Cover of L'Assommoir by Emile Zola Audiobook L'Assommoir
Audiobook · Sovereign

L'Assommoir

Author
Emile Zola
Read by
Eloise Fairfax
Language
English
Length
14 hours 47 minutes
ISBN
9781802561050
Published
15 November 2013
Imprint
Sovereign
  • Poverty
  • alcoholism
  • struggle
  • Paris
  • working class
  • ambition
  • despair
  • betrayal
  • societal decay
  • human resilience

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Description

Step into the gritty streets of Paris with "L'Assommoir" by Emile Zola, a poignant narrative of struggle and shattered dreams. Gervaise Macquart, a determined laundress, aspires for a better life but faces the harsh realities of poverty, alcoholism, and societal decay. As she navigates love, betrayal, and hardship, her hope gradually succumbs to despair. Zola's unflinching depiction of working-class life evokes powerful emotions, capturing the relentless grip of circumstance and the resilience of the human spirit.

Author

Emile Zola (1840–1902) grew up in Aix-en-Provence, failed his baccalaureat, and then mapped a France under pressure in the twenty novels of the Rougon-Macquart. L'Assommoir is drink and a Paris street; Germinal is the mine, the strike, the dark that works. He stood up for Dreyfus in J'Accuse...! and paid in exile. Naturalism was the method: heredity, milieu, a crowd that behaves like weather. The accusation is documentary.

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