Zola

Zola's place as one of the towering figures of modern civilization would today seem secure. A major shaper of the twentiethcentury novel, most notably the twentieth-century American novel, he has never ceased to be enormously popular with the public at large. His best works have lost little or none of their power over the years. Moreover, since the current revival of critical interest in him began about 1950, his literary reputation has soared ever higher. Few commentators would now deny that L 'Assommoir, Germinal, and La Terre and probably also Nana and La Debacle are supremely great novels. Zola still remains, furthermore, along with Michelet and Hugo, one of the chief embodiments of republican France, and what Anatole France said of him is still undeniably true: 'he was a moment of the conscience of man.'
Like most other contemporary students of Zola, I have been impressed above all by the artistic, poetic, and prophetic aspects of Zola's fiction. No doubt because, in my youth, I also dreamt of becoming a creative writer, I have also been especially fascinated by Zola's artistic development, his mature aesthetic theories, and his long, hard, and ultimately successful struggle to achieve lasting literary fame. To provide a complete image of the man while emphasizing these aspects of his life and works is the purpose of this book.