Émile Zola - Self-portrait (1902)
(Click on blue links to hear audio clips)
Né le 2 avril 1840 (born on April 2nd 1840), Émile Zola fait partie des personnalités imposantes de la littérature du 19ème siècle (belongs to towering figures of 19th century French literature).
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) said:“Tout ce qui est dans la nature est dans l’art.” (everything that is in nature is in art). With Le Réalisme (Realism), literature moved away from le mouvement Romantique (the Romantic movement), with des grands romans de mœurs (great psychological novels) like the vast La Comédie Humaine by Balzac (1799-1850).
Out of Realism emerges Le Naturalisme (Naturalism), of which Émile Zola is le chef (the leader). His great fresco of Les Rougon-Macquart paints a man subjected to his physiology, heredity (alcoholism), and social environment.
Un écrivain (a writer), un romancier (a novelist), Zola was also an artist who was powerfully socially engaged, despite his disdain for politics. But his views on human nature and socialism were unlike those who saw some measure of progress in society: “[…]le monde a-t-il été rendu meilleur par notre grande Révolution ? […] Les hommes sont-ils en quoi que ce soit en réalité plus égaux qu’ils ne l’étaient il y a cent ans ?” (“[…] has the world been made better by our great Revolution? […] Are men in reality in any way more equal than they were hundred years ago?”)
Quelques citations(f.) (some quotes) from Émile Zola:
“La science a-t-elle promis le bonheur ? Je ne le crois pas. Elle a promis la vérité, et la question est de savoir si l’on fera jamais du bonheur avec de la vérité.” (“Did science promise happiness? I do not believe it. It promised truth, and the question is to know if we’ll ever make happiness with truth.”)
“Je n’ai guère de souci de beauté ni de perfection. Je me moque des grands siècles. Je n’ai souci que de vie, de lutte, de fièvre. Je suis à l’aise parmi notre génération.” (“I am little concerned with beauty or perfection. I don’t care for the great centuries. All I care about is life, struggle, intensity. I am at ease in my generation.”)
