French Bulldog Puppy—Émile Zola

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One year ago on Round and Square (20 February 2012)—Kanji Mastery: Radical 139 (Color)

[a] French Musings PD

I don't know who you are, 
but I will find you...[1]

[b] B-Z RF

...and tell you that the other great nineteenth century French "ethnographer" is Émile Zola. Like Balzac, but five decades later, Zola documented life in such detail that it is still vivid for us today. His accounts of mining life in Germinal terrify me to this day.

Channeling Balzac, Zola set out to detail life in the Second Republic in such detail that it would be a lasting monument to life in his day. His account of a family (in twenty volumes), Les Rougon-Marquart is appropriately subtitled Histoire naturelle et sociale d'une famille sous le Second Empire—A Natural and Social History of a Family Under the Second Republic.

So all you have to do to understand French life in the twentieth century is read, read, read (from B to Z). Start an account with Pléiade—or find a good library—and get to work.

           [1] I like Liam's opening, and he gave me a year's supply of biscuits to use it for the rest of the month.

[c] Mastery RF

[Originally posted on May 20, 2014]