Emile Zola, Germinal

HGERMINAL BY EMILE ZOLA - ION MY OPINION, ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS EVER WRITTEN. FIRST OF ALL IT IS VERY IMPORTANT THAT YOU OBTAIN THE TRANSLATION PUBLISHED BY PENGUIN CLASSICS! The Oxford translation is a TERRIBLE translation and actually spoils the story!

I first read this when I was about 12 years old (in an English translation, I hasten to add).

I am now 66 years of age, but have never forgotten the initial impact this made on me. Somehow Zola's writing is so descriptive and evocative that one feels that one is really there in the suffering and squalor along with the characters. The suffering and social deprivation of those times is quite unbelievable as we look back over 150 years.

I do not know who translated that edition but I have read it in the original French since ( firstly recommended by my 'A' Level French teacher in about 1961) where it is even more moving and extremely thought provoking.

If you haven't read it, please do, you'll be glad you did and it could even change your life in the way that you regard modern living or at the very least, give you much pause for thought.

ALL of Zola's books (and he had an enormous output) are good, if not excellent and well worth obtaining. There are some great authors with marvellous stories in French Literature, most being traslated into English. Madame Bauvery by Gustav Flaubert being a good place to begin after Germinal.