Brian Nelson (1)
Auteur de The Cambridge Companion to Zola
Pour les autres auteurs qui s'appellent Brian Nelson, voyez la page de désambigüisation.
Œuvres de Brian Nelson
The Cambridge Introduction to French Literature (Cambridge Introductions to Literature) (2015) 8 exemplaires
Zola and the Bourgeoisie: A Study of Themes and Techniques in Les Rougon Macquarts (1983) 4 exemplaires
Emile Zola: a selective analytical bibliography (Research Bibliographies and Checklists) (1982) 2 exemplaires
'Jeanne genie' in ALR, 2 April 2008 [review of Evelyne Bloch-Dano's 'Madame Proust: a bio'] 1 exemplaire
Oeuvres associées
Le Ventre de Paris (1873) — Traducteur, quelques éditions; Introduction, quelques éditions — 1,209 exemplaires
La Fortune des Rougon (1871) — Traducteur, quelques éditions; Introduction, quelques éditions — 899 exemplaires
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- 56
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This VSI also explains why you might not want to read the Rougon-Macquart cycle in the chronological order that I used, because themes reveal themselves differently if you read the novels in publication order. The VSI also provides the historical context for the novels in a way that you might not have understood if you don't have the OUP editions with their excellent introductions. (Some of the novels were not available in OUP editions when I first started reading Zola, a problem since rectified. See my post 'The Art of Book Introductions, or Why You Should Always Buy the Oxford Editions of Zola'.)
Brian Nelson, Emeritus Professor of French Studies and Translation Studies at Monash University here in Melbourne, translated some of the recent editions of the Rougon-Macquart cycle, and wrote the introductions. His style, as you will know if you have read the OUP editions that he translated, is clear, free of pedantry and academic jargon, and easy for a general reader to enjoy. I was really pleased to add this edition to my collections of VSIs.
Zola, (1840-1902) like his predecessor Balzac (1799-1850), used storytelling to examine his society, but Zola's focus was the changing cultural landscapes of the late 19th century. He was a novelist of modernity driven by industrial capitalism. He was interested in the new shapes of the city, new forms of social practice and economic organisation, and the heightened political pressures of the era. One of the innovative features of his novels is the portrayal of crowds, a feature of the emerging mass society.
Committed to a literature of truth, and to a new freedom of expression, he introduced a new realm of subjects: urban poverty and the working class; class consciousness and class relations; sexuality and gender. Truth, for him, was not just a matter of personal integrity, but also an aesthetic principle. He believed in telling it like it is, with no aspect of human experience out of bounds. He believed [and I do too] that a writer plays a social role. What Zola shows is the lives of ordinary people but within the context of change: how they were affected by the growth of the city, by the abuse of power, by the growth of consumer culture, by banking, crime, poverty and prostitution.
His style was not documentary but ironic and satiric. Zola was provocative, combative, critical and subversive. He was the most criticised and maligned writer of his day, but also the most popular. Today he is recognised as a narrative artist, a craftsman, a storyteller and a fabulist.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2021/02/18/emile-zola-a-very-short-introduction-by-bria...… (plus d'informations)