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The Floating Press - Émile Zola

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180 pages

English

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The story of a girl trapped in an unhappy marriage to her first cousin so captivated the French writer Emile Zola that he explored it in multiple works, producing both a novel and a play based on the same core set of characters. The protagonist, Camille, becomes desperate and takes matters into her own hands, committing what may be the perfect crime in order to build a new life for herself. Will she get away with it, or will her paralyzing guilt give her away?

Informations

Publié par	The Floating Press
Date de parution	01 décembre 2010
Nombre de lectures	1
EAN13	9781775450399
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0134€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

THERESE RAQUIN
* * *
EMILE ZOLA
Translated by
ERNEST ALFRED VIZETELLY

*

Therese Raquin From a 1901 edition ISBN 978-1-775450-39-9 © 2010 The Floating Press
While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike.
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Contents
*
Preface Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII Chapter VIII Chapter IX Chapter X Chapter XI Chapter XII Chapter XIII Chapter XIV Chapter XV Chapter XVI Chapter XVII Chapter XVIII Chapter XIX Chapter XX Chapter XXI Chapter XXII Chapter XXIII Chapter XXIV Chapter XXV Chapter XXVI Chapter XXVII Chapter XXVIII Chapter XXIX Chapter XXX Chapter XXXI Chapter XXXII Afterword Endnotes
Preface
*
This volume, "Therese Raquin," was Zola's third book, but it was theone that first gave him notoriety, and made him somebody, as the sayinggoes.
While still a clerk at Hachette's at eight pounds a month, engaged inchecking and perusing advertisements and press notices, he had alreadyin 1864 published the first series of "Les Contes a Ninon"—a reprint ofshort stories contributed to various publications; and, in the followingyear, had brought out "La Confession de Claude." Both these books wereissued by Lacroix, a famous go-ahead publisher and bookseller in thosedays, whose place of business stood at one of the corners of theRue Vivienne and the Boulevard Montmartre, and who, as Lacroix,Verboeckhoven et Cie., ended in bankruptcy in the early seventies.
"La Confession de Claude" met with poor appreciation from the generalpublic, although it attracted the attention of the Public Prosecutor,who sent down to Hachette's to make a few inquiries about the author,but went no further. When, however, M. Barbey d'Aurevilly, in a criticalweekly paper called the "Nain Jaune," spitefully alluded to this ratherdaring novel as "Hachette's little book," one of the members of the firmsent for M. Zola, and addressed him thus:
"Look here, M. Zola, you are earning eight pounds a month with us, whichis ridiculous for a man of your talent. Why don't you go into literaturealtogether? It will bring you wealth and glory."
Zola had no choice but to take this broad hint, and send in hisresignation, which was at once accepted. The Hachettes did not requirethe services of writers of risky, or, for that matter, any other novels,as clerks; and, besides, as Zola has told us himself, in an interviewwith my old friend and employer, [1] the late M. Fernand Xau, Editor ofthe Paris "Journal," they thought "La Confession de Claude" a triflestiff, and objected to their clerks writing books in time which theyconsidered theirs, as they paid for it.
Zola, cast, so to say, adrift, with "Les Contes a Ninon" and "LaConfession de Claude" as scant literary baggage, buckled to, and setabout "Les Mysteres de Marseille" and "Therese Raquin," while at thesame time contributing art criticisms to the "Evenement"—a series ofarticles which raised such a storm that painters and sculptors were inthe habit of purchasing copies of the paper and tearing it up in thefaces of Zola and De Villemessant, the owner, whenever they chanced tomeet them. Nevertheless it was these articles that first drew attentionto Manet, who had hitherto been regarded as a painter of no account, andmany of whose pictures now hang in the Luxembourg Gallery.
"Therese Raquin" originally came out under the title of "A Love Story"in a paper called the "Artiste," edited by that famous art critic andcourtier of the Second Empire, Arsene Houssaye, author of "Les GrandesDames," as well as of those charming volumes "Hommes et Femmes du 18emeSiecle," and many other works.
Zola received no more than twenty-four pounds for the serial rights ofthe novel, and he consented at the insistence of the Editor, who pointedout to him that the periodical was read by the Empress Eugenie, to drawhis pen through certain passages, which were reinstated when the storywas published in volume form. I may say here that in this translation,I have adopted the views of the late M. Arsene Houssaye; and, if I haveallowed the appalling description of the Paris Morgue to stand, it is,first of all, because it constitutes a very important factor in thestory; and moreover, it is so graphic, so true to life, as I have seenthe place myself, times out of number, that notwithstanding its horror,it really would be a loss to pass it over.
Well, "Therese Raquin" having appeared as "A Love Story" in the"Artiste," was then published as a book, in 1867, by that same Lacroixas had issued Zola's preceding efforts in novel writing. I was livingin Paris at the time, and I well recall the yell of disapprobation withwhich the volume was received by the reviewers. Louis Ulbach, thena writer on the "Figaro," to which Zola also contributed, and whosubsequently founded and edited a paper called "La Cloche," whenZola, curiously enough, became one of his critics, made a particularlyvirulent attack on the novel and its author. Henri de Villemessant, theEditor, authorised Zola to reply to him, with the result that a vehementdiscussion ensued in print between author and critic, and "ThereseRaquin" promptly went into a second edition, to which Zola appended apreface.
I have not thought it necessary to translate this preface, which isa long and rather tedious reply to the reviewers of the day. It willsuffice to say, briefly, that the author meets the strictures of hiscritics by pointing out and insisting on the fact, that he has simplysought to make an analytic study of temperament and not of character.
"I have selected persons," says he, "absolutely swayed by their nervesand blood, deprived of free will, impelled in every action of life,by the fatal lusts of the flesh. Therese and Laurent are human brutes,nothing more. I have sought to follow these brutes, step by step, in thesecret labour of their passions, in the impulsion of their instincts,in the cerebral disorder resulting from the excessive strain on theirnerves."
EDWARD VIZETELLY SURBITON, 1 December, 1901.
Chapter I
*
At the end of the Rue Guenegaud, coming from the quays, you find theArcade of the Pont Neuf, a sort of narrow, dark corridor running fromthe Rue Mazarine to the Rue de Seine. This arcade, at the most, isthirty paces long by two in breadth. It is paved with worn, loose,yellowish tiles which are never free from acrid damp. The square panesof glass forming the roof, are black with filth.
On fine days in the summer, when the streets are burning with heavy sun,whitish light falls from the dirty glazing overhead to drag miserablythrough the arcade. On nasty days in winter, on foggy mornings, theglass throws nothing but darkness on the sticky tiles—unclean andabominable gloom.
To the left are obscure, low, dumpy shops whence issue puffs of air ascold as if coming from a cellar. Here are dealers in toys, cardboardboxes, second-hand books. The articles displayed in their windows arecovered with dust, and owing to the prevailing darkness, can only beperceived indistinctly. The shop fronts, formed of small panes of glass,streak the goods with a peculiar greenish reflex. Beyond, behindthe display in the windows, the dim interiors resemble a number oflugubrious cavities animated by fantastic forms.
To the right, along the whole length of the arcade, extends a wallagainst which the shopkeepers opposite have stuck some small cupboards.Objects without a name, goods forgotten for twenty years, are spreadout there on thin shelves painted a horrible brown colour. A dealer inimitation jewelry, has set up shop in one of these cupboards, and theresells fifteen sous rings, delicately set out on a cushion of blue velvetat the bottom of a mahogany box.
Above the glazed cupboards, ascends the roughly plastered black wall,looking as if covered with leprosy, and all seamed with defacements.
The Arcade of the Pont Neuf is not a place for a stroll. You take it tomake a short cut, to gain a few minutes. It is traversed by busypeople whose sole aim is to go quick and straight before them. You seeapprentices there in their working-aprons, work-girls taking home theirwork, persons of both sexes with parcels under their arms. There arealso old men who drag themselves forward in the sad gloaming that fallsfrom the glazed roof, and bands of small children who come to the arcadeon leaving school, to make a noise by stamping their feet on the tilesas they run along. Throughout the day a sharp hurried ring of footsteps,resounds on the stone with irritating irregularity. Nobody speaks,nobody stays there, all hurry about their business with bent heads,stepping out rapidly, without taking a single glance at the shops. Thetradesmen observe with an air of alarm, the passers-by who by a miraclestop before their windows.
The arcade is lit at night by three gas burners, enclosed in heavysquare lanterns. These jets of gas, hanging from the glazed roof whereonthey cast spots of fawn-coloured light, shed around them circles of paleglimmer that seem at moments to disappear. The arcade now assumes theaspect of a regular cut-throat alley. Great shadows stretch along thetiles, damp puffs of air enter from the street. Anyone might take theplace for a subterranean gallery indistinctly lit-up by three funerallamps. The tradespeople for all light are contented with the faint rayswhich the gas burners throw upon their windows. Inside their shops, theymerely have a lamp with a shade, which they place at the corner of theircounter, and the passer-by can then distinguish what the depths of these