フランスの文豪エミール・ゾラ（1840-1902年）の主題や物語技法を検討します。冷静かつ鋭い観察を踏まえ淡々と語る筆致の巧みさは、自身が提唱した自然主義理論を凌駕するゾラ作品ならではの特徴です。『パリの胃袋』『居酒屋』『ボヌール・デ・ダム百貨店』『ジェルミナル』『大地』の5作品を取り上げ、同時代の芸術家と交流やドレフュス事件での活躍、暗殺の疑いのある不慮の死といった生涯と当時の社会的背景に位置付け考察します。(cf. The Belly of Paris / The Assommoir / The Ladies' Paradise / Germinal / Earth (Oxford World's Classics) その他の作品も同シリーズより発売中) 
　　

• Examines Émile Zola's distinctive place in the history of the European novel
• Explores how Zola opened the novel up to a new realm of subjects and how his work embodies a new freedom of expression in their depiction
• Situates Zola's work in its social and political contexts
• Considers Zola's art criticism, and his role in the Dreyfus Affair, as well as his fiction

      
Émile Zola was the leader of the literary movement known as 'naturalism' and is one of the great figures of the novel. In his monumental Les Rougon-Macquart (1871-93), he explored the social and cultural landscape of the late nineteenth century in ways that scandalized bourgeois society. Zola opened the novel up to a new realm of subjects, including the realities of working-class life, class relations, and questions of gender and sexuality, and his writing embodied a new freedom of expression, with his bold, outspoken voice often inviting controversy.
     
In this Very Short Introduction, Brian Nelson examines Zola's major themes and narrative art. He illuminates the social and political contexts of Zola's work, and provides readings of five individual novels (The Belly of Paris, L'Assommoir, The Ladies' Paradise, Germinal, and Earth). Zola's naturalist theories, which attempted to align literature with science, helped to generate the stereotypical notion that his fiction was somehow nonfictional. Nelson, however, reveals how the most distinctive elements of Zola's writing go far beyond his theoretical naturalism, giving his novels their unique force. Throughout, he sets Zola's work in context, considering his relations with contemporary painters, his role in the Dreyfus Affair, and his eventual murder.