Il dottor Pascal

Les Rougon-Macquart #20

by Émile Zola

Pascal Rougon, uomo di scienza dalla grande fede per la vita, esegue uno studio sull’eredità usando la sua famiglia come campo d’indagine, malgrado l’opposizione della madre. Ha un figlio dalla nipote Clotilde ma muore prima della sua nascita.

Genres: Classics, France, French Literature, Fiction, 19th Century, Literature, Novels

309 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1893

About the author

Émile Zola was a prominent French novelist, journalist, and playwright widely regarded as a key figure in the development of literary naturalism. His work profoundly influenced both literature and society through its commitment to depicting reality with scientific objectivity and exploring the impact of environment and heredity on human behavior. Born and raised in France, Zola experienced early personal hardship following the death of his father, which deeply affected his understanding of social and economic struggles—a theme that would later permeate his writings.
Zola began his literary career working as a clerk for a publishing house, where he developed his skills and cultivated a passion for literature. His early novels, such as Thérèse Raquin, gained recognition for their intense psychological insight and frank depiction of human desires and moral conflicts. However, it was his monumental twenty-volume series, Les Rougon-Macquart, that established his lasting reputation. This cycle of novels offered a sweeping examination of life under the Second French Empire, portraying the lives of a family across generations and illustrating how hereditary traits and social conditions shape individuals’ destinies. The series embodies the naturalist commitment to exploring human behavior through a lens informed by emerging scientific thought.
Beyond his literary achievements, Zola was a committed social and political activist. His involvement in the Dreyfus Affair is one of the most notable examples of his dedication to justice. When Captain Alfred Dreyfus was wrongfully accused and convicted of treason, Zola published his famous open letter, J’Accuse…!, which condemned the French military and government for corruption and anti-Semitism. This act of courage led to his prosecution and temporary exile but played a crucial role in eventual justice for Dreyfus and exposed deep divisions in French society.
Zola’s personal life was marked by both stability and complexity. He married Éléonore-Alexandrine Meley, who managed much of his household affairs, and later had a long-term relationship with Jeanne Rozerot, with whom he fathered two children. Throughout his life, Zola remained an incredibly prolific writer, producing not only novels but also essays, plays, and critical works that investigated the intersections between literature, science, and society.
His legacy continues to resonate for its profound impact on literature and for his fearless commitment to social justice. Zola’s work remains essential reading for its rich narrative detail, social critique, and pioneering approach to the realistic portrayal of human life. His role in the Dreyfus Affair stands as a powerful example of the intellectual’s responsibility to speak truth to power.

Reviews

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zola published this last volume of Rougon-Macquart in 1893. Doctor Pascal is a bit like his double. Moreover, he took refuge in London after the Dreyfus affair and signed his hotel card with this name.
This character has a special place in family history. It is the fictitious custodian of what the author wanted to demonstrate in this long-term work: the laws of heredity from generation to generation. Because it is the passion to which the doctor devotes his life, he wants to prove the consequences of an initial defect by examining his own family: the grandmother's madness, Adélaïde Foulque.
I have tenderness for this character, whose evocation logically closes the work since he embodies the author's project. There is sadness in his loneliness that moves. Despite being a devoted physician, he lives on the sidelines and often feels misunderstood. However, I also like his generosity and enthusiasm.
Above all, what gives an emotional aspect to her character is her second passion, tormented and plagued by others' intolerance: that for Clotilde, her tender and sincere niece, who assists her in her research and will become a disturbing, beautiful young woman. Their relationship has never seemed unhealthy to me; they have such purity, such innocence.
The author's last word evokes the child who will be born from their union: "And after so many terrible Rougons, so many abominable Macquartes, another was born. Life was not afraid to create one. one more, in the brave challenge of his eternity." This eternity is a fate to imagine beyond writing.

[John Mauro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Everything comes together in Doctor Pascal, Zola's twentieth and final novel of his Rougon-Macquart cycle, in which he paints a detailed portrait of life in France during the Second Republic. The Rougon-Macquart series follows three branches of the same family covering the upper, middle, and lower classes of French society. One of Zola's overarching themes is heredity and the role of nature vs. nurture in the development of our individual lives.

In Doctor Pascal, the titular character serves as a mouthpiece for Zola's theories. He has been meticulously studying the three branches of his family to build his theories of heredity and the evolution of a family from generation to generation. Pascal takes a scientific approach to his research but engages in numerous discussions with his niece and assistant, Clotilde, regarding the religious implications of his work.

While Doctor Pascal achieves the goal of pulling together the previous nineteen entries in the series, it fails to deliver a compelling story on its own. Never one to shy away from icky subjects, the main story concerns an incestuous relationship between Pascal and Clotilde, which, I suppose, has interesting implications for the doctor's theory of heredity...

Overall, this is probably the weakest entry in the Rougon-Macquart series, but it does succeed in tying together loose ends from the other books and presenting Zola's unifying theory.

2.5 stars, rounded up because the Rougon-Macquart series as a whole is one of the finest collections of literature ever published.

[Zahra · Rating 3 out of 5]

دکتر پاسکال بیستمین و آخرین کتاب مجموعه روگن ماکاره. داستان کتاب دو سال بعد از اتفاقات کتاب شکست و در دوران جمهوری سوم فرانسه اتفاق میوفته. زولا از طریق تجارب شخصیت هاش تصویر خوبی از زندگی در جمهوری سوم فرانسه و تنش های گروه های مختلف سیاسی رو نشون داده. نویسنده تو این کتاب داستان نوزده تا کتاب قبلی رو بهم وصل می‌کنه، به بررسی تقابل بین ایمان و علم می‌پردازه، تاثیر صنعتی شدن و شهرسازی گسترده بر جامعه فرانسه رو نشون میده و تئوری تاثیر وراثت و محیط بر افراد یک خانواده رو به شکل کامل توضیح میده.
برعکس بقیه کتاب های مجموعه، دکتر پاسکال کتابی نیست که بشه به تنهایی و مستقل از بقیه نوزده تا کتاب خونده بشه و برای خوندنش نیازه که حداقل یه آشنایی کلی با کتاب های قبلی وجود داشته باشه.
در کل بعنوان کتاب آخر یه مجموعه بد نیست و جمع بندی خوبی داره اما بعنوان یه کتاب مستقل خیلی قوی نیست و یکی از ضعیف ترین کتاب های زولائه.
ترجمه کتاب افتضاحه. پر از غلط نگارشیه، ویراستاری خیلی بدی داره و پر سانسوره. موضوع کتاب و روابط افراد با همدیگه صد و هشتاد درجه متفاوتن تو نسخه ترجمه شده. اصلا طرف ترجمه فارسی نرید آکسفورد ترجمه انگلیسی خوبی داره خیلی پیشنهادش میکنم.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

« La vie continue, recommence, c’est l’idée de la série. »

Les Rougon-Macquart series tells the story of a family spanning the second French Empire. It begins with Pierre Rougon. During the coup d’État of December 1851 when Napoleon III a ascends to power, Pierre and his wife Félicité Rougon are staunch supporters in Plassans, a mythical town (La Fortune de Rougon). Their offspring fill twenty volumes through to the disastrous war of Sedan (1870), when Napoleon III is defeated, the Paris Commune (1871) and Jean Macquart, a soldier comes to grips with the end of the Empire (Le Débâcle). The book takes place in 1873-4, after the fall of the Empire.

Le Docteur Pascal neatly recalls five generations of family. Just as the glory of the Empire crumbles, so to does this family. Just as the series begins in Plassans, we return to Plassans and the estate called La Souleiade in the south of France.

Pascal Rougon is approaching 60 years and has spent the last years studying heredity, in particular, of his own family. Pascal realizes that the genetics being passed down reveal a checkered past and undoubtedly, a checkered future.

He works away with the help of his niece, Clotilde. She is 25 and has worked transcribing his information. She calls him master and has faithfully worked with him for the last seven years. Pascal develops a family tree, that reflects upon the various relatives. It acts as the reference guide for all the stories in the twenty volumes.

His mother Félicité does not appreciate his work on the family. She wants to bask in the former glory of the Empire and more importantly, the Rougon’s legacy. She has one ambition, to find the key to the cabinet and burn all the evidence. She needs help. Clotilde is ruled by her faith and not science. Clotilde might be “in.”

The maid Martine has worked for Doctor Pascal for the last thirty years. She is hard working and very frugal but keeps the house working while the doctor indulges in his work. Martine has been a little wary of Clotilde, and after so many years wants nothing better than keep the good doctor to herself. She is most definitely “in” to help mother Félicité.

The problem occurs when the doctor falls head over heals with Clotilde. The fact that she is 35 years younger, the fact that he sees himself as an elderly biblical King David and she is a young Sunamite Abigail, the fact he is an old white haired man and she, a fair skinned blonde, the fact that he is her uncle, makes for an odd couple. Something just doesn’t seem right.* Anyways, Clotilde eventually sides with Pascal. This annoys mother Félicité, who is disgusted that the two lovers are together, and even worse, living in sin. She wants that key…

* Or maybe it’s because the last book I read was the Booker winner Kairos, a book about a woman having an affair with a thirty-five year old man? Really, two books in a row?

Nonetheless, their love is full on passion.* Their love begins during a raging summer storm and then again, when things change, they embrace passionately during a mistral storm, which almost tears the roof off. Yup, full of passion.

*Apparently Zola was inspired by his own affair with a younger woman (sheesh these men)

For the sake of spoiler alert, the series ends full of drama. Zola spent twenty years writing these books and he wasn’t going out with a whimper. There is a visit to old Paradou (La Faute de l’abbé Mouret), there are several family deaths (a most shocking one as well), a money scam, the clash of science versus religion, questions on modern medicine, multiple discourses, monologues, thoughts and pondering of moral and ethical issues. In short, lots to think about. At its heart, this is still a romance. Sure it gets moody, dark, and at times depressing but there is a voice of optimism. How good is that?

***************

PS. The book was published in 1893 and later that same year he received “la croix d’officier de la Légion d’honneur.” One can’t get much higher acclaim in France.

Final note on the series
It took me almost five years to read all twenty book, tout en français. Some 9000 pages. There were so many books that I gave 4 or 5 stars. It was impressive to see so many themes, different characters and such consistently good writing. He did his homework and it shows.

In a way I have to thank Covid for this because it was in lockdown that I came across L’Assommoir in one of the little lending libraries in my neighborhood. The story was so vivid, so enchanting, so real. I was hooked.

In 2015 I remember seeing Zola’s tomb under the Pantheon in Paris. He rests alongside Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas. It’s easy to understand this. What a remarkable man who gave us a slice of French life like no other author. Gosh, I will miss him (or re-read him).

Les Rougon-Macquart #20

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started reading the Rougon-Macquart sequence on 14 October 2011 (I have Goodreads to thank for the precision—the novel was The Drinking Den), finally completing the 20-strong epic on 18 June 2023. Reading this phenomenal sequence of classics over a long period was the most pleasurable way to tackle Zola, for patience and doggedness is required to wrestle with the more verbose, overblown elements of the Gallic Goliath’s oeuvre. Doctor Pascal concludes the epic with a codependent love story between an uncle and his niece, featuring a scheming mother, a pious servant, and a handy summary of the preceding nineteen works. The character of Pascal is a frustrating contradiction—supremely intelligent when magicking up vaccines in a pestle, too thick to shelter his manuscripts outside his own home away from his mother whose only wish is to destroy them. An exasperating, melodramatic end to an exasperating, magnificent, epochal cycle of classics. How would I rank the cycle from 1-20, you never asked? Let me tell you.

Rougon-Macquart RANKED (Best to Worst):

1. The Earth (La Terre)
2. The Drinking Den (L’Assommoir)
3. The Belly of Paris (La Ventre de Paris)
4. Germinal
5. The Debacle (La Débâcle)
6. The Beast Within (La Bête Humaine)
7. Pot Luck (Pot-Bouille)
8. The Masterpiece (L'Œuvre)
9. The Kill (La Curée)
10. The Ladies’ Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames)
11. The Dream (Le Rêve)
12. The Bright Side of Life (La joie de vivre)
13. The Fortune of the Rougons (La Fortune des Rougon)
14. The Conquest of Plassans (La Conquête de Plassans)
15. Nana
16. Money (L'Argent)
17. A Love Story (Une page d'amour)
18. Doctor Pascal (Le Docteur Pascal)
19. His Excellency Eugene Rougon (Son Excellence Eugène Rougon)
20. The Sin of Abbé Moret (La Faute de l'Abbé Mouret)

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

No matter how awful it might seem, life was necessarily great and good, because people put so much tenacious will into living it, the purpose being, no doubt, this same will itself and the great work it unwittingly performed. Of course, he was a scientist, a man of unclouded vision, he didn’t believe in an idyllic humanity living in a land of milk and honey – quite the opposite, he saw the vices and defects, and had been exposing them, probing them and cataloging them for thirty years, but his passion for life, his admiration for the forces of life, were enough to throw him into a state of constant joy, from which seemed to flow naturally his love of others, a brotherly compassion, a fellow feeling, that you could sense beneath the unflinching rigour of the anatomist and the affected impersonality of his studies.

This, the twentieth and final of the Rougon-Macquart novels, is the only one that requires having read at least a few of the preceding novels. Otherwise, it could be a bit confusing, not its plot, but because many of the philosophical insights and references would lose much, if not most, of their impact and meaning. If you’re only going to read one, don’t make it this one; if you’re intending to read more, save it for later.

The first third of the book sums up Zola’s philosophy of naturalism through Pascal’s eyes and experience. We first meet Pascal in the first novel of the cycle, The Fortune of the Rougons , one of five children born to Pierre and Félicité Rougon, the conniving, amoral couple whose tactical morals and intentions put them on the “winning” side of the Second French Empire. He is a rather minor character, one who does not engage in cynical behavior of his siblings and parents. He becomes a country doctor in his home of Plassans, beloved and seemingly unlike the rest of family. Wealth and power take a back seat to contentment and pursuit of scientific knowledge. Maintaining his privacy, buying his property, and supporting is long-time maid are enough for him. He has no need for a wife, only the solitude of his study, in which he chronicles the lives of all the members of his extended family—the people who become the stories of the Rougen-Macquart cycle—into a family tree, much to the suspicion and chagrin of Félicité, who constantly maintains a wary, condescending eye on the one child who has disappointed her the most with a bundle of emotions that border on contempt. She has a vague understanding of what he is doing and does all she can to make sure the knowledge Pascal accumulates never leaves the walls of his study.

Even though she’d been torturing him for years and there was nothing he didn’t know about her, he remained a deferential son and had vowed to himself never to abandon this resolutely respectful stance. And so as soon as she broached certain subjects, he took refuge in absolute silence.

He takes pride in the distance his neighbors, his patients, put between him and the rest of the Rougons:

“Have you ever heard anyone in this town call me Pascal Rougon? No! People have always said Doctor Pascal, full stop. That’s because I’m the odd one out. And it may not be very nice of me, but I’m delighted, because there are some legacies that are really too heavy to bear. However much I may love them all, my heart still beats with glee when I feel myself to be alien, different, that I have absolutely nothing in common with them, my God! It’s a breath of fresh air, it’s what gives me courage to put them all down there on paper, to lay them bare in these files, and still find the courage to go on living.”

Pascal is personally and scientifically obsessed by the role heredity plays in human behavior; does it overwhelm, controlling behavior and choices people make in their lives or can it be escaped to create independent, free will? The more he examines his family and compares their individual stories, however, the more he fears the burden and controlling force of heredity.

Unwittingly and never aware of it, his fears come true in the form of Clotilde, the daughter of his financier brother Aristide, who is sent from Paris to be cared for by Pascal. At first, she is the child he would never have; his passion for work gave him no time or motivation for other interests. Years pass in apparent bliss as Clotilde learns to assist him in his medical work, his maid maintains the household, and he disappears for hours, alone in his study. He quits taking payments for his work, but when his patients insist on giving him money, he shoves it into a drawer and forgets about it. He has invested well, and the interest maintains his life as he wants it. Among his “medical” theories, somewhat popular at that time, were to give his patients injections, water and with various ground substances. But when one dies from a blood clot caused by a pebble that inadvertently gets into an injection, his confident balance begins to tilt disastrously.

Clotilde transforms from a child and apprentice into a lover, his first and only love. The incestuous relationship, reviled by his family and community, causes him to lose sight of reality and his own health, not that he ever really thought about the latter. What ensues is an odd decline. His maid turns out not to be as loyal as he imagined. When Clotilde becomes pregnant, he realizes that he cannot escape the burdens of his family’s heredity. As much as Félicité is shocked by the relationship, preserving her power and appearances take precedence over family, decency, and truth. The conniving, opportunistic woman we meet in The Fortune of the Rougons has only become more skilled at her mendacity and malice. If it were up to her, there would never have been a Rougon-Macquart cycle. Thankfully, we have Zola’s legacy with us to remind us, despite being a cultural and social history of sorts of the Second Empire, that the themes of this family have been universal throughout history and will continue to be so.

How and Why I Came to Read the Entire Cycle

In the summer of 2013, I didn’t even know Rougon-Macquart existed. I went to one of my favorite bookstores, City Lights in San Francisco, to look for a book to read on a cross-country flight. City Lights is a must for me whenever I’m lucky enough to be in San Francisco. After spending more than 90 minutes browsing around, picking up books I was sure I would buy and then later putting them back when something else seemed more interesting, going from music to history to whatever and finally ending up in fiction, I got to the Z’s in fiction and saw a book by Emile Zola. I hadn’t really thought about him for more than 30 years, his novel Germinal was unquestionably the best novel I read in my college years. And then I saw a new translation of The Fortune of the Rougons. After reading the back cover and flipping through some pages, I decided to put back whatever I had in my hand at the time. I ended up reading the entire book on the flight (plus one layover) home. I was hooked. I needed more, but once I learned there were nineteen more to go, I was sure there was no way I was that hooked. But then I looked up Rougon-Macquart on Wikipedia to get a sense of which would be next. And it got more complicated.

Anyone undertaking the goal of reading the entire cycle knows that there are generally two ways of approaching the task. Doctor Pascal’s reading of the family’s history becomes the source of Zola’s recommended reading order of the Rougon-Macquart cycle, which is not the same as the publication order. I tried to keep as close to the recommended order as possible, being tripped up mostly by waiting for Oxford to publish some that I knew were coming. In reality, the only two that really must be read in order are the first, The Fortune of the Rougons and the concluding Doctor Pascal. Every other novel is free-standing and does not require previous knowledge of any other novel.

On the other hand, reading them all and knowing of Zola’s intent to give voice to a philosophical/scientific outlook makes the achievement of reading each one more fulfilling. These are not preachy novels. They are all stories that build to often surprising, stunning conclusions. They provide insights into the age of the Second Empire with universal themes that are ageless. Of the twenty novels, there are only four I would not consider reading again. Not that I will reread the other sixteen—there are just too many books out there—but I have a feeling I will hopefully come back to Germinal once more before I die. As one who has been consumed by politics and history throughout my life, I consider His Excellency Eugène Rougon to be among the best books on political behavior I have ever read, fiction or nonfiction. It is as underrated a classic, in my opinion, as The Conquest of Plassans . L'Assommoir , La Bête Humaine , La Terre , and Nana each are most popularly accessible. The understated tragedy in The Belly of Paris and uncharacteristic flashes of compassion and humor in The Ladies Paradise are almost outliers in the cycle. Almost. The two novels with the most contemporary feel, about the everlasting hypocrisy and venality of human existence, even though there is no mistaking the historical settings of the stories, are The Kill and Money . The brilliance of The Masterpiece could easily serve as a case study in any medical school course on depression. Zola sums them all up in short passage from Doctor Pasacal: “Well, what’s so wonderful is that you can put your finger on how individuals springing from the same stock can appear radically different, while being merely logical modifications of common ancestors.”

It took me ten years, an average of two books a year, to complete the cycle. I will admit there were extended periods when I easily forgot them and could have stopped, but like a pleasing addiction, Zola’s hold kept drawing me in. My only regret was not being able to read them in the original French. His was the essence of great writing, one of the reasons a community like Goodreads can, does, and should exist. Especially at a time when great bookstores like City Lights are becoming extinct.

[Sammy · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Our fortune was a long time in the making!"

A peculiar, sometimes sleepy epilogue to my favourite series of novels, Doctor Pascal feels rather like the neglected stepchild one might find in a Zola story. Written in 1893, it is the conclusion to his 20-volume Rougon-Macquart, which details five generations of a single family under the Second Empire reign of Napoleon III (1851 - 1871). Pascal takes place between 1872 and 1874. The war is done; the carnage is being mopped up in Paris; and here we are back in Plassans, the town where the family began, to mingle with some of the survivors for a while as they contemplate their past and, indeed, their future.

The series has given us yarns about mass uprisings at a coal mine, incest and murder among peasants, the drama of France's biggest stock market bubble, lust and cruelty among the aristocracy, not to mention the series' actual climax during the series of missteps now known as the Franco-Prussian War, that it's discombobulating to discover that the final volume in the series takes place almost entirely in a single house, with a handful of characters. At the same time, two of the best novels in the collection - the vastly underrated A Love Story and philosophical masterwork The Bright Side of Life - used this format, so why not? (It reminds me, actually, of the current trend in "prestige dramas" on TV, to devote your penultimate episode to the season's narrative climax, while giving over the actual finale to contemplative, award-nominated performances from your lead cast.)

Pascal Rougon is a member of the third generation of the family, a scientist and natural observer in life, who appeared occasionally during early volumes of the series. On the verge of 60, Pascal has now largely retired from seeing patients to focus on his grand plan, writing a masterwork on heredity, using his own extended family as evidence, as part of aims to cure mankind of illnesses and much more. On Pascal's side is his niece and acolyte, Clotilde; in the opposing corner is that bastion of cruelty, Félicité Rougon, who made such an impact back in the series' opening volume that I've been eagerly awaiting her return.

At heart, the novel is little more than a chance for Zola to expound upon his theories of humanity - theories which had evolved substantially from the misguided scientific beliefs he held when he set out on the series 23 years earlier. Perhaps one might say that Zola uses this novel to stick his fingers up at his many critics, who had denounced him as a pornographer or, perhaps worse, a believer in the essential malignancy of humankind. Instead, although the novel charts the horrors and woe - both personal and national - that the extended Rougon-Macquart clan have inflected on their fellow man, it also bustles with optimism for the potential within humanity. As always, Zola is superb at his moments of symbolism, the baby-like teenager Charles, for example, who reminds everyone of those end-of-the-line princes who never even take the throne due to extreme weakness, or the death of another long-lost character in one of fiction's many spontaneous combustion sequences. And the master's understanding of character - although it takes a while to arrive - is profoundly felt as we navigate the complex relationship between master, mistress, and servant, gradually revealed in conflicting points-of-view. There are weaknesses to be found, for sure. The novel is perhaps overly soppy. Some of the science v. religion debates - although they resonated with me in the increasingly Luddite, recalcitrant 21st century - don't feel entirely earned. On top of this, the "tell, don't show" mentality that had begun to infect Zola's writing in the last few novels of the series is often on show here. I think of the sequence - late in the novel - where the impoverished Clotilde describes an experience on the street, accidentally knocking down a child and being turned on by a mob, which would have made for a quintessential Zola scene in his heyday. It is for these reasons, I think, that the novel has been without an English translation for more than 70 years, a problem rectified this year (2020) with the release of Julie Rose's stellar translation, capping off Oxford University Press' monumental complete translation of the series. But it is not the case that the sedge is withered from the lake, quite yet. This relatively short novel is worth it for the sequence in chapter five, in which Pascal expounds his Rougon-Macquart theory to Clotilde, giving us in 10 pages what it had taken Zola two-and-a-half decades to write. Pascal even spares a moment to note the complexity and individuality of animals, reminding us of the many horses, dogs, and cats, who populate the narrative. (I should say here, if you're contemplating reading Doctor Pascal without having read the rest of the series: don't! The other 19 novels can be read independently without losing much; this, however, is very much a finale, devoting extensive space to conclusions, often for characters who don't even appear physically in this volume.)

"Ah, youth! He was ravenous for it!"

At the heart of the novel, however, and the reason Zola chose the insular format for his grand finale, is the relationship between Pascal and Clotilde. It is a strange, surprising, often problematic relationship from the perspective of 2020. Clotilde is less than half Pascal's age, has lived with him since she was a child, and ends up giving her body to him as a present because she's so overwhelmed by his genius? Yet, this relationship is blatantly based on Zola's own late-in-life love affair with a much younger woman named Jeanne, who would bear him two children (out of wedlock, as he was already married), and no doubt captures something of their relationship. In that sense, what seems like an old man's fantasy to us is in fact an old man's reality. (The fact that Clotilde is Pascal's niece, and that no-one seems to mind this, is perhaps best chalked up to cultural differences!) And Pascal is Zola in other ways too. The man always right, even in the face of great opposition; the man rejected by society but still desperately needed by them; a man ultimately apotheosised by all who know and love him. And yet, again, is this not true of Zola also? He could not have known - writing this novel nine years before his death - that his final years would be spent as a lightning rod for the debate about anti-Semitism and corruption in the establishment, a debate in which he would choose the correct side and be hated by millions for it, before being remembered by history (at least in the 20th century) more for his social activism than for his novels.

All in all, I can't say that Doctor Pascal is a great novel, or even completely worthy of a 4-star rating. But I can attest that the experience of reading these 20 books in chronological order, in modern translation, has been one of the great experiences of my literary life. Perhaps it is best to view the novel from a scientific standpoint. This is the conclusion to the paper. One shouldn't come here expecting hypotheses, innovative research, thrilling experiments, or the Sturm und Drang of trial and error. These all lie behind us; ahead is only a neat summation and a memory, a slideshow perhaps, of the many roads we have thus far travailed.

It is a journey I will no doubt take again... one day.

[Dagio_maya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nascondo questo commento non perché ci siano realmente spoiler ma perché il GDL a cui appartiene questa lettura è ancora in corso.
Le mie compagne sappiano che ho finito sì velocemente ma con tanta emozione.
Abbiamo passato tre anni a commentare questi venti romanzi con accordi e disaccordi che mi mancheranno moltissimo!! 💚


"oh Dio! Appartenere alla sua famiglia finiva per essere come appartenere a un’altra, poiché non si rassomigliano forse tutte, l’umanità non è forse identica dappertutto, con la stessa quantità di bene e di male?"


Il dottor Pascal (1893) è l’ultimo di un ciclo di venti romanzi che nell’intento di Émile Zola dovevano dimostrare la tesi dell’ereditarietà all’interno della famiglia dei Rougon-Maquart.

La scena si apre sull’interno di una grande casa di campagna sita nella proprietà chiamata la Souléiade.
Siamo nel soggiorno in un giorno d’estate.
Le persiane chiuse per lasciar fuori l’afa rovente. Tre personaggi che, solo di tanto in tanto, spezzano il silenzio con qualche monosillabo.
Ognuno è assorto nella propria attività: il dottor Pascal tra le ante del grande armadio dove giacciono affastellati le numerose pagine delle sue ricerche e Clotilde (la bella nipote che vive con lo zio dall’età di sette anni) completamente assorbita dal quadro che sta dipingendo.
Più tardi si unisce Martine, domestica fedele, che senza parlare si diede e comincia a cucire.

Una scena armonica anche troppo per chi conscee la penna di Zola e sa che ogni raggio di sole nelle sue storie è solo presagio di venti impetuosi e tempeste che attendono dietro l’angolo.
Quello che nel nostro gruppo di lettura abbiamo ribattezzato #Zola#mai’na-gioia

”… fate tutto questo per la mia felicità, non è così? Ma, ahimè! sento che saremo tutti infelici!”

Questi tre personaggi sono meccanismi utilizzati dall’autore per tirare le somme dei romanzi precedenti.
Lo scontro tra realismo ed idealismo s’incarna violentemente nella rottura dell’equilibrio di questa prima scena e va a parare nella nascita di un amore tanto scandaloso quanto puro e sincero.

Zola lascia pagine-manifesto del suo pensiero come ad esempio quando fa recitare al dottor il Credo del positivista sulla falsariga di quello cattolico:


«Vuoi che ti ripeta il mio credo perché poi tu mi accusi di rifiutare il tuo… io credo che il futuro dell’umanità risieda nel progresso della ragione grazie al contributo della scienza. Credo che la scoperta della verità attraverso la scienza sia l’ideale divino che l’uomo deve aspirare a raggiungere.
Credo che tutto, al di fuori del grande tesoro delle verità, lentamente acquisite ed eterne, sia illusione e vanità.
Credo che la somma di queste verità, sempre in aumento, finirà per dare all’uomo un potere incalcolabile, e la serenità, se non la felicità….
Sì, credo nel trionfo ultimo della vita.»

Nel romanzo ritornano, dunque, i protagonisti già conosciuti e veniamo a conoscenza della loro sorte.
Credo proprio che questo elemento renda l’opera meno godibile da parte di chi non conosce appieno la storia di questa intricata famiglia che prende l’avvio proprio dove lo termina, ossia a
a Plassan facendo così combaciare i pezzi di questa meraviglioso meccanismo che si chiama Letteratura.


Incipit:

”Nell’afa di quel rovente pomeriggio di luglio regnava una grande calma nella stanza dalle persiane accuratamente chiuse. Dalle tre finestre filtrava, attraverso le fessure del legno, solo qualche sottile filo di luce; e, in mezzo all’ombra, un chiarore molto dolce bagnava gli oggetti di un bagliore diffuso e tenue. C’era fresco nella stanza, al riparo dal caldo torrido dell’esterno, dove il sole cocente incendiava la facciata. “

l’avvio dell’ultimo capitolo…

”Erano circa le tre del pomeriggio di un luminoso giorno di fine agosto, dal cielo rovente; le imposte, accuratamente chiuse, non lasciavano penetrare, attraverso le fessure, che sottili frecce di sole, nell’ombra assopita e tiepida della vasta stanza. La grande pace oziosa della domenica pareva giungere da fuori con il volo lontano delle campane, che suonavano l’ultimo rintocco dei vespri.”

[Sass · Rating 1 out of 5]

j'ai terminé les 20 romans des Rougon-Macquart. Quelle déception de terminer sur ce roman. Je ne reconnais pas Zola: le style est redondant (il y a carrément des phrases qui sont quasiment reprises mot pour mot dans le roman), l'histoire "d'amour' entre un oncle et sa nièce sans que ce ne soit critiqué ou remis en question, cette misogynie latente (la femme vs la science). Le tome clôt bien la série car il se termine sur l'espoir, sur la vie sans cesse renouvelée, Zola revient également sur chaque personnage de la série, mais pardon je n'avais aucune envie de lire une histoire d'inceste aussi romantisée.

[Janelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Doctor Pascal is the final book in the Rougon-Macquart series and while far from the best book of the series it’s still a good read. Pascal is a doctor and scientist and has been studying and collecting info on the family tree and its history of madness, vice and goodness as well. He sees himself as outside the family and unique but in the end succumbs to his own form of madness. His passion for his niece, Clotilde who he has brought up since childhood takes up a large section and for me was a bit much and the ending with the birth of their child makes you wonder where heredity will take it! There is a good summing up of all the family that have been the main characters of all the previous novels.


Such an extraordinary mix of the best and the worst, humanity in a nutshell, with all its defects, and all its struggles!

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A disappointing end to the sequence, and one there is certainly no reason to read until all of the others have been finished.

[Natalie Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great read, but very tame compared to some of his others!

[Armin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Der Abschluss des Rougon-Macquart-Zyklus erwies sich bislang für jede Generation von Lesern als ganz große Enttäuschung, mir geht es auch im zweiten Anlauf nicht anders. Dabei hat das Grundkonzept durchaus seine Reize: eine Art alt gewordener Faust entdeckt die Liebe zur eigenen Nichte und wird davon überwältigt. Clotilde, Tochter des Finanzschwindlers Saccard, wächst in der Provinz bei ihrem Onkel Pascal auf und wird so etwas wie die Assistentin des Privatgelehrten, dabei fungiert das junge Gemüt durchaus als Matrix, in die der Forscher der Vererbungslehre, der auch im Selbstversuch eine Frischzellentherapie entwickelt hat, seine materialistischen Anschauungen hinein schreibt. Im Anschluss an eine fromme Rebellion ihrerseits, die von seiner verhassten Mutter Félicité und der treuen Dienerin gesteuert und befeuert wird, finden die beiden dann doch zusammen. Schön mit eingewoben ist die biblische Legende vom alten König David und seiner Wärmerin Abisaig, die später u.a. noch im englischen Patienten zitiert wird.
Der Stoff hat sicher nicht das Potenzial für einen Roman wie Germinal, aber die erste Hälfte führt noch einmal sämtliche Handlungsfäden zusammen, das Zola Kurzfassungen der vorher gehenden Romane in einzelne Szenen en passant einbaut und der Doktor, anhand des Stammbaums der ebenso kriminellen wie inzestuösen Fmilie, die Entwicklung von 1799 bis 1873 aufzeigt. Auch vor dem Hintergrund, dass er seiner Musterschülerin den Inhalt seiner Forschungen erklärt, um sein Lebenswerk vor der Vernichtung durch die ehrenkäsige, mittlerweile 80jährge Mutter zu schützen, die nichts unversucht lässt, um das Ansehen der Familie zu schützen.
Die erste Hälfte ist durchaus noch drei Sterne wert, auch wenn die mentale Abhängigkeit Clotildes, bzw. der Ehrgeiz der 25 Jahre jungen Frau, unbedingt den 62jährigen und keinen anderen zu wollen, seitens heutiger Leserschaft mit * sicher für viel Ärger und Unverständnis gut ist.
Im zweiten Teil ist Zola aber von einer geradezu unmenschlichen Schlusswut befallen, dass er nicht nur eine Lawine durchaus möglicher Katastrophen auf das ungleiche Paar einprasseln lässt, sondern andere Mitglieder der Familie unter geradezu lachhaften Umständen den Geist aufgeben. Dazu zählt auch ein Fall von Selbstentzündung eines alten Säufers. Der Tod des Stammvaters wirkt dabei wie eine Übernahme aus Dickens Bleak House, aber vielleicht haben beide Meister auch nur aus derselben Quelle geschöpft.
Im Gegenzug dazu gerät Pascals Agonie unendlich geschwätzig, als gäbe es eine Wechselwirkung zwischen schöpferischen Impotenz der Titelfigur und Problemen des Autors den Stoff zu bewältigen.
Leben geht weiter ist so etwas wie die abschließende Botschaft des Buches, das mit zwei gierig geleerten Brüsten endet, Clotilde geht ganz in der Mutterrolle auf, während Oma Felicité als Wohltäterin ihren größten öffentlichen Triumph feiert, Doktor Pascal ist zum Glied im Stammbaum geschrumpft, hat nicht mehr als seine Rolle in der Propagation des Geschlechts eingenommen.
Ein deprimierendes Ende, das nicht nur die auf den Fortschritt des Menschengeschlechts getaktete erste Lesergeneration enttäuscht hat. Die Naturwissenschaftler haben zudem eine ziemlich fehlerhafte oder zumindest überholte Anwendung der Vererbungslehre als weiteres Hauptmanko ausgemacht. Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts war das noch ein umkämpftes Thema, aber auch mit gut 125 Jahren Abstand lässt sich feststellen, dass die Defizite in Sachen Vererbung negativ auf den Roman, bzw. die Auflösung des Zyklus durchschlagen. Am meisten gewundert hat mich allerdings der Umstand, dass einen derart kritischen Vererbungsforscher nicht der Hauch eines Zweifels beim eigenen Nachwuchs mit der Nichte befallen hat. Alles andere ist rein menschlich, auch, dass eine dickköpfige junge Frau ihren Willen durchsetzt, selbst wenn sie anfangs gar nicht so genau weiß, wie sehr sie nur den einen Mann will, der seit Kindheit zum täglichen Umgang gehört.

Meine persönliche Zola-Bilanz:

Das Glück der Familie Rougon
Seine Exzellenz Eugene Rougon
Die Beute
Das Geld
Der Traum
Die Eroberung von Plassans
Ein Hintertreppenroman
Das Paradies der Damen
Die Sünde des Abbe Mouret
Ein Blatt Liebe
Der Bauch von Paris
Lebensfreude
Der Totschläger
Das Werk
Die Bestie
Germinal
Nana
Mutter Erde
Der Untergang
Doktor Pascal

[نور | NOUR · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mon premier livre d'Émile Zola , il m'était facile de l'écouter comme AudioBook .

[Emma · Rating 1 out of 5]

I’m going to be honest: I think Zola was losing it at this point. It’s a shame the 20-novel Rougon-Macquart saga, which contains a handful of truly excellent works deserving of their enduring fame, and which I have now read and reviewed in full, ends with this dross. My intelligence has rarely been so insulted, and goodness knows lesser authors than Zola have tried.

Some of Zola’s novels would need only a few details changed to make them read as if they were written yesterday. This is very much not one of them.

As he approaches sixty, Dr Pascal Rougon, middle brother of Eugène and Saccard, is still living in Plassans and engaged in a struggle to stop his mother Félicité from destroying his life’s work: his controversial scientific research papers and the files he keeps on their many unsavoury relatives. He dies before her, so she wins in the end, burning all his papers and thus ensuring that her legacy will be spotless in the eyes of the world. I’m glad Félicité, who captivated me with her intelligence and ruthlessness back in the first novel, is the ultimate winner in the last. That’s just about the only thing I’m glad about after reading this.

To be honest, for me, any actual plot this book has, and goodness knows there’s not much, was completely overshadowed by the creepy incestuous “romance”. After raising her since she was 7 years old, 59-year-old Pascal embarks on an affair with his 25-year-old niece Clotilde, daughter of his full brother Saccard. Pascal parades her about town as his mistress and eventually gets her pregnant. The novel closes on her breastfeeding her son-cousin and thinking fond thoughts of the late old uncle who fathered him.

My face basically looked like this for most of the novel: 🤢

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against tackling difficult subjects in fiction. Treated seriously, Pascal and Clotilde’s relationship might have been an interesting if disturbing topic, exploring the ramifications of their vast age difference, explicitly unequal master-pupil/parent-child relationship, and the impact their affair has on the rest of their family and on their progeny’s genes. Instead, none of the issues are given serious examination and all obstacles are glossed over blithely to give us a simplistic, male chauvinist version of the author’s own personal life.

Even leaving the incest aside—though oh boy, are we ever coming back to that in a moment!—the relationship reads like a patriarchal wet dream of male domination and female subjugation.

After numerous scenes where Zola describes Clotilde’s youth and long legs and adorable blonde hair and little widdle breasts as if she were about twelve years old, the incestuous relationship starts because Clotilde realises she’s in love with the elderly Pascal after he roughly manhandles her during an argument about his papers, leaving her bruised and bleeding from a scratch on her shoulder. Apparently, at this point in his life, Zola believes women like that kind of thing. On his side, Pascal initiates the relationship because, aside from the fact he gets to bed a young woman at home instead of the brothels he regularly visits, he’s suddenly realised as he’s about to turn 60 that he wants to have children. I guess by children, he means sons, since he technically already raised a daughter. You know, the full-blood niece he now wants to be the mother of his children. I think I’m doing that emoji face again.

As a lover, Pascal treats Clotilde like a doll, dressing her in pretty clothes and jewellery and largely keeping her tucked away in the isolated property where she’s spent almost her entire life alone with him. We are treated to numerous scenes where Clotilde gushes about how much she worships her decrepit old uncle and how she is so happy to be his obedient, submissive sex slave. At one point, she calls herself “his object, a flower that sprouted at his feet to please him”, before echoing the domineering fantasies of fragile-egoed men throughout the ages, by crying out “Et je ne suis rien, maître, si je ne suis pas tienne !” (I am nothing, master, if I am not yours!). I guess self-worth wasn’t in the curriculum when he was educating her as a young child. This is all pretty dire stuff from someone who once said in Son Excellence Eugène Rougon that women are just as clever as men. Zola evidently regressed as he approached old age.

I don’t know if Zola’s real-life mistress Jeanne was as much of a doormat as Clotilde, but it’s distractingly obvious that a great deal of this is based on the author’s own life as the middle-aged lover of a woman a quarter of a century younger. In other respects too, Pascal is very clearly Zola’s self-insert in this novel. Despite a brief bout of stress-related impotence, he is described as unusually handsome and vigorous for his age (yeah, yeah, dream on, Émile) and shares his writing schedule and interest in heredity with the author, as well as keeping the same notes about the Rougon-Macquart family, including the famous family tree. So it isn’t difficult to imagine that Clotilde is also Jeanne, if not as she actually was, at least as Zola wanted her to be.

And yet, what remains of the astute observer of humanity in Zola still seems to intuitively understand that this “romance” only works if Clotilde has been brainwashed into it over a long period of time. Odds are overwhelmingly stacked in Pascal’s favour. For all her relatively mature age of 25, Clotilde’s physical depictions and impulsive emotional behaviour are more consistent with a young teenager than a grown woman, and this fits in with her completely subservient relationship to Pascal even before they have sex.

She is 34 years younger than Pascal, was raised by him from childhood, unironically calls him “master”, has no friends her own age, has never been to school (Pascal only taught her to read and write), has no independent means of support (the point is made several times that she doesn’t even get pocket money), and aside from occasionally going to church with the maid and her grandmother, doesn’t even seem to leave the property without him. Since the rest of her family are a bunch of self-serving egotists and even Martine, the maid who helped raise her, doesn’t like her, Clotilde has lived practically all her life with no emotional connection to anyone else but Pascal. Nowadays, we call that “grooming”.

But despite the amount of contrivance needed to set it up, this grossly imbalanced incestuous affair is presented to us unblinkingly as a Good Thing, with absolutely no trace whatsoever of irony in a book that also purports to examine the causes of “hereditary degeneration” in a family… You know what the top cause of hereditary degeneration in a family is? Inbreeding! Did Zola not hear about the Hapsburgs? They were big fans of avunculate marriage too and eventually produced this unfortunate abomination who had only 23 individual ancestors where the rest of us have 30.

On that note, just to update people on the state of modern genetic knowledge: a full-blood uncle and niece share on average 25% of their DNA. Having children with your uncle is therefore as bad as reproducing with your half-sibling or your grandparent. Clotilde could only have done worse if she’d had a child by Maxime or Saccard.

However, it’s striking that the novel goes on a great deal about all the sickly children the Rougon-Macquarts have produced with unrelated people, but Zola makes a big fuss about how strong and healthy Clotilde’s son-cousin is. While I’ll admit it’s unlikely problems would immediately appear in the first incestuous generation, the fact that the possibility of inbreeding isn’t even raised makes me wonder if the grandiose conclusion of Zola’s 20-year study of heredity is somehow that having children with your close blood relatives is better than diluting your genes with strangers? I can’t really think what else he might be trying to make us believe here.

One point this all brings home, though, is that 19th century France was closer to the Hapsburgs than to us after all. I find it ironic that the final volume in a 130-year-old book series that, to me, seemed surprisingly modern in many places, should be the one to demonstrate just how very long ago this was written. The 1811 Code Napoleon apparently scrapped incest laws, and contemporary attitudes to incest were evidently different than they are now. La Curée made a big deal of Maxime’s relationship with his unrelated, same-generation stepmother Renée being unacceptable incest—a point reiterated here—and the aunt-in-law/nephew-in-law relationship in Germinal was similarly condemned; though it’s notable that in both those instances, the woman is married and older than the man.

The way Pascal and Clotilde’s “romance” is written, on the other hand, suggests that Zola thought his contemporary audience wouldn’t bat an eyelid at an elderly uncle impregnating his brother’s daughter. I think there is one reference to gossip in the town about “the uncle who debauched his niece”, but that is quickly resolved by writer fiat and from then on, everyone in the entire novel seems to find the relationship entirely wholesome. Félicité’s only objection to her son having sex with her granddaughter is that they’re not married. Even Pascal’s young medical colleague, who proposes to Clotilde at one point, is totally fine with her shacking up with her elderly uncle instead.

Meanwhile, the novel shows its age in its other main subject as well. Zola’s original theme for this one was apparently “a book on science”. There are consequently meandering, confusing passages about various outlandish theories of heredity that would make a cat laugh nowadays (if it weren’t repulsed by all the incest). For example, did you know that Nana probably turned out the way she did because Lantier had it off with her mother years before she was born but Gervaise somehow kept a trace of him inside her that affected her child with Coupeau? (Any influence he might have had on her couldn’t possibly be simply because Lantier was literally living with Nana as she was growing up…) Also, placebo injections of distilled water totally cure every disease and condition! Countryside air stops you from catching tuberculosis when your whole family are carriers! I know it’s unfair to laugh at the ignorance of 130 years ago, but it does make this a tedious read.

To compound matters, the book isn’t even well written. They have a lot of sex and she’s completely submissive and adoring. He’s like King David and she’s the submissive slave girl Abisaïg. The entire population of Plassans smiles as they pass because they look so happy and beautiful together, his hair so white and hers so blond, him all virile and manly at 60 and her his good little submissive woman at 25. They have a lot of sex and she’s completely submissive and adoring. He’s like King David and she’s the submissive slave girl Abisaïg. The entire population of Plassans smiles as they pass because they look so happy and beautiful together, his hair so white and hers so blond, him all virile and manly at 60 and her his good little submissive woman at 25.… and so on. (Apparently, the word “submissive” only appears 10 times. It felt like a lot more.)

To be honest, there is so much padding and repetition that only my outrage at what I was being invited to read kept me awake. Well, that and the determination to finish the whole series. Maybe Zola felt the same. He can’t even be bothered to pace his story: Macquart, Tante Dide and Maxime’s haemophiliac son Charles, retconned in for this novel, all die in one chapter (I’ll grant you that Macquart’s death of “spontaneous combustion” was at least interesting). There’s a chapter in which Pascal summarises every other novel in the series and then infodumps the fates of all the more interesting characters who survived their books, giving details he couldn’t realistically know, and ruining in passing the only happy ending in the Rougon-Macquart series by telling us Octave has started cheating on Denise. Gee, thanks, I’d have liked to stick with the happily ever after version, actually.

This is not a good book and it’s a poor conclusion to the series. And yet, one can imagine how much better this could have been…

Instead of telling us everything in one paragraph, perhaps the novel could have started by showing us brief vignettes of the surviving characters and the lives they now live: Eugène, ever the politician, carving his niche in the new Third Republic; Mouret struggling to adapt to family life but still dazzling the newly reconstructed Paris with his department store; Saccard once again clawing his way to the top of the pile with his Republican newspaper; Étienne exiled in New Caledonia but working with the likes of Louise Michel to better the lives of the Kanak people; Jean finally realising the dream that escaped him in La Terre and La Débâcle, and tending to his farm with a woman who loves him; and maybe a briefer summary of Pascal’s life’s work than the repetitive sprawl we actually got. If Zola really, really wanted to stick with the avunculate incest because of his misguided genetic beliefs, have Clotilde, raised to be a normal human being by someone else, come into Pascal’s life and discover that his work touches on themes that interest her, and nurture a romance from there. I’ll even let him keep the death scene and bonfire of the papers.

And then, when their common ancestor Tante Dide dies at 105, all her surviving descendants who can, converge on Plassans for her funeral and witness Félicité’s ultimate triumph: the former aristocracy, prosperous middle-class, and victorious Republican working class uniting to crown her queen of Plassans…

But no, instead, Zola’s parting shot is a poorly-written, padded novel steeped in ignorance, wishful thinking and reactionary patriarchal attitudes, with a dose of creepy incest on top. I suppose on the plus side, it was so awful, it made me glad the series was finished, and didn’t leave me yearning for more…

ETA: I've now summarised my (non-spoilery) thoughts on the entire series and listed some content warnings for all books on my review for the first volume

[gufo_bufo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ultimo romanzo della serie, che mi riesce difficile valutare in stelline. Ho apprezzato moltissimo la circolarità per cui il racconto si conclude dove tutto era cominciato; è sempre stupendamente delineata la figura di Félicité, secca (“di dietro al liceo, davanti al museo”, si dice perfidamente delle vecchie che mantengono una figura snella) ambiziosa inesorabile; la storia coinvolge il lettore, tanto che nelle pause della lettura mi sono trovata a pensare ai personaggi e ai loro guai. D’altra parte emergono qui ancor più chiaramente che in altri romanzi quelli che a mio parere sono i limiti di Zola: una costruzione complessa finalizzata a sostenere una teoria; dei personaggi creati per essere simboli e che quindi vivono una vita innaturale; dei dialoghi che sono manifesti filosofici; clausole fisse che ricorrono per identificare situazioni e personaggi, con uno sgradevole effetto di scrittura meccanica. Insomma, è Zola, nel bene e nel male. Finisco per valutare in 3 *** l’intero ciclo, dove coesistono pagine di grande potenza e mezzucci di prolifico scrittore professionista.

[Scarlett · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Doktor Paskal" je poslednji roman serijala o Rugon-Makarovima i shodno tome, predstavlja konačnu potvrdu Zolinih teorija o nasleđu i zaokruženje priče o ovoj porodici. Jedini roman koji se možda ne treba čitati bez prethodnog predznanja o Zoli i Paskalovoj porodici. Knjiga je objavljena 1893. godine i nakon skoro dvadeset godina od početka svog projekta, Zola kao da je ublažio svoje teorije i povremeno se nazire njegovo priznanje da nije genetska predispozicija sve u razvoju pojedinca, tu je i negovanje određenih osobina i snaga volje da se radi na sebi i svojim slabostima.

Doktor Paskala smo upoznali u prvom romanu, "Uspon Rugon-Makarovih", ali samo posredno, kao izolovanog sina legitimne loze Rugon koji ne želi mnogo da se meša u njihove spletke, već živi odvojeno i bavi se alternativnom medicinom i istraživanjem. Predstavlja sramotu za svoju majku jer od trojice sinova on jedini nema ambiciju, a to je za nju ogromna slabost. Već na početku mu je time data određena doza objektivnosti i pozicija sa koje može da analizira svoju porodicu, a da ipak osećamo da nije pristrasan. Njegovo životno delo je da napravi detaljnu porodičnu lozu svoje porodice gde će narednim naraštajima biti jasno kako genetika utiče na njihov karakter. Prikupljao je podatke skoro celog svog života i sada se, na užas svoje majke, priprema da to delo objavi kao naučnu studiju koja će svima biti dostupna. Takvo otkrivanje porodičnog prljavog veša za Felisitu nije moguće, pa će sukob majke i sina biti okosnica romana.

Paskal pomalo liči i na Zolu, potrebna mu je tiha porodična atmosfera da bi stvarao svoje veliko životno delo, a na svakom koraku nailazi na osudu i spoticanje. Zola je tokom cele svoje karijere nailazio više na negativnu kritiku, nego na pohvale i podršku, tako da nije teško povezati ove sličnosti. Paskal je pomalo i pasivan, on živi sa sestričinom i spremačicom, a njih dve upravljaju domaćinstvom. One se bave novcem, hranom i svim ovozemaljskim obavezama koje njega ne zanimaju i udaljavaju ga od životnog dela.

Dosta kontroverzna je i činjenica da Paskal ostvaruje vezu sa svojom sestričinom (ona je zapostavljena ćerka njegovog brata Sakara) koja je sa njim u kući od detinjstva. Možda je to predstavljeno kao jedna od devijacija Paskalovog karaktera, ali me čudi da u romanu nigde ne nailazimo na osudu ovakvog spoja, već naprotiv, svi navijaju za njihov brak.

Kao i u prethodnim romanima, vidimo tragični razvoj priče i frustraciju zbog nepravde koja je naneta Paskalu i njegovom konačnom delu. Nijedan od likova ne traži saosećanje i kao čitaocu, bilo mi je teško da prihvatim njihove motive i postupke. Razumevanje je bilo tu, Zola je jasno objasnio pokretač svakog svog junaka, ali su oni toliko mračni i poremećeni da tu prestaje svaka podrška koju bih mogla da im pružim. Baš ta moja borba koju proživljavam dok čitam jeste razlog zbog koga obožavam Zolu i njegove romane.

[Zéro Janvier · Rating 4 out of 5]

Si le récit de ce vingtième et dernier volume des Rougon-Macquart n’est pas le plus passionnant de tous, ce livre offre tout de même une très belle conclusion à une œuvre monumentale. A travers ses personnages, en particulier le Docteur Pascal mais aussi sa nièce et amante Clotilde, Émile Zola dresse le bilan de sa saga familiale. Après avoir raconté la chute du Second Empire dans le volume précédent, il met un terme au récit familial, sur une jolie fin douce-amère qui mêle chagrin et optimisme. Remarquable.

[Gill · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a great feeling to have reached the end of reading the 20 books of the Rougon Maquart series.

What a pity that this final book is only available in such a poor translation. This very much detracted from my enjoyment of this story, which ties up most of the loose ends of the series.

I'm going to miss my bimonthly read of Zola!

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, I did it. I read all 20 goddamn volumes of 'Les Rougon-Macquart', one of the finest monuments to fiction's tackling the human spirit ever. A rich panoply of characters terrible and sympathetic, all based in Zola's simple idea that human shittiness/kindness is somehow genetic. He was mostly wrong but the novels are overall outstanding in their own right. I could recommend almost all of them with a whole heart.
Unfortunately, the project ends with a whimper not a bang with the sad-sack, yawn-inducing tale of incest and, well, incest, that is "Doctor Pascal". Pascal is the character who's basically been charting the progress of everyone in his extended family as part of his scientific study whose thesis is that human shittiness/kindness is somehow genetic. Sounds familiar, right? He's an older guy, 60, and he's spent the last 20 years raising his niece and training her to be a scientific thinker, etc. Then they fall in love and start fucking a lot. Now. I'm not saying that Zola, who had a mistress around this same time, thirty years his junior, was writing this novel as an attempt to somehow justify his affair, but that's what I'm saying. With little-to-no plot, the novel meanders through their creepy relationship and lots of sex is had in a dry, geriatic kind of way. Light filters through curtains and lovely white forearms are bared and so on and so forth. Pascal's project has little to do with the story except that his mother wants to stop him from publishing it and ruining the family name. Hmm. A ripe plot point, but little is done with it. Much of the book is taken up with Zola/Pascal's crazy ideas of genetics and his and the chick's pining after each other.
On the plus side, Zola is a phenomenal writer, especially descriptively and there is a lot of closure, if all to brief and forced, regarding every other character in the other 19 novels.
So, done but not wholly satisfied.

[Sotiris Karaiskos · Rating 4 out of 5]

The epilogue to this great series of novels raises many questions about what might happen next after the collapse of the Second Empire. Can science replace religion? Logic to replace passion? Can everything be explained, put in a predetermined position and thus create the basis for a bright future? What, after all, is the meaning of a life destined to bring pain and frustration? Scientists are immersed in their books trying to find the answers but in the end maybe only human emotions, life itself can give a satisfactory answer.

Through a beautiful and moving story, the author asks these questions and wonders what the future of his country might be. Will France learn from its mistakes and take the right steps, or will bury the past and start the cycle from the beginning? Of course, this concern extends to the whole human species as we all share the same passions. In the end, I have the feeling that the author, after so many negatives he found and commented on these 20 books, leaves room for optimism.

Ο επίλογος αυτού του μεγάλου κύκλου μυθιστορημάτων έχει πολλά ερωτήματα για το τι μπορεί να γίνει στη συνέχεια, μετά την κατάρρευση της δεύτερης αυτοκρατορίας. Μπορεί άραγε η επιστήμη να αντικαταστήσει τη θρησκεία; Η λογική να αντικαταστήσει το πάθος; Μπορούν όλα να εξηγηθούν, να μπουν σε μία προκαθορισμένη θέση και έτσι να δημιουργηθεί η βάση για ένα λαμπρό μέλλον; Ποιο είναι, στο τέλος, το νόημα μιας ζωής προορισμένη να φέρει πόνο και απογοήτευση; Οι επιστήμονες προσπαθούν βυθισμένοι στα βιβλία τους να βρουν τις απαντήσεις αλλά στο τέλος ίσως μόνο τα ανθρώπινα συναισθήματα, η ίδια η ζωή μπορεί να δώσει μία ικανοποιητική απάντηση.

Μέσα από μία όμορφη και συγκινητική ιστορία, ο συγγραφέας βάζει αυτά τα ερωτήματα και αναρωτιέται ποιο μπορεί να είναι το μέλλον της χώρας του. Θα μάθει η Γαλλία κάτι από τα λάθη της και θα προχωρήσει με σωστά βήματα ή θα θάψει το παρελθόν και θα ξεκινήσει ο κύκλος από την αρχή; Φυσικά αυτός ο προβληματισμός εκτείνεται σε όλο το ανθρώπινο είδος καθώς όλοι μας μοιραζόμαστε τα ίδια πάθη. Στο τέλος έχω την αίσθηση ότι ο συγγραφέας, μετά από τα τόσα αρνητικά που βρήκε και σχολίασε σε αυτά τα 20 βιβλία, αφήνει ένα περιθώριο αισιοδοξίας.

[Gláucia Renata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vigésimo e último volume da saga Os Rougon-Macquart, história natural e social de uma família sob o segundo império, focando no médico Pascal Rougon da terceira geração.
Todos os livros da série são independentes e podem ser lidos separadamente sem problema algum, com exceção desse. Aqui o autor faz um resumo breve de todos os anteriores, comentando os destinos finais de seus personagens e quem não conhece as histórias ficará perdido.
Pascal está com cerca de 60 anos e tem um único objetivo: traçar a genealogia de sua família e toda a sua história, comprovando assim a tese da hereditariedade e do fator ambiental como determinantes no destino e comportamento das pessoas. O personagem seria o alter ego do próprio autor, que vinha estudando essas correntes científicas e escreveu todos esses 20 livros baseado nessa ideia.



Histórico de leitura
17/02/2019


"Uma mãe que amamenta é a imagem do mundo continuado e salvo."

"Otave Mouret, proprietário do Paraíso das Damas, cuja fortuna colossal não parava de crescer, tivera, no final do inverno, um segundo filho de sua mulher, Denise Baudu, a quem ele adorava, embora recomeçasse a ter a sua aventurazinha por fora."

"No calor da ardente tarde de julho, a sala, com os postigos cuidadosamente fechados, estava cheia de uma grande calma."

[Erich C · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars rounded down. This was a very disappointing end to the Rougon-Macquart. Yes, there's incest, scheming, fire, but it's so awfully dull! Everything about Pascal is perfect in a noble and kingly way; everything about Clotilde is perfect in an angelic and delicate way. If they have an argument, it's about topics like "You don't revere yourself as much as you should" or "How can you sell jewelry I gave you so that we don't die of starvation? Don't you love me enough?" I haven't rolled my eyes so much in an awfully long time.

Pascal has a white beard, kind of like Noah or God. He's old, but don't worry because he can still make babies no problem. Zola didn't want to piss his girlfriend Jeanne off, and I can tell you exactly what she looked like in real life: She was "willowy," her skin was soft and so delicate that she bruised if you touched her, she had small firm breasts and beautiful blond hair. And she must have called him "master" all the time (if that bugged you in Jane Eyre, you will really notice it here).

Zola also gets all meta with his family tree, as if there's some type of breakthrough there that will end humanity's suffering. To be "scientific," Pascal creates laws of "heredity" from the couple of handfuls of people in the family that he has documented from his hobbyhorse. Zola wants us to believe that losing those notes would set humanity back 20 years, but I've read all the books so I know what they are all about: People resemble their ancestors and are affected by their environment, they can be crappy and conniving, some terrible things happen to them through no fault of their own. Thomas Hardy knew that, too, but he isn't always telling us about it except through excellent plots.

The only pages I might revisit in the future are the ten or so dealing with Felicite, Dide, and Antoine. Otherwise, this book is a one-timer for sure.

Here are my groupings for the books in the Rougon-Macquart:

4.5-5 stars
L'Assommoir *****
La Bête humaine ****1/2
Nana ****1/2
La Débâcle ****1/2

3.5-4 stars
The Fortune of the Rougons ****
His Excellency Eugène Rougon ***1/2
The Kill ****
Money ****
The Conquest of Plassans ****
Pot Luck ***1/2
The Sin of Abbé Mouret ****
A Love Story ***1/2
The Belly of Paris ****
The Bright Side of Life ****
Germinal ****
The Earth****

2.5-3 stars
The Dream ***
The Ladies’ Paradise ***
The Masterpiece ***
Doctor Pascal **1/2

[Natia Morbedadze · Rating 4 out of 5]

გაივლის წლები და სიკვდილის მოლოდინში ექიმი პასკალ რუგონი იმ დროს გაიხსენებს, როდესაც ადელაიდა ფუკმა პირველი რუგონ-მაკარები გააჩინა და იქცა იმ ხის ფესვად, რომელმაც მრავალი ფოთოლი გამოისხა. ჩვენს თვალწინ გაიარა ფრანგული მარტოობის 105-მა წელმა, ამ ოჯახის წევრთა სიხარულით, ტკივილით, ბრძოლით, გამარჯვებით, დამარცხებით, სიკეთით, ბოროტებით, სიგიჟით, სიყვარულით, სიძულვილით, სისასტიკით, რწმენით, გულგრილობით, თავგანწირვით სავსე ყოფამ და ბოლოს კლოტილდასთან ერთად მივხვდით, რომ ცხოვრება გრძელდება. შემოდგომაზე ხე მოიშორებს გამხმარ ფოთლებს, გაზაფხულზე კი ისევ განახლდება და სანამ ბუნებაში ეს პროცესი არსებობს, სანამ დედა შვილს იკრავს გულში, ყოველთვის იარსებებს იმის იმედი, რომ შემდგომი თაობა წინას აჯობებს. ბნელ მემკვიდრეობას უკუაგდებს, თანდაყოლილ ნაკლსა და გარემოს შეეწინააღმდეგება და ნათელ მომავალს შექმნის.

[Eve Kay · Rating 2 out of 5]

Erm...? Zola, why you gotta try a "romance" novel? That's not your shtick! To be fair (to who?), it's not romantic.

There's a romance there, that we can argue in the light of modern views, is actually a sort of manipulation/brainwashing from the side of the elder gentleman towards the fair maiden. She essentially has no one else, she's not held captive but what else does she have in her life besides church and religion? Some oil pastels? Wow, that'll do it for any girl!

*sarcasm

And even that little religion is taken away from her by the man meant to essentially fill the role of a father - NOT to get it on with her!

Eh, isn't that the age-old-story.
But when we come to Zola, any old crap from him is always better than crap from others so I'll take this as a completion of the whole Rougon-Macquart series and pat myself on the back for even finishing it since it seems it is the one that tends to break the camel's back when it comes to getting through every single one of these twenty feats of storytelling.

[Elettra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Il dottor Pascal è l’ultimo libro del ciclo narrativo dei Rougon -Macquart, e pertanto la sua lettura non può essere compresa completamente, se non si sono letti i libri precedenti. Ci troviamo di fronte in questo volume non solo alla conclusione ma al riepilogo dell’intera vicenda. Ricompaiono infatti qui quasi tutti i personaggi protagonisti dei libri precedenti del ciclo, perché proprio il dottor Pascal, uno dei capostipiti della famiglia, ha studiato per tutta la vita come le tare dell’ereditarietà abbiano intaccato e condizionato le azioni e le vite della sua famiglia. Non so se Zola si sia immedesimato o raffigurato in questo personaggio di studioso e ricercatore, certo ha riassunto qui attraverso le parole di Pascal tutta l’idea alla base della saga, ispirata alla medicina sperimentale di Claude Bernard. Non penso sia il libro migliore del ciclo ma è certamente un testo epico con tanto di lotta di Pascal per la difesa della sua opera contro la madre Felicitè che la vuole distruggere (e che alla fine riuscirà!), la ricerca e i dubbi dell’uomo e dello studioso, l’amore assoluto e totalizzante per la nipote Clotilde, la consapevolezza di non essere neppure lui immune dalle tare della sua famiglia. È comunque un libro che stimola ulteriori riflessioni.

[AB · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's something for everything there, the best and the worst, the vulgar and the sublime, flowers, muck, tears, laugher, the river of life itself endlessly carrying humanity along!

And it's also a historical document; it tells the story of the Second empire, from the coup d'etat to Sedan, for our family rose from the people, then spread throughout the whole of contemporary society, invaded all walks of life, propelled by outbreaks of unbridled appetite, by the essentially modern impulse, this crack of the whip that drives the lower classes to seek pleasure, as they move upwards across the social body...

With Doctor Pascal, I have now completed the entire R&M series. While The Debacle may be the true (apocalyptic) end of this series as a social history of the Second Empire, Doctor Pascal is really the spiritual end. The true center of this novel is a both a summation of Zola's characters and defense of what he wrote. He revels in the beauty of life as whole. Both the good and the bad, life is worth experiencing.

The story itself was not all that amazing, which I am fine with. Much like The Debacle, there is such a complete affirmation of life and the future and really, it was a fitting end to a series that I have been reading on and off for over 5 years.

[Eilidh Fyfe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful writing and profound ideas. However, this book would have been rated 4 stars were it not for the fact that it revolves around grooming.
Old Man raises his niece from childhood to being a 25 year old, attacks her when they disagree on religious ideas, marries her and then dies in a somewhat noble medical way.
I was also surprised at the graphic nature of many death scenes such as a child bleeding continuously out of his nose until death as a mute, demented old woman watches helplessly and a man who is set on fire and burns to death because he is very fat, thus serving as fuel, and because he is in such a severe alcoholic coma that he doesn’t wake up.
Happy happies.

[G · Rating 4 out of 5]

The last of the Rougon Macquart series! He ends in great form delving fairly deeply into his whole determinism philosophy. I thoroughly enjoyed this as well as the other 19. So glad I stuck with group to finish the entire series. Well worth the effort.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

A magnificent conclusion to the brilliant 20-novel sequence featuring the Rougon and Macquart families living during France's Second Empire under Napoleon III. Emile Zola was clever enough to make each novel stand on its own if read out of sequence. Reading them in chronological order somehow brings readers closer to the stories of the five generations of these families.