L'assommoir (Classics) - Softcover

Zola, Émile; Tancock, Leonard

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140442316 ISBN 13: 9780140442311

Publisher: Penguin Classics, 1973

Synopsis

The seventh novel in the Rougon-Macquart cycle, L'Assommoir (1877) is the story of a woman's struggle for happiness in working-class Paris. It was a contemporary bestseller, outraged conservative critics, and launched a passionate debate about the legitimate scope of modern literature. At the centre of the novel stands Gervaise, who starts her own laundry and for a time makes a success of it. But her husband Coupeau squanders her earnings in the Assommoir, the local drinking shop, and gradually the pair sink into poverty and squalor. L'Assommoir is the most finely crafted of Zola's novels, and this new translation captures not only the brutality but also the pathos of its characters' lives. This book is a pwerful indictment of nineteenth-century social conditions, and the introduction examines its relation to politics and art as well as its explosive effect on the literary scene.

About this title

About the Author:

Emile Zola, born in 1840, was the founder of the Naturalist movement in French literature. His novel Thérèse Raquin caused a scandal on publication and was followed by his brilliant Rougon-Macquart cycle (1871-1893), a series of twenty novels focussed on one family. Zola died in mysterious circumstances in 1902, the victim of an accident or murder.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Classics
• Publication date: 1973
• ISBN 10: 0140442316
• ISBN 13: 9780140442311
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 432