A Zola Dictionary Part 3

L'a.s.sommoir.

A terrible study of the effects of drink on the moral and social condition of the working-cla.s.s in Paris. There is probably no other work of fiction in which the effects of intemperance are shown with such grimness of realism and uncompromising force.

Gervaise Macquart, daughter of Antoine Macquart (_La Fortune des Rougon_), having accompanied her lover Lantier to Paris, taking with her their two children, was deserted by him a few weeks after their arrival in the city. She got employment in the laundry of Madame Fauconnier, and a few months later married Coupeau, a zinc-worker, who, though the son of drunken parents, was himself steady and industrious. For a while everything prospered with the Coupeaus; by hard work they were able to save a little money, and in time a daughter (Nana) was born to them.

Then an accident to Coupeau, who fell from the roof of a house, brought about a change. His recovery was slow, and left him with an unwillingness to work and an inclination to pa.s.s his time in neighbouring dram-shops. Meantime Gervaise, with money borrowed from Goujet, a man who loved her with almost idyllic affection, had started a laundry of her own. She was successful for a time, in spite of her husband's growing intemperance and an increasing desire in herself for ease and good living; but deterioration had begun, and with the reappearance of Lantier, her old lover, it became rapid. Coupeau was by this time a confirmed loafer and drunkard, while Gervaise was growing careless and ease-loving. Lantier, having become a lodger with the Coupeaus, ceased doing any work, and as he never paid anything for his board, his presence not unnaturally hastened the downfall of his hosts.

Circ.u.mstances conspired to renew the old relations between Gervaise and Lantier, and by easy stages she descended that somewhat slippery stair which leads to ruin. The shop was given up, and she again got employment in the laundry of Madame Fauconnier, though she was no longer the capable workwoman of former times. Nana, her daughter, vicious from childhood, had taken to evil courses; her husband had at least one attack of delirium tremens; and she herself was fast giving way to intemperance. The end was rapid. Coupeau died in the asylum of Sainte-Anne after an illness the description of which is for pure horror unparalleled in fiction; while Gervaise, after sinking to the lowest depths of degradation and poverty, died miserably in a garret. The tragedy of it all is that Gervaise, despite her early lapse with Lantier, was a good and naturally virtuous woman, whose ruin was wrought by circ.u.mstances and by the operation of the relentless laws of heredity.

It may be useful to note here that though Zola states in _L'a.s.sommoir_ that Gervaise and Lantier had two sons (Claude, born 1842, and Etienne, born 1846), he makes a third son (Jacques, born 1844), not elsewhere mentioned, the hero of _La Bete Humaine_, a subsequent work in the Rougon-Macquart series.

L'Oeuvre.

A novel dealing with artistic life in Paris towards the close of the Second Empire.

Claude Lantier, the eldest son of Auguste Lantier and Gervaise Macquart (_La Fortune des Rougon_ and _L'a.s.sommoir_), had been educated at Pla.s.sans by an old gentleman who was interested in his childish skill in drawing. His benefactor died, leaving him a sum which yielded an annual income of a thousand francs, and he came to Paris to follow an artistic career. There he met Dubuche, Pierre Sandoz, and others of his former schoolboy friends, and the little band formed a coterie of revolutionary spirits, whose aim was to introduce new ideas and drastic changes into the accepted canons of art. Claude attempted to embody his theories in a picture which he called _Plein Air_ ("Open Air") in which he went direct to nature for inspiration, and threw aside all recognized conventions.

The picture was refused by the committee of the _Salon_, and when subsequently shown at a minor exhibition was greeted with derision by the public. The artist was in despair, and left Paris with Christine Hallegrain, a young girl between whom and himself a chance acquaintanceship had ripened into love. They lived happily in a little cottage in the country for several years, a son being born to them, but Claude became restless, and they returned to Paris. Here he gradually became obsessed by an idea for a great picture, which would show the truth of his theories and cover his detractors with confusion. By this time there is no doubt that his mind was becoming affected by repeated disappointments, and that the family virus was beginning to manifest itself in him. Everything was now sacrificed to this picture; his little fortune was gradually encroached on, and his wife and child (he had married Christine some time after their return to Paris) were frequently without the necessaries of life. Christine was, however, devoted to her husband, and did all she could to induce him to leave the picture, which she saw was increasing his mental disturbance. This was becoming more serious, and in the death of his child he saw only the subject of a picture, _L'Enfant Mort_, which was exhibited at the _Salon_ and was received with even more contempt than _Plein Air_. Despite all the efforts of Christine, Claude returned to his intended masterpiece, and one morning, in despair of achieving his aims, hanged himself in front of the fatal picture.

As a study of artistic life the novel is full of interest. There is little doubt that the character of Claude Lantier was suggested by that of Edouard Manet, the founder of the French Impressionist school, with whom Zola was on terms of friendship. It is also certain that Pierre Sandoz, the journalist with an idea for a vast series of novels dealing with the life history of a family, was the prototype of Zola himself.

La Bete Humaine.

A novel dealing with railway life in France towards the close of the Second Empire. The hero is Jacques Lantier, the second son of Gervaise Macquart and August Lantier (_La Fortune des Rougon_ and _L'a.s.sommoir_).

When his parents went to Paris with his two brothers, he remained at Pla.s.sans with his G.o.dmother, "Aunt Phasie," who afterwards married Misard, a railway signalman, by whom she was slowly poisoned to secure a small legacy which she had concealed. After Jacques had pa.s.sed through the School of Arts and Crafts at Pla.s.sans he became a railway engine-driver, and entered the service of the Western Railway Company, regularly driving the express train between Paris and Havre. He was a steady man and a competent engineer, but from his early youth he had been affected by a curious form of insanity, the desire to murder any woman of whom he became fond. "It seemed like a sudden outburst of blind rage, an ever-recurring thirst to avenge some very ancient offences, the exact recollection of which escaped him." There was also in the employment of the railway company, as a.s.sistant station-master at Havre, a compatriot of Lantier named Roubaud, who had married Severine Aubry, the G.o.dchild of President Grandmorin, a director of the company. A chance word of Severine's roused the suspicions of Roubaud regarding her former relations with the President, and, driven to frenzy by jealousy, he compelled her to become his accomplice in the murder of Grandmorin in an express train between Paris and Havre.

Though slight suspicion fell upon the Roubauds, they were able to prove an alibi, and as, for political reasons, it was not desired that Grandmorin's character should be publicly discussed, the inquiry into the murder was dropped. By a singular chance, however, Jacques Lantier had been a momentary witness of the crime, and the Roubauds became aware of his suspicions. To secure his silence they invited him constantly to their house, and a liaison with Severine followed. For the first time Lantier's blood l.u.s.t was not aroused; the knowledge that this woman had killed seemed to const.i.tute her a being apart and sacred. After the murder of Grandmorin a gradual disintegration of Roubaud's character set in, and he became in time a confirmed gambler. His relations with his wife were ultimately so strained that she induced Lantier to promise to murder him, in order that they might fly together to America with the proceeds of a small legacy she had received from Grandmorin. The arrangements were made, but at the last moment Lantier's frenzy overtook him, and it was Severine who was struck down by the knife destined for her husband. Lantier escaped without suspicion; but Roubaud, who was found on the scene of the crime under circ.u.mstances considered compromising, was tried, and along with a companion equally innocent, was sentenced to penal servitude for life. But Nemesis was not distant; Jacques had aroused the jealous fury of his fireman, Pecqueux, who, one night in 1870, attacked him as they were driving a train loaded with soldiers bound for the war. A fierce struggle followed, and in the end the two men fell from the engine and were cut in pieces beneath the wheels of the train, which, no longer under control, rushed on into the darkness with its living freight.

Germinal.

A novel dealing with the labour question in its special relation to coal-mining. The scene of the book is laid in the north of France at a time preceding and during a great strike; the hero is Etienne Lantier (_La Fortune des Rougon_ and _L'a.s.sommoir_). In a moment of pa.s.sion Lantier had struck one of his superiors, and having been dismissed from his employment as an engineer, found it difficult to get work, till, after drifting from place to place, he eventually became a coal-miner.

The hardships of the life and its miserable remuneration impressed him deeply, and he began to indoctrinate his comrades with a spirit of revolt. His influence grew, and he became the acknowledged leader of the strike which followed. The result was disastrous. After weeks of misery from cold and hunger the infuriated workmen attempted to destroy one of the pits, and were fired upon by soldiers sent to guard it. Many were killed, and the survivors, with their spirits crushed, returned to work.

But worse was yet to come. Souvarine, an Anarchist, disgusted with the ineffectual struggle, brought about an inundation of the pit, whereby many of his comrades were entombed. Among them was Lantier, who was, however, eventually rescued.

As a study of the ever-lasting struggle between capital and labour the work has no rival in fiction; the miseries and degradation of the mining cla.s.s, their tardy revolt against their employers, and their sufferings from hunger during its futile course, these are the theme, and the result is a picture of gloom, horrible and without relief.

Nana.

A novel dealing largely with theatrical life in Paris. Nana, the daughter of Coupeau and Gervaise Macquart his wife (_L'a.s.sommoir_), has been given a part in a play produced at the Theatre des Varietes, and though she can neither sing nor act, achieves by the sheer force of her beauty an overwhelming success. All Paris is at her feet, and she selects her lovers from among the wealthiest and best born. But her extravagance knows no bounds, and ruin invariably overtakes those who yield to her fascination. After squandering vast sums she goes to the East, and stories spread that she had captivated a viceroy and gained a great fortune in Russia. Her return to Paris is speedily followed by her death from small-pox. In this novel the life of the courtesan cla.s.s is dealt with by Zola with unhesitating frankness; there are many vivid studies of theatrical manners; and the racecourse also comes within its scope. The work was intended to lay bare the canker which was eating into the social life of the Second Empire and ultimately led to the _debacle_ of 1870.

La Terre.

This is a novel which treats of the conditions of agricultural life in France before the war with Prussia, and the subsequent downfall of the Second Empire. It is, in some respects, the most powerful of all Zola's novels, but in dealing with the subject he unfortunately thought it necessary to introduce incidents and expressions which, from their nature, must always render it impossible to submit the book in its entirety to the general English reader.

Its connection with the Rougon-Macquart series is somewhat slight. Jean Macquart, son of Antoine Macquart and brother of Gervaise (_La Fortune des Rougon_), having served his time in the Army, came to the plain of La Beauce, and became an agricultural labourer on the farm of La Borderie, which belonged to Alexandre Hourdequin. He fell in love with Lise Mouche, who, however, married Buteau, and Macquart subsequently married her sister Francoise. Constant quarrels now arose between the two sisters as to the division of their father's property, and in the end Francoise was murdered by her sister. Macquart, tired of the struggle, decided to rejoin the army, which he did immediately after the outbreak of war.

The interest of the book is, however, largely connected with the history of the Fouans, a family of peasants, the senior member of which, having grown old, divided his land among his three children. The intense and brutish rapacity of these peasants, their utter lack of any feeling of morality or duty, their perfect selfishness, not stopping short of parricide, form a picture of horror unequalled in fiction. It is only to be regretted that the author, in leaving nothing to the imagination, has produced a work suitable only for the serious student of sociology.

La Debacle.

In the earlier volumes of the Rougon-Macquart series Zola had dealt with every phase of life under the Second Empire, and in this novel he tells the story of that terrific land-slide which overwhelmed the regime. It is a story of war, grim and terrible; of a struggle to the death between two great nations. In it the author has put much of his finest work, and the result is one of the masterpieces of literature. The hero is Jean Macquart, son of Antoine Macquart and brother of Gervaise (_La Fortune des Rougon_). After the terrible death of his wife, as told in _La Terre_, Jean enlisted for the second time in the army, and went through the campaign up to the battle of Sedan. After the capitulation he was made prisoner, and in escaping was wounded. When he returned to active service he took part in crushing the excesses of the Commune in Paris, and by a strange chance it was his hand that killed his dearest friend, Maurice Leva.s.seur, who had joined the Communist ranks. _La Debacle_ has been described as "a prose epic of modern war," and vast though the subject be, it is treated in a manner that is powerful, painful, and pathetic.

In the preface to the English translation (_The Downfall_. London: Chatto & Windus) Mr. E. A. Vizetelly quotes from an interview with Zola regarding his aim in writing the work. A novel, he says, "contains, or may be made to contain, everything; and it is because that is my creed that I am a novelist. I have, to my thinking, certain contributions to make to the thought of the world on certain subjects, and I have chosen the novel as the best way of communicating these contributions to the world. Thus _La Debacle_, in the form of a very precise and accurate relation of a series of historical facts--in other words, in the form of a realistic historical novel--is a doc.u.ment on the psychology of France in 1870. This will explain the enormous number of characters which figure in the book. Each character represents one _etat d'ame psychologique_ of the France of the day. If my work be well done, the reader will be able to understand what was in men's minds and what was the bent of men's minds--what they thought and how they thought at that period."

Le Docteur Pascal.

In this, the concluding novel of the Rougon-Macquart series, Zola gathers together the threads of the preceding volumes and makes a vigorous defence of his theories of heredity. The story in the book is both simple and sad. Doctor Pascal Rougon, a medical man at Pla.s.sans and a distinguished student of heredity, had brought up his niece Clotilde (daughter of Aristide Rougon alias Saccard) from childhood. Years afterwards they found that they pa.s.sionately loved one another, but they did not marry, as Pascal, who had lost money, thought that by doing so she would sacrifice her interests. (In this connection it is right to mention that marriage between an uncle and a niece is legal in France, and is not uncommon.) With fine self-sacrifice Pascal persuaded Clotilde to go to Paris to live with her brother who was wealthy and wanted her to nurse him. Soon after her departure Pascal showed symptoms of a fatal affection of the heart, and after some weeks of great suffering telegraphed for Clotilde to come back. One hour before her return he died. His mother, Madame Felicite Rougon, who feared that his researches on heredity might bring scandal on the family, burned all his papers, and in one hour destroyed the work of a lifetime. A child was born to Clotilde seven months after the death of Doctor Pascal; a child which he intensely desired, in the hope that through it might come the regeneration and rejuvenation of his race.

Zola, in an interview quoted by Mr. E. A. Vizetelly in the preface to his translation of _Le Docteur Pascal_ (London: Chatto & Windus), states that in this book he has been able to defend himself against all the accusations which have been brought against him. "Pascal's works on the members of his family," says Zola, "is, in small, what I have attempted to do on humanity, _to show all so that all may be cured_. It is not a book which, like _La Debacle_, will stir the pa.s.sions of the mob. It is a scientific work, the logical deduction and conclusion of all my preceding novels, and at the same time it is my speech in defence of all that I have done before the court of public opinion."

THE ZOLA DICTIONARY

A

ADELE, the girl for whom Auguste Lantier deserted Gervaise Macquart.

They lived together for seven years, a life of constant bickerings and quarrels, accompanied, not infrequently, by blows, until the connection was ended by Adele running away. Her sister was Virginie, with whom Gervaise fought in the public washing-house on the day of her desertion by Lantier. L'a.s.sommoir.

ADELE, maid-servant to the Josserands, and one of Hector Trublot's friends. Pot-Bouille.

ADELE, an a.s.sistant in the shop of Quenu, the pork-butcher. It was she who took charge of the shop on the sudden death of her master. And subsequently sent Pauline Quenu to Madame Chanteau. La Joie de Vivre.

ADOLPHE, an artillery driver in the same battery as Honore Fouchard. In accordance with a rule of the French artillery, under which a driver and a gunner are coupled, he messed with Louis, the gunner, whom, however, he was inclined to treat as a servant. At the battle of Sedan, before the Calvary d'Illy, where the French were almost exterminated by the Prussian artillery, Adolphe fell, killed by a wound in the chest; in a last convulsion he clasped in his arms Louis, who had fallen at the same moment, killed by the same shot. La Debacle.

ALBINE, niece of Jeanbernat, keeper of the Paradou, a neglected demesne in Provence. Her father had ruined himself and committed suicide when she was nine years old, and she then came to live with her uncle. She grew up in that vast garden of flowers, herself its fairest, almost in ignorance of the world outside, and when Abbe Mouret came to the Paradou forgetful of his past, she loved him unconsciously from the first. As she nursed him towards health, and his mind began again to grow from that fresh starting-point to which it had been thrown back, there developed an idyll as beautiful and as innocent as that which had its place in another and an earlier garden. The awakening of Abbe Mouret to the recollections of his priesthood ended the romance, for the call of his training was too strong for his love. One effort Albine made to bring him back, and it was successful in so much that one day he returned to the Paradou. Again there followed the struggle between the flesh and the Church, and again the Church prevailed. Broken-hearted, Albine pa.s.sed for the last time through her loved garden, gathering as she went vast heaps of flowers. More and more she gathered, till her room was nearly full; then, closing the door and windows, she lay down amongst the flowers, and allowed herself to be suffocated by their overpowering perfume. La Faute de l'Abbe Mouret.

ALEXANDRE, a porter at the Halles Centrales, where he became a friend of Claude Lantier. He was involved along with Florent and Gavard in the revolutionary meetings at Lebigre's wine-shop, and was sentenced to two years' imprisonment. Le Ventre de Paris.

ALEXANDRE, one of the warders at the asylum of Les Tulettes. He was a friend of Antoine Macquart, and at his request allowed Francois Mouret to escape from the asylum, with disastrous results to Abbe Faujas and his relations. La Conquete de Pla.s.sans.

ALEXANDRE, a boy employed in the shop known as _Au Bonheur des Dames_.

Pot-Bouille.

AMADIEU, a speculator on the Paris Bourse who made a fortune by a rash purchase of mining stock. He went into the affair without calculation or knowledge, but his success made him revered by the entire Bourse.

He placed no more orders, however, but seemed to be satisfied with his single victory. L'Argent.

AMANDA, one of the singers at a cafe concert in Boulevard Rochechouart.

L'a.s.sommoir.