gervaise - we would follow her faith later in L'Assommoir - but here we get a glimpse of how she was brought up literally with drinks and by her drunkard parents. She was conceived when her parents were drunk, resulting to a delicate feature and a liking of drinks.

Ursule Macquart inherited more from her mother, than her father. She is shy, whimsical, melancholy, with sudden changes of nervous laughter and dreaminess. She married a respectable hatter: Mouret, and they had three children: François, Hélène, and Silvère. After Ursule died of consumption, Silvère lived with Tante Dide.

Fortune opens with the story of Silvère and his sweetheart, a very young girl called Miette. Theirs is an innocent relationship, almost childish. It was on the night of December 1st, 1851 - the night of the coup d'état. Together with Miette, Silvère, full of idealistic (more of a nervous hysteria, actually - inheritance from grandma Dide!) views of Republican, joined a group of insurgents which was marching towards Plassans. Fortune could be viewed as a miniature of the recorded history about the coup d'état. Louis Phillippe staged the coup; just as the Rougons, according to Eugène's secret letters, staged Pierre's heroic salvation of the city. And just as the bloody origins of the Second Empire, so did the fortune of the Rougons was paid for in blood.

As usual with Zola, Fortune is full of metaphors. In fact you would be surprised with how often the word "blood" or something represents it (red color in the flag carried by Miette and Miette's coat, for instance) surfaced from the entire story, especially near the end. The most obvious one is when Pierre and Felicité was in bed after planning their own "coup":

"They kissed each other gain and fell asleep. The patch of light on the ceiling now seems to be assuming the shape of a terrified eye, staring unblinking at the pale, slumbering couple, who now reeked of crime under their sheets, and were dreaming that they could see blood raining down in big drops and turning into gold coins as they landed on the floor."

Even Pascal, the naturalist self of Zola "could see, in a flash, the future of the Rougon-Macquart family, a pack of wild, satiated appetites in the midst of a blaze of gold and blood."

Another less obvious metaphor is how Zola described the cycle of life using "the door" built by Macquart the poacher to smoothen his adultery with Tante Dide. Dide has closed it after Macquart's death, but later on Silvére and Miette found and opened it once again for similar purpose, though theirs are pure and innocent. It represents how each generation was condemned to repeat the actions of the former. Here is a tinge of the determinism views not uncommon in 19th century.

But the last paragraph (my favorite) is the strongest of all, where Zola stroke his hammer for the last time with all his might:

"But the strip of pink satin fastened to Pierre's buttonhole was not the only splash of red marked the triumph of the Rougons. A shoe with a bloodstained heel lay forgotten under the bed in the next room. The candle burning at Monsieur Peirotte's bedside, on the opposite side of the street, shone in the darkness with the lurid redness of an open wound. And far away, in the depths of the Aire Saint Mittre, a pool of blood was congealing on a tombstone."

Another metaphor of cycle of life I found in the third paragraph of Chapter 1 - the cemetery:

"In 1851 the old people of Plassans could still remember having seen the walls of the cemetery when they were still standing, though the place had been shut for years. The earth, gorged with corpses for over a century,  exuded death... The abandoned cemetery had then gone through a process of purification every spring by covering itself with thick, lack vegetation.... After the May r rains and the June sunshine, the tallest weeds sprouted higher than the walls and could be seen as far away as the main road; while inside the place seemed like a deep, dark green sea bestrewn with big, strangely colored flowers. Underfoot, between the mass of stems, you could feel the damp soil bubbling and oozing with sap."

Life ends in death, and sometimes, death is needed to get a new life on top of it. So Zola opened the book with new life germinating from a cemetery - could the cemetery interpreted to be the dead of First Empire (after February Revolution in 1848)? Then the new stems should be the present Second Republic. Or is it the Republic that is dying, and the new life oozing from the damp soil is the germinating of the Second Empire? Either way, as with all Zola's novels, there's always hope and regeneration after each death.

In his preface Zola mentioned that Fortune, as the first of twenty novels, "could bear the scientific title Origins.” And with such a great origin, it's no wonder that The Rougon-Macquart turned out to be an epic tale of a disordered family during Second Empire of France. Or is it because I have read all the novels (except Doctor Pascal) that I can regard Fortune as great? It's true that when I first read it, I didn't see something special. It is true then what I have mentioned in the beginning, Fortune becomes great because it's an 'origins'. Hence, the title 'cycle' which we put to The Rougon Macquart. Bravo Zola!

Rating: 5 to 5