All About Books discussion

Gill and Laura, should we read this in the very beginning of May?

Yes, that suits me well. As I've said on the Sebald thread, I can read some of this on my flight out to Brisbane.

Great, is that alright for you too Laura?

Good for me too

Well, I've started this one a bit early. I finished chapter 1, and I have to say it feels like this is going to be a good read. I especially liked the description of (view spoiler)[ the wash house, both the normal things that happened there and the rather exceptional events of that day! (hide spoiler)]

Yes. I've stared it as well today and got to chap 5. Don't know why but those of this novels set in Paris are more to my taste than those in the country! The wash house scene was great (view spoiler)[reminded me of some italian "lavandaie" waherwomen fighting for men or children in some neorealistic films of the '60s (hide spoiler)]

I've started it yesterday, and who would have thought: it's very much a Zola!!! :) The description of women beating each other half to death in the wash house? OH my.
I agree, I prefer the big city ones as well, and this starts promising.

Loved the somewhat absurd marriage party and their attempts to go sight- and artseeing.

I finished it yesterday! Couldn't stop reading it!
Definitly one of the best so far - and one of the most terrible one.
So many things to talk about; so many different perspectives.
I'll wait a bit for you to chatch up.

I've enjoyed what I've read so far, will probably get quite a lot read the next few days.

I've just finished Chapter 6. What is it with Zola, that things become so sordid? Though I must admit he writes it well!

I've just finished Chapter 7. I loved the description of the dinner party.

Gill wrote: "I've just finished Chapter 7. I loved the description of the dinner party."

Din't you find it a bit..."excessive"?

LauraT wrote: "Gill wrote: "I've just finished Chapter 7. I loved the description of the dinner party."

Din't you find it a bit..."excessive"?"

Well yes, but then it is written by Zola!!!!

LOL, good point. Almost at the end, and as usual he's not the most subtle of writers, but I am quite enjoying this one!

Yes you're right; it is a sort of "marks" of his books...

I've not brought my 'family tree' away with me. Can either of you remind me how the people in this book fit into the Rougon Maquart family? Thanks

Oh dear, how badly Lalie is treated by her father.

Ladies,

Is this one the same as L'Assommoir (The Dram Shop)? The details you're discussing seem to fit (I read it a few years ago and liked it very much!)

Alice wrote: "Ladies,

Is this one the same as L'Assommoir (The Dram Shop)? The details you're discussing seem to fit (I read it a few years ago and liked it very much!)"

Yes, Alice. It seems to have a variety of titles in translation.

I can remember the vivid description of the still inside the bar, as if it had a life of its own, and how Gervaise was repulsed by the sight of it (an irony)!

I am so painfully slow with this one this time, though I enjoy it so much more than our last Zola's!!

Gill wrote: "Oh dear, how badly Lalie is treated by her father."

I think those are he most terrible pages of the book, though I'm afraid they were real more than realistic...

Jenny wrote: "I am so painfully slow with this one this time, though I enjoy it so much more than our last Zola's!!"

I do agree. This is so much better - and more terrible!

Gill wrote: "I've not brought my 'family tree' away with me. Can either of you remind me how the people in this book fit into the Rougon Maquart family? Thanks"

Me too. Tomorrow I'll be at home and give it a look. The only thing that's clear is that they're Naná parents! I before starting I didn't even know that Nana was part if a serie!

Gill wrote: "I've not brought my 'family tree' away with me. Can either of you remind me how the people in this book fit into the Rougon Maquart family? Thanks"

Ha, I feel so German now, because I always carry it in a little pocket of my mini-kobo case ;)

As a reminder: The Rougon-Macquart family begins with Adelaïde Fouque. Born in 1768 in the fictional Provençal town Plassans to middle-class parents (members of the French "bourgeoisie"), she has a slight intellectual disability. She marries Rougon, and gives birth to a son, Pierre Rougon. However, she also has a lover, the smuggler Macquart, with whom she has two children: Ursule and Antoine Macquart. This means that the family is split in three branches.

Gervaise Macquart is the daugther of the Lower Class strand of the family. Antoine Marcquart is her father. The first time this family played a lead in one of his novels (apart from the introductory first) was in the Belly of Paris. So maybe we don't only like Zola best when in a big city, but we like him best when with the Macquarts?

Mmm you may be right

Jenny wrote: "Gill wrote: "I've not brought my 'family tree' away with me. Can either of you remind me how the people in this book fit into the Rougon Maquart family? Thanks"

Ha, I feel so German now, because I..."

Ummm, "The Kill" ("La Curee") which is another Rougon-Macquart novel that I loved is set in Paris but is concerned with Aristide Saccard who is related to the Rougon branch... Did you guys like "The Kill"?

I wrote a review of "The Kill" if anyone is interested:-

http://goo.gl/v01bZ0

Just finished. Uffff. What a downward spiral!!

Jenny wrote: "Just finished. Uffff. What a downward spiral!!"
Yes, I know what you mean! I'm so glad that Zola isn't writing my life for me. I would have given up by this stage, if he was! Having said that, he writes so graphically doesn't he?

Alice wrote: "Jenny wrote: "Gill wrote: "I've not brought my 'family tree' away with me. Can either of you remind me how the people in this book fit into the Rougon Maquart family? Thanks"

Ha, I feel so German ..."
Thanks Alice. I'll have a look at the review.

Gill wrote: "Jenny wrote: "Just finished. Uffff. What a downward spiral!!"
Yes, I know what you mean! I'm so glad that Zola isn't writing my life for me. I would have given up by this stage, if he was! Having s..."

I suppose your life isn't so terrible though! Or at least I hope so!!!!

Since we've all finished, what do you say about it being classified as a novel centred in the terrible effects of alcohol and alcohilism?

It is of course about that, but I feel that there's more. Germaine become and alcoholis right in the end of the novel; what I found really scaring was what we call in italian the "ignavia" - remember the third Canto on Dante's Inferno Jenny? We could translate it with apathy, indolence.
Germaine saw, clearly saw, that everything was going into ruin, but couldn't "make an effort". Only in the end she was prisoner of alcohol, before she was sort of stupefied by the events; didn't have the strengh to fight back.

Feeling sometims overpowered myself by life I'm always terrified by these stories ...

I think Zola is also trying to show gross social injustice in French society by depicting the stark despair and powerlessness of the lower social class against a backdrop of extravagance and prosperity under Napoleon III's rule. All Gervaise ever wants out of life is "to be able to get on with her work, always have something to eat and a half-decent place to sleep, , bring up her children properly, not to be beaten, and die in her own bed". And yet such humble wants are denied her. Financial security is always something very fickle for people in such social class. When bad luck strikes, they have no defense whatsoever. The irony is that the authorities are spending vast sums to gentrify the whole of Paris.

You are right "up to a certain point" I think.
Zola was definitly fighting against social injustice, and the economical instability of all the lower classes is here well depicted and stigmatized.
But I think he was also stigmetizing some "moral deficiencies" of single people.
It is true that the money that Gervaise and Coupeau had put by were scattered after his falling from the roof he was wotking on, but after that he stopped working altogether and started drinking. Thta's what really broght the family to ruin. Followed by Gervaise "abandoning the struggle" for life: she let things go: she was a good worker and suddenly she stopped being precise and neat.

LauraT wrote: "You are right "up to a certain point" I think.
Zola was definitly fighting against social injustice, and the economical instability of all the lower classes is here well depicted and stigmatized.
..."

Yes, Laura, I do agree that Coupeau should be blamed here for becoming an idler and not making any real efforts. But in Gervaise's case, I think she should be given some slack. Sometimes in life when one mishap comes relentlessly after another, one's will power to struggle gets chipped away and is tempted to find an easy way out (in her case, numbing herself by turning to alcohol). Understandably, in a low point in life, a desperate person could easily give up hope when there doesn't appear to be any help forthcoming.

Alice wrote: "But in Gervaise's case, I think she should be given some slack. Sometimes in life when one mishap comes relentlessly after another, one's will power to struggle gets chipped away and is tempted to find an easy way out (in her case, numbing herself by turning to alcohol). Understandably, in a low point in life, a desperate person could easily give up hope when there doesn't appear to be any help forthcoming. "

Here we do agree!

I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited propensities will 'come out'. I don't think I've really got to grips with the fact that Zola actually believes what he believes.

Gill wrote: "I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited propensities will 'come out'. I don't th..."

Ah ah ah!!!

Readin these books made me think of another great writer of more or less the same period, italian this time: Giovanni Verga.
He had a terribly deterministic - and pessimistic - view of life in general and on life of the lower classes in particular.
The House by the Medlar Tree in particular is incredibly beautifull and terrible at the same time!!!

Gill wrote: "I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited propensities will 'come out'. I don't th..."

On such subjects, it's hard to be scientifically accurate. Perception, experience and observation serve as the general guide to judgment. I would say that in a lot of cases, what Zola claims does have some truth - it's so much harder for the lower social classes to have success because of their deprivation in childhood. If you're born poor, you're likely to stay poor. Such phenomenon should not be uncommon in Zola's times, when social welfare was unheard of yet.

Alice wrote: "Gill wrote: "I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited propensities will 'come out..."

My understanding is that Zola is not really looking at issues such as poverty but the way that one is pre-disposed to alcoholism/depravity etc. With Gervaise he has constructed a story where rat one stage in life she is succeeding, but then because of her inherited characteristics she goes back to dismal failure. In another authors hands the period where she is succeeding could be the climax of the book, but Zola couldn't allow this to happen.

Gill wrote: "Alice wrote: "Gill wrote: "I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited propensities ..."

His objective may be two-pronged. But his aim to expose the darker side of society is quite evident. On his "Rougon-Macquart" series, Zola was quoted as commenting thus:-

"I want to portray, at the outset of a century of liberty and truth, a family that cannot restrain itself in its rush to possess all the good things that progress is making available and is derailed by its own momentum, the fatal convulsions that accompany the birth of a new world."

Evidently, 'family' here refers to the Rougons, while the Macquarts who are destitute and tragic serve as a stark contrast.

Gill, I think you are partly right, but then I guess Zola has so far not really proven to be an author with a micro-vision, meaning he seems not very interested in the individual and mostly tends to comment on a political and larger sociological level. So despite the fact that I agree with your theory on Gervaise and her predisposition, I do think that Zola is looking at it very much also through the lens of her social background and is making a comment on lower class in general, which - if one were to put it harshly - would be: if your born in the dirt you'll stick with the dirt despite the attempts to climb the ladder. The fact that Gervaise washes for a living seems almost ironic if one were to take that point of view.
Do you guys think that Zola genuinely emphasizes with Gervaise? This may seem a silly question, but did Zola like Gervaise or feel for her you think?

Alice wrote: "Gill wrote: "Alice wrote: "Gill wrote: "I guess if Zola's views on personalities, heredity etc we're to be accepted, there's no way Gervaise stands a chance of success in life, since her inherited ..."

Sorry Alice, I've only just now seen you comment after posting mine (that's what you get if you take such a long time writing a comment because you keep getting distracted ;))

I agree!

Jenny, regarding your question, my take is that as much as Zola wants to empathize with his characters, he has to use them to evoke a sense of justice and a sense of right and wrong in his readers. Therefore, something bordering on mawkishness results.

See I have the same feeling, which is why I think Zola won't ever win my heart fully, despite the fact that I've so far enjoyed some of his novels in the series a lot.

Actually I have never intended to read all the 20 books in his series. I've so far read three (Nana, L'Assommoire and La Curee) and plan to read two more (Germinal and La Bete Humaine) and that's it. I just don't want to satiate myself to excess :)
On the other hand, I still adore Zola for his humanistic views as well as for his altruistic act relating to the Alfred Dreyfus affair.

I'm not sure what Zola thought re Gervaise; my gut feeling is that he didn't empathise with her. The characters he, it seems to me, empathises with are the 'bit-players'. You know, the ones who gossip and chat and take some delight in others' misfortunes. I think he has an extraordinary grasp of their discussions and interactions.