Emile Zola: Social Reformer

Literature / Writers Datebook: April 2

Major 19^th-century novelist known for novels that deal with harsh realities in working-class life but reflective of his humane values and the need to defend them.  (170)

Emile Zola (2 April 1840 – 29 September 1902), French novelist, journalist and critic, was born in Paris, the son of an Italian engineer.  He grew up in Aix-en-Provence, southeast of France, educated at the College Bourbon (now College Mignet).  When he was seven his father died leaving the family with financial problems having been debt-ridden. He moved back with his mother to Paris when he was 18.  He studied in Lycee Saint-Louis.

After failing his final school exam, he went to work for a publisher as a clerk,  but soon became an active journalist. He began writing novels and gained his first  success with Therese Raquin, a story with a very powerful picture of remorse, which was published when he was 27 years old. Emile Zola was also a political journalist, critical of the French Emperor Napoleon III and his Second Empire. 

The people he subsequently met, and his experiences as he struggled for success as a writer, became provocative subject matter in the short stories and novels that earned him  place in literature. 

When he was 31, Zola began writing the great novels called Les Rougon-Macquart series of 20 novels about 'the natural and social history of a family under the Second Empire,' which he didn't complete until 22 year later. This series comprises a score of books, all linked to each other by the appearance of one or more members of the family, describing their lives and adventures. In order to apply his theory to the study of le document humain, Zola mastered the technical details of most professions, occupations and crafts, as well as the history of recent events in France at that time. Zola wrote about all levels of French society, from prostitutes (Nana), poor farm laborers (The Soil) to coal miners (Germinal).  His writings portrayed the harsh realities of life, nevertheless reflecting his attachment to humane values and the need to defend them.   
 

In the later years of the Empire he had formed with Flaubert, Daudet, the Goncourts, and Turgenev a sort of informal society, out of which grew the 'Naturalist school'.

Zola espoused the cause of Jewish soldier Alfred Dreyfus who was accused of treason, in his famous letter I Accuse! to the president of France in 1898. He was brought to trial for libel, convicted and sentenced, and removed from the Legion of Honor. Rather than go to jail, he escaped for a year to England, but welcomed back as a hero.

He wrote two more series of novels, The Three Cities (3 Volumes, 1894-98) and The four Gospels (4 volumes, 1899-1902).     

At 62, he died in Paris, suffocated by carbon monoxide poisoning, from charcoal fumes coming in the chimney of his home. 

Photo Credit:


Emile Zola. Public Domain.

Resources:  Emile Zola. en.wikipedia.org.  Accessed April 19, 2009

Emile Zola. Encyclopaedia Britanica. Accessed April 2009

The Life of Emile Zola.  A biographical film about his involvement with the Dreyfus affair and his friendship with painter Cezanne.  It won the Academy Award for best picture in 1937. 



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