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Les Rougon-Macquart #17

سایه‌های شب

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سایه‌های شب، هفدهمین رمان از زنجیره‌های داستانی «خانوادهٔ روگن- ماکار»، از پر حادثه‌ترین و بی‌پرده‌ترین رمان‌های امیل زولا نویسندهٔ بزرگ فرانسوی است. این رمان در یک سطح داستان جنایت و پیمان شکنی و شور تصاحب و عشق و مرگ است، همچنان که روایت شبکه‌های در هم پیچیدهٔ راه‌آهن و شتاب درنگ ناپذیر برای رسیدن به آینده نیز هست، اما در سطحی دیگر، در حکم ژرف نگری دلسوزانه و ناشناخته، بدوی و کوری هستند که بیرون از حیطهٔ اختیار آنان خودسرانه عمل می‌کنند.

484 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1890

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About the author

Émile Zola

2,874 books4,080 followers
Émile François Zola was an influential French novelist, the most important example of the literary school of naturalism, and a major figure in the political liberalization of France.

More than half of Zola's novels were part of a set of 20 books collectively known as Les Rougon-Macquart. Unlike Balzac who in the midst of his literary career resynthesized his work into La Comédie Humaine, Zola from the start at the age of 28 had thought of the complete layout of the series. Set in France's Second Empire, the series traces the "environmental" influences of violence, alcohol and prostitution which became more prevalent during the second wave of the Industrial Revolution. The series examines two branches of a family: the respectable (that is, legitimate) Rougons and the disreputable (illegitimate) Macquarts for five generations.

As he described his plans for the series, "I want to portray, at the outset of a century of liberty and truth, a family that cannot restrain itself in its rush to possess all the good things that progress is making available and is derailed by its own momentum, the fatal convulsions that accompany the birth of a new world."

Although Zola and Cézanne were friends from childhood, they broke in later life over Zola's fictionalized depiction of Cézanne and the Bohemian life of painters in his novel L'Œuvre (The Masterpiece, 1886).

From 1877 with the publication of L'Assommoir, Émile Zola became wealthy, he was better paid than Victor Hugo, for example. He became a figurehead among the literary bourgeoisie and organized cultural dinners with Guy de Maupassant, Joris-Karl Huysmans and other writers at his luxurious villa in Medan near Paris after 1880. Germinal in 1885, then the three 'cities', Lourdes in 1894, Rome in 1896 and Paris in 1897, established Zola as a successful author.

The self-proclaimed leader of French naturalism, Zola's works inspired operas such as those of Gustave Charpentier, notably Louise in the 1890s. His works, inspired by the concepts of heredity (Claude Bernard), social manichaeism and idealistic socialism, resonate with those of Nadar, Manet and subsequently Flaubert.

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5 stars
4,545 (37%)
4 stars
4,514 (37%)
3 stars
2,287 (18%)
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1 star
203 (1%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 650 reviews
Profile Image for Luís.
2,204 reviews1,060 followers
April 10, 2024
Jacques Lantier, a train driver, attends the crime of the railway company president, Grandmorin.
Roubaud, a Deputy Chief of the station, and Séverine, his wife, will commit the crime. It's a crime of revenge to punish this character for abusing Severine since childhood.
Jacques decided to shut up. Instead, he and Séverine fall in love.
But Jacques is inhabited by deadly impulses due to heavy alcoholic heredity.
This one is passionate about his craft and described his "La Lison" locomotive as a person.
The title "The Human Beast" focuses on the book. One wonders if he addressed it to Jacques or the locomotive.
That's a beautiful novel by Zola, which includes the family Lantier. James is the son of Gervaise, met in "L'Assomoir."
The author cleverly connects novels in the Rougon-Macquart series.
"The human beast" is an excellent thriller without any length. I thought I skimmed it, but I still left the lead in the story.
He goes a bit against my certainty because I am entirely against determinism—a point of view that has served me well.
Zola had much to document in this series as he approached many areas with many details.
Profile Image for Emily May.
2,109 reviews315k followers
June 10, 2022
This is my least favourite Zola so far. It sells the same moral lessons that Thérèse Raquin does-- namely, that giving in to your passions and inner demons never ends well --but it is, I feel, overlong and contains so many characters plotting to kill one another that it verges on farcical.

Some parts of the story are more compelling than others. I enjoy reading about conniving awful people getting what they deserve, but I found Roubard and Severine one-dimensional compared to Therese and Laurent.

Roubard opens the novel by discovering his wife has been sexually-involved with old lecher Grandmorin and then beats her up. Severine herself is eye-rollingly naive and insipid. I suspect the author has her declare she has never experienced sexual desire to make the contemporary reader more sympathetic toward her and, in fact, this is not the only time in the book that a ridiculous show is made of women having to pretend to be sexually disinterested and fight off their lover to appear virtuous. But such were the times.

The other central character-- Jacques --for no apparent reason, desires to hurt and murder women. When he is introduced to us in chapter two he sexually assaults a woman.

My desire to see these characters get their due did keep me reading, but the story drags on and I can't help thinking that, like with Thérèse Raquin, we were expected to eventually feel sorry for these pathetic men, but unlike Thérèse Raquin, I did not feel one ounce of sympathy toward these abusive misogynists.

Did they get punished for their "beast[s] within" in the end? Well, boo hoo.
Profile Image for Steven Godin.
2,683 reviews2,983 followers
June 14, 2023

After well over a century, Emile Zola still retains the power to absorb readers with his 'Les Rougon-Macquart' series of novels. This, regarded as one of his finest achievements is a tale full of rage that studies the dark haunting impressionistic nature of man's slow corruption by jealousy. Set against the backdrop of the industrial revolution, the story is set in the world of the railways. A lot of the main action takes place either on trains, or close by to the tracks, there is murder, passion and obsession, fused with a compassionate look at individuals derailed by atavistic forces beyond their control. I found Zola’s use of imagery evocative and atmospheric, and quite shocking, he fills pages with dread, metal and flesh, blood and rust, where at any one moment somebody could turn criminal with hell bent discontent.

There are three central characters, Roubaud, the deputy station master at Le Havre, his fragile wife Séverine, and Jacques Lantier, an engine driver on the Parisian line. As a result of a chance remark, Roubaud suspects that Séverine has had an affair some years earlier, with Grandmorin one of the directors of the railway company, who had acted as her patron and who had helped Roubaud get his job. He forces a confession out of her and makes her write a letter to Grandmorin telling him to take a particular train that evening, the same train Roubaud and Séverine are taking back to Le Havre. From here on the tension is upped with a chilling bite, a murder is committed and thus an investigation follows, where more than one person is suspected of the attack. The relationship between Roubaud and his wife is now fractured, he believes she is carrying on with Lantier, whilst she realizes that he has been stealing the last of some hidden money. Both now, with almost frenzy, start dark plans of their own...

The last third contained some really tense scenes, leaving me holding the book with clammy hands,
as it hurtled along the tracks to it's conclusion. The Human Beast is never far away, but the novel is about far more than vicious homicide; Zola's targets include the French judicial system which is looked at in great detail, and the world he creates is brilliant with it's realization of railways and railwaymen (similar to what he did looking at the coal miners lives in Germinal). I did find 'Germinal' richer and a more complex experience than 'The Beast Within' (hence the four stars), but lets not kid ourselves, this novel compared to most other books written at the time, simply stands out from the crowd. He dared to write about what no one else would, and pulls it off with such high standards.
Profile Image for Lisa.
1,099 reviews3,308 followers
April 14, 2018
"She was a virgin and a warrior, disdainful of the male, which was what eventually convinced people that she really must be off her head."

So that trace of sanity is what made the public consider her mad. You can open Zola at a random page and find deep knowledge of the human machinery.

Since I finished Crime and Punishment, I have been meditating on La Bête Humaine over and over. I used to consider Jacques Lantier the most evil character imaginable: the incarnation of Death. After all, his emotions are guided by brutal pleasure, and his sexuality is linked to destruction. He is a murderer long before he has a victim. Sociology could possibly find some valid explanations for his psychopathic tendencies, being the son of an alcoholic mother, Gervaise in L'Assommoir (The Dram Shop), and an absent father, growing up in poverty and misery. After all, his sensitive siblings struggle to find a place in life as well. His brother Claude is a failed and suicidal painter, as portrayed in The Masterpiece, his other brother Étienne a rebellious miner in Germinal, and his younger half-sister Nana probably one of the most famous prositutes in world literature. But even though the reader knows all that, it is difficult to feel pity for the rage inside the head of Jacques. Can he control his urges? Or will he be weak, thus turning into the monster he senses inside his body?

Zola, the realist painter of 19th century life, won't give his murderer a pass. And that is why he keeps coming back to me after I encountered Raskolnikov and lived through the horror of his crime, and my quite unexpected, feverish wish for him to "get away with it". With what, exactly? As opposed to Jacques, Raskolnikov kills with his mind, not his confused desire. Raskolnikov deliberately chooses a victim he considers worthless and useless, and kills her for his own benefit. Does the fact that his crime catches up with him excuse that his act shows even more bestiality than Jacques' fight with his inner demons? Why do I feel manipulated into siding with Raskolnikov while I stay cold and horrified confronting Jacques?

I can't stop pondering on that, and the solution I can offer myself is that Dostoyevsky was much more of a missionary writer, trying to convince readers of his message, while Zola was a surgeon, cutting his literary patients open to look at their insides.

What do I prefer? In literature, I enjoy a good mix of both, and range those two authors next to each other in my eternal hall of fame. In reality, I dread ideological manipulation and "greater universal messages", so I would go for Zola's socialist realism any time, shunning Dostoyevsky's appeal to male, Christian suffering.

Murder must advertise? Well, this one is worth its money and time.
April 15, 2019
«Το ανθρώπινο κτήνος» είναι ένας αγώνας μεταξύ κοινωνιολογικής και ψυχοπαθολογικής γραφής,
σχετικά με τα κίνητρα των απλών ανθρώπων για ολοκληρωτική καταστροφή.
Σχετικά με τις επιλογές που προκαλούν την επιθυμία κάποιου να δολοφονήσει, να εγκληματήσει, να αφαιρέσει τη ζωή απο άλλες υπάρξεις, για πολλούς και διάφορους λόγους ή απλώς για μια δοκιμή κυριαρχίας και αυτοϊκανοποίησης.

Αυτό το σκληρό ρεαλιστικό μυθιστόρημα γεμίζει με χαρακτήρες που πολεμούν τις βίαιες εσωτερικές τους παρορμήσεις, το θηρίο που γεννιέται και μεγαλώνει μέσα μας, μαζί μας, αυτό που καιροφυλακτεί την κατάλληλη στιγμή για να κατεβάσει τους διακόπτες της λογικής και να ακυρώσει μέσα στο πηχτό σκοτάδι της συνείδησης κάθε πολιτισμένη ηθική αναστολή ή αξία.

Όλοι οι ήρωες εδώ, συμβάλουν με τον τρόπο τους στις απάνθρωπες πράξεις που διασκορπίζονται σαν εφιάλτες προδοσίας, σε όλη τη θλιβερή ιστορία που εξελίσσεται και θα μπορούσε να εμπνεύσει τις πιο τραγικές εγκληματικές φαντασίες δημιουργίας, στη ζωή και στην τέχνη.

Σήραγγες, φώτα άχρωμα, θολά, πράσινα και κόκκινα, σιδηροδρομικοί σταθμοί αδιάλειπτης ρουτίνας και μελαγχολικής ατμόσφαιρας, έρημα σπίτια δίπλα σε ράγες, εγκαταλειμμένα στο σκοτεινό παρόν, που το συνέτριψε διαπαντός το ματωμένο παρελθόν του θανάτου και της κακοποίησης.
Σκηνικά παρόμοια με οδύνες και πόνους ανθρώπων που ειναι επιβάτες στις ατμομηχανές της συνήθειας και της απαθειας.
Αυτές που κινούνται αδιάφορα και καταστρέφουν ως ανθρώπινη επέκταση ό,τι βρίσκεται στον δρόμο τους.
Η πορεία ειναι προδιαγεγραμμένη, η ταχεία της ανθρώπινης μοίρας δεν θα σταματήσει πριν φθάσει στον επόμενο σταθμό απανθρωπιάς ή στον τελικό προορισμό, σε κάποια πόλη, χώρα, χωριό, σε κάποιο θολωμένο μυαλό που σκέφτεται να ανεβεί στο βαγόνι της διαιώνισης του κρυμμένου κακού ή να κατέβει στα χωράφια της αβύσσου, αυτούς τους βαλτότοπους της ψυχής που κληρονόμησε κάθε επιβάτης μαζί με την αιώνια καταδίκη.

Ο Ζολά, ορμάει στην ανθρώπινη ελευθερία και τη φυλακίζει υλοποιώντας ένα βάναυσο όραμα.
Σκοτεινοί ορίζοντες, απομόνωση, συντρίμμια, τραυματίες, νεκροί.
Στο προσκήνιο πρωταγωνιστούν τα πάθη, εγκληματικά, δολοφονικά, σαρκικά, ανεξέλεγκτα, ζοφερά.

Οι τελευταίες σελίδες είναι εμμονικές, προφητικές, βίαιες και βλαβερές.
Εφιαλτικός κόσμος ευαισθητοποιημένος και άπραγος στην εκμετάλλευση, την ψευτιά, την τρέλα και την απληστία.
Οι αρετές χάνουν κάθε αξία, η επανάσταση της τεχνολογίας έκανε τον άνθρωπο άμοιρο θύμα μπροστά στην πρόοδο και τις εφευρέσεις.
Ένα αιώνιο θύμα που θα αναζητά να κατανοήσει τον εσωτερικό του κόσμο και θα τρελαίνεται απο κρυμμέν��υς εαυτούς που ψιθυρίζουν την αλήθεια.


Καλή ανάγνωση. 💯
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.
Profile Image for سـارا.
278 reviews234 followers
November 24, 2023
این روزا اینقد زمان کم دارم که تموم کردن هر کتاب یه کار خیلی خیلی بزرگه.
زولا تو هر کتابش یه چیزی داره که منو شگفت زده کنه. این کتاب رو صرفا گرفته بودم چون میخواستم یه اثر دیگه ازش بخونم و به شدت خوشحالم از انتخابم.
ژاک سایه های شب من رو به شدت یاد جفری دامر قاتل سریالی دهه ۸۰ آمریکا مینداخت. اینکه بیشتر از ۱۰۰ سال قبل زولا اینقد دقیق درون آدمی با ویژگی‌های دامر رو واشکافی کرده فوق العاده است.
Profile Image for Alienor ✘ French Frowner ✘.
876 reviews4,152 followers
Read
June 25, 2017


Fail. After spending 3 hours trying to decipher if the story was meant to be that misogynic or if it was only the sad expression of the 19th Century, I decided that I did not care whatsoever. My diminished reading time is way too precious to be spent hating every male character in there while being annoyed by the way women are portrayed.

DNF as soon as I felt like I was supposed to feel sorry for that abusive jerk. Not happening. Zola relies way too much on telling rather than showing to pull this off, no matter how revered his books are. Not to mention that his multiple POV is confusing and awkward.

I stand by what I thought : there are plenty of amazing books in classic French Literature, but Zola's aren't part of them as far as I'm concerned.
Profile Image for David.
161 reviews1,617 followers
September 20, 2012
Could you kill someone? (Shush now. That's a rhetorical question. Think the answer to yourself in your head. We don't want to hand over compromising evidence to the prosecution in your inevitable criminal trial.) Now I'm not asking you if you could kill in self-defense or to protect your loved ones from harm—because those cases are ethically cut-and-dried and very boring; I'm asking if you think you are capable of ending someone's life for pettier reasons: jealousy, revenge, or just good old-fashioned unclassified hatred. Before you don your barrister's wig and get all indignant about it, I want you to remember that the question is whether you could, not whether you would. We don't even need to consider all (or any) of the deterrents that would stay your machete-wielding hand—such as moral conscience or the threat of punishment. I am only wondering if you think that, in a moment of emotional heat or psychological abandon, your mind and body would allow you to, say, pull the trigger, thrust the blade, or hold down the pillow. (Assume for the sake of this discussion that you are mechanically capable or strong enough to kill your victim. This is a question about will, not about the precision of your aim.)

Émile Zola's La Bête Humaine is predicated on the assumption, I think, that most humans have murderous inclinations stowed away in their psychological hope chests and that it's only a matter of how difficult it is to pick the lock. The first chapter introduces us to a railway station employee named Roubaud and his wife Séverine—a seemingly contented and loving couple who are spending an afternoon in Paris. They're having a pleasant enough lunch—when one thing leads to another, which leads to another, which leads to another, and—long story short: Séverine admits that she was repeatedly molested as a child by her guardian, the prestigious and powerful Grandmorin. (I know. Talk about losing your appetite.) In response to the revelation, Roubaud does what any reasonable and compassionate husband would do under the circumstances: he beats the living shit out of Séverine and threatens her life. A regular Renaissance man. He's not upset at the crime of molestation and the victimhood of his wife—he's enraged because in the used car lot of brides, he bought himself a lemon... a used and abused woman whose odometer had been rolled back. Too bad he can't trade her in for a showroom new model—but trust me here: Showroom new models are pretty hard to come by in France. Most kids have their first torrid love affairs when they're eight, I think.

Being a 'sensible' man, Roubaud decides not to kill Séverine. He may beat her a while longer to work out his frustrations, but then he'll move on to Plan B: Kill Grandmorin. Always crazy like a fox, Roubaud figures he'll implicate Séverine in the crime so she won't ever spill the beans. (And—hey—since she's the lemon in this transaction, she should do some of the dirty work... Am I right or am I right?)

You may think you've been spoiled upon, but the preceding events all occur within the first chapter. This is actually only the gentle prelude to the madness which will follow. (And by madness, I'm referring particularly to the events in Chapter Ten—which, by the standards of 19th century literature, are pretty shocking and over-the-top.) Make no mistake: this is a violent and cynical book. Although the major characters are differently bad, none of them is perceptibly good, even in the most degraded sense of the term. We may understand them—to varying degrees—but the elaboration of their universal impulses into (grisly) action makes me think that Zola needed a good SSRI.

Oh. And to answer my own question: I think that I could in fact summon the will (if I desired, which I don't) to kill someone, merely out of spite. I recently watched the film God Bless America (directed and written by Bobcat Goldthwait) in which a middle-aged schlub (played by the guy who plays Freddy Rumsen on Mad Men) and a teenage girl go on a killing spree. Their targets are all the most loathsome people in our culture (in my humble opinion, and theirs too), such as pandering political pundits, reality TV stars, people who won't shut up in movie theaters, and so on. Even though the film isn't terribly well-made on the whole, I was vicariously thrilled by it. Apparently Bobcat Goldthwait and I have the same things stowed away in our hope chests.
Profile Image for P.E..
851 reviews696 followers
August 4, 2023
La machine à désirer - Sexe, Argent, Pouvoir et Mort



'The Night Train', by Lionel Walden (1861-1933)


'The Human Beast', also translated as 'The Beast Within' deals with engine driver Jacques Lantier, a man afflicted with an eerie form of mental disorder, causing him to get murderous drives from any form of sexual arousal. However - as it is often the case with Zola - the scope is much larger, as this novel deals primarily about the various forms of behaviour likening homo sapiens sapiens and brutes on the one hand, and to train engines on the other end, to wit: an train driver infatuated with his engine, a magistrate infatuated with himself, an old crossing-keeping poisonning his wife to snatch the inheritance, a stern-looking administrator using his leverage to have sex with Séverine since her teens, a trustworthy deputy station master becoming a reckless gambler overnight, a brave and caring young woman turning into a deadly saboteur.

All in all, this novel is contending for the title of "most bleak and gruesome novel written by Zola", only challenged by Germinal for the moment... Next stop: L'Assommoir.


La gare (1907), by Auguste Chabaud


QUOTES

About the French railway network in the late 1860s:
'C’était comme un grand corps, un être géant couché en travers de la terre, la tête à Paris, les vertèbres tout le long de la ligne, les membres s’élargissant avec les embranchements, les pieds et les mains au Havre et dans les autres villes d’arrivée. Et ça passait, ça passait, mécanique, triomphal, allant à l’avenir avec une rectitude mathématique, dans l’ignorance volontaire de ce qu’il restait de l’homme [...].'


'Le monde entier défilait, la foule humaine charriée à toute vapeur, sans qu’ils en connussent autre chose que des visages entrevus dans un éclair[...]. Et voilà que, dans la neige, un train débarquait à leur porte : l’ordre naturel était perverti, ils dévisageaient ce monde inconnu qu’un accident jetait sur la voie, [...] avec des yeux ronds de sauvages, accourus sur une côte où des Européens naufrageraient.'


'Pourtant, cette idée du flot de foule que les trains montants et descendants charriaient quotidiennement devant elle, au milieu du grand silence de sa solitude, la laissait pensive, les regards sur la voie, où tombait la nuit. Quand elle était valide, qu’elle allait et venait, se plantant devant la barrière, le drapeau au poing, elle ne songeait jamais à ces choses. Mais des rêveries confuses, à peine formulées, lui embarbouillaient la tête, depuis qu’elle demeurait les journées sur cette chaise, n’ayant à réfléchir à rien qu’à sa lutte sourde avec son homme. Cela lui semblait drôle, de vivre perdue au fond de ce désert, sans une âme à qui se confier, lorsque, de jour et de nuit, continuellement, il défilait tant d’hommes et de femmes, dans le coup de tempête des trains, secouant la maison, fuyant à toute vapeur. Bien sûr que la terre entière passait là, pas des Français seulement, des étrangers aussi, des gens venus des contrées les plus lointaines, puisque personne maintenant ne pouvait rester chez soi, et que tous les peuples, comme on disait, n’en feraient bientôt plus qu’un seul. Ça, c’était le progrès, tous frères, roulant tous ensemble, là-bas, vers un pays de cocagne. Elle essayait de les compter, en moyenne, à tant par wagon : il y en avait trop, elle n’y parvenait pas. Souvent, elle croyait reconnaître des visages, celui d’un monsieur à barbe blonde, un Anglais sans doute, qui faisait chaque semaine le voyage de Paris, celui d’une petite dame brune, passant régulièrement le mercredi et le samedi. Mais l’éclair les emportait, elle n’était pas bien sûre de les avoir vus, toutes les faces se noyaient, se confondaient, comme semblables, disparaissant les unes dans les autres. Le torrent coulait, en ne laissant rien de lui. Et ce qui la rendait triste, c’était, sous ce roulement continu, sous tant de bien-être et tant d’argent promenés, de sentir que cette foule toujours si haletante ignorait qu’elle fût là, en danger de mort, à ce point que, si son homme l’achevait un soir, les trains continueraient à se croiser près de son cadavre, sans se douter seulement du crime, au fond de la maison solitaire.

Phasie était restée les yeux sur la fenêtre, et elle résuma ce qu’elle éprouvait trop vaguement pour l’expliquer tout au long.

— Ah ! c’est une belle invention, il n’y a pas à dire. On va vite, on est plus savant… Mais les bêtes sauvages restent des bêtes sauvages, et on aura beau inventer des mécaniques meilleures encore, il y aura quand même des bêtes sauvages dessous.'


About the namesake "Human beast":
'Il y avait là un triomphe pour le juge d’instruction Denizet, car on ne tarissait pas d’éloges, dans le monde judiciaire, sur la façon dont il venait de mener à bien cette affaire compliquée et obscure : un chef-d’œuvre de fine analyse, disait-on, une reconstitution logique de la vérité, une création véritable, en un mot.'

'Le juge raffinait la psychologie de l’affaire, avec un véritable amour du métier. Jamais, disait-il, il n’était descendu si à fond de la nature humaine ; et c’était de la divination plus que de l’observation, car il se flattait d’être de l’école des juges voyeurs et fascinateurs, ceux qui d’un coup d’œil démontent un homme.'

'La famille n’était guère d’aplomb, beaucoup avaient une fêlure. Lui, à certaines heures, la sentait bien, cette fêlure héréditaire ; non pas qu’il fût d’une santé mauvaise [...] ; mais c’étaient, dans son être, de subites pertes d’équilibre, comme des cassures, des trous par lesquels son moi lui échappait, au milieu d’une sorte de grande fumée qui déformait tout.'

'Jacques fuyait dans la nuit mélancolique. Il monta au galop le sentier d’une côte, retomba au fond d’un étroit vallon. Des cailloux roulant sous ses pas l’effrayèrent, il se lança à gauche parmi des broussailles, fit un crochet qui le ramena à droite, sur un plateau vide. Brusquement, il dévala, il buta contre la haie du chemin de fer : un train arrivait, grondant, flambant ; et il ne comprit pas d’abord, terrifié. Ah ! oui, tout ce monde qui passait, le continuel flot, tandis que lui agonisait là ! Il repartit, grimpa, descendit encore. Toujours maintenant il rencontrait la voie, au fond de tranchées profondes qui creusaient des abîmes, sur des remblais qui fermaient l’horizon de barricades géantes. Ce pays désert, coupé de monticules, était comme un labyrinthe sans issue, où tournait sa folie, dans la morne désolation des terrains incultes. Et, depuis de longues minutes, il battait les pentes, lorsqu’il aperçut devant lui l’ouverture ronde, la gueule noire du tunnel. Un train montant s’y engouffrait, hurlant et sifflant, laissant, disparu, bu par la terre, une longue secousse dont le sol tremblait.'


The man-machine relationship:
'Il l’aimait donc en mâle reconnaissant, la Lison, qui partait et s’arrêtait vite, ainsi qu’une cavale vigoureuse et docile ; il l’aimait parce que, en dehors des appointements fixes, elle lui gagnait des sous, grâce aux primes de chauffage. Elle vaporisait si bien, qu’elle faisait en effet de grosses économies de charbon. Et il n’avait qu’un reproche à lui adresser, un trop grand besoin de graissage [...]'

'L’énorme masse, les dix-huit wagons, chargés, bondés de bétail humain, traversaient la campagne noire, dans un grondement continu. Et ces hommes qu’on charriait au massacre, chantaient, chantaient à tue-tête, d’une clameur si haute, qu’elle dominait le bruit des roues.

[...]

Qu’importaient les victimes que la machine écrasait en chemin ! N’allait-elle pas quand même à l’avenir, insoucieuse du sang répandu ? Sans conducteur, au milieu des ténèbres, en bête aveugle et sourde qu’on aurait lâchée parmi la mort, elle roulait, elle roulait, chargée de cette chair à canon, de ces soldats, déjà hébétés de fatigue, et ivres, qui chantaient.'



Also read:

Le Rouge et le Noir
Contes cruels
Crime and Punishment
The Bone Factory
Christine
La Curée
Germinal
La France du XIXe siècle. 1814-1914



'Train at night' (c. 1890), by Lionel Walden (1861-1933)


Soundtrack:

The Virus of Life - Slipknot

Geneva - Russian Circles

Road to Nowhere - Alphaxone
Profile Image for David.
1,577 reviews
March 28, 2024
One could say humans have a beastly nature.

Roubaud was a man going places. He worked his way up to the station master of Havre train station, part of The West Company Railway, with services from Paris to Havre. He has a beautiful young wife, Séverine. They make a great couple. He was ambitious.

One day she was not keen on making a trip with her husband to meet with the company president Grandmorin at his big house in the country, la Croix-de-Maufras. You know those business meetings - impress the boss with your enchanting wife. Perplexed that his wife refused to go, Roubaud plied her until he discovered her secret - at the age of 16 she lost her virginity with the president. She was not his only victim. Such a beast. Did I tell you that Roubaud is a very jealous man?

Later that same night, Jacques Lantier,* a young brash train engineer discovered his boss dead along the railway tracks. His throat had been slit. So begins a classic “who done it” with Zola mixing railways with murder.

*Jacques is the brother to CLaude Lantier, the artist from L’Oeuvre

The Roubauds are the key suspects but you know people with connections. They can point the finger elsewhere. When the will is revealed, Roubaud gets possession of the country house, la Croix-de-Maufras. In the mean time Roubaud asks the young engineer Lantier to escort his wife back to Paris. His job was to keep an eye on her. He did that all too well.

Of course, when two young people are together over time, sparks fly. This is a problem for Lantier because his cousin Flore also had her eye on him. And a bigger problem for the jealous husband. Love triangles with jealous people never end well, do they?

Speaking of love, the other major love in this book is the love of trains, both by our author and of course, Jacques Lantier the engineer. He truly loved La Lison, that beast of a train engine. Powerful, sleek, full of horse power. The descriptions are steamy. Sorry, bad pun.

In Thérèse Raquin, one of Zola’s early books (1867), he referred to the young couple as nothing other than being “la bête humaine.” A beast is a wild animal that hunts down and kills its prey. A human beast is ruthless, driven by carnal desires and cares little other than getting what they want. Add in love and jealousy, and that beast is a very dangerous thing.

This is definitely Zola’s darkest book to date and one of his last books of the Rougon-Macquart series, published in 1890. It is truly a wild ride.

Les Rougon-Macquart #17
Profile Image for Dagio_maya .
1,008 reviews309 followers
May 26, 2022
Prima lettura marzo 2018



Seconda lettura maggio 2022


Locomotive come donne e donne come locomotive: le prime, con un fischio, chiedono impazienti il via libera per entrare in stazione; le seconde trattate come macchine che non possono uscire dai binari.
Così il sotto capo della stazione di Le Havre, Roubaud, tira i fili delle moglie Séverine.
” Era bastato un minuto.” per far crollare il castello di carte del loro matrimonio...

Torbido romanzo dove s’incrociano malvagità e bestialità di diversa natura.

Ancora una volta è un discendente dei Rougon – Maquart a portare il peso di un’atavica colpa.
In lui, sorprendentemente, c’è consapevolezza di appartenere ad un albero marcio.

Jacques Lantier – figlio della Gervaise de “L’Assomoir”- combatte fin dall’infanzia con un brutale istinto che lo vuole omicida.
La sua via di fuga è la Lison, la sua locomotiva.

Una storia a due velocità: la folle corsa dei treni con il loro carico di vite anonime e la lentezza dei piccoli gesti di chi rimane fermo al suo solito posto e combatte i drammi quotidiani mascherati di normalità.
Una casa, il cui giardino è tagliato in due dai binari, rappresenta la triste solitudine dei personaggi di questo romanzo:

”Croix-de-Maufras sotto la luna immobile, l’improvvisa apparizione della casa situata di traverso, nell’abbandono e nella solitudine, le imposte eternamente chiuse, di una paurosa malinconia.
E senza darsene ragione, questa volta ancora più delle precedenti, Jacques sentì che il cuore gli si serrava, come se passasse davanti alla sua malasorte.”


Eros e Thanatos salgono in carrozza:

”A denti stretti, ormai capace solo di balbettare, Jacques questa volta l’aveva presa; e a sua volta, Séverine aveva preso lui.
Si possedettero, ritrovando l’amore in fondo alla morte, nella stessa dolorosa voluttà delle bestie che si sventrano quando sono in calore.”



Rimango colpita in questa mia rilettura dai particolari alcuni dei quali si adattano così perfettamente alle pagine della storia che il mondo sta scrivendo in questi mesi perchè la bestialità inzia da piccole cose per sfociare nelle grandi carneficine:


«Non c’è che dire, è una bella invenzione. Si va più in fretta, si sanno più cose...
Ma le bestie feroci restano bestie feroci, e avranno un bell’inventare meccanismi ancora più perfetti; nell’ombra vi saranno sempre delle bestie feroci.»



Qualcuno si era illuso che il progresso avrebbe innalzato l’Uomo?
La bestialità non si annulla: ce lo dice Zola e ce lo dice la cronaca dei giorni che viviamo.
Da ogni parte la vogliate guardare la Bestia rimane Bestia e la verità una parola senza valore...

"Poi, Dio mio! la giustizia, quale ultima illusione!
Voler essere giusto non è un’illusione quando la verità è tanto ostruita dai rovi?"


Profile Image for MJ Nicholls.
2,160 reviews4,626 followers
September 28, 2015
Nice to be back in the Zolan bosom: multiple histrionic murderers, meticulous locomotive nous, and a splash of hopeless determinism. The seventeenth novel in the Rougon-Macquart series features some of Zola’s most breathtaking descriptions of bleak rural backwaters, trains in their brutal firebreathing phallic infancy, hopeless provincials devising schemes to escape their predetermined lives of hate and misery, implausible gruesome murders committed by almost every character, and humorous courtroom antics. As usual, Zola delivers the point with the subtle wallop of a heavyweight boxer, but with his usual scalpel-sharp prose, translated here with aplomb by Mr. Roger Whitehouse.
Profile Image for Zahra.
198 reviews62 followers
February 7, 2024
از گفتن حقیقت چه سود هنگامی که به نظر می‌آید تنها دروغ معنی دارد؟
سایه های شب یا دیو درون، هفدهمین رمان از مجموعه بیست جلدی روگن ماکاره. ماجرای داستان در سال های آخر امپراطوری دوم فرانسه و در خط راه‌آهن تازه ساخته شده پاریس- لوهاور اتفاق میوفته. دورانی که ناپلئون سوم با وارد شدن به جنگ با پادشاهی پروس، سند نابودی خودش و امپراتوریش رو امضا کرد
کتاب تم جنایی داره و درباره جنون ارثیه. موضوعی که در خیلی از کتاب های روگن ماکار و حتی ترز راکن تکرار میشه اما با این حال، کتاب درباره چیزی فراتر از خشونت ذاتی و یک جنایت شرارت باره. زولا تو این کتاب سیستم قضایی فرانسه رو به باد انتقاد میگیره و خواننده رو با دنیای راه آهن و کارکنان اون آشنا می‌کنه. زولا تو این کتاب به مشکلاتی می پردازه که در اون زمان خیلی ها جرئت پرداختن بهش رو نداشتن.
ترجمه کتاب در بهترین حالت قابل قبوله. حداقل موضوعات منشوری که این کتاب به میزان زیادی داره رو به خوبی رسونده. من یک کتاب دیگه هم از امیل زولا با ترجمه همین مترجم خوندم و اون هم متاسفانه خیلی دلچسب نبود خصوصا در مقایسه با ترجمه ژرمینال و فتح پلاسان و یا حتی ارثیه خاندان روگن که خیلی ترجمه قدیمی‌ایه.
پ.ن: از روی این رمان فیلم های زیادی ساخته شده که احتمالا معروفترینشون، نسخه‌ای به کارگردانی فریتس لانگ و بازی گلن فورد باشه
Profile Image for Reza Ng.
10 reviews14 followers
August 7, 2022
کتاب عجیبی بود.و داستان عجیب .نمیشه از شباهت عجیب رمان دختری در قطار نوشته پائولا هاوکینز گذشت .خیلی داستانش شبیه سایه های شب بود که قسمت جناییش جدا کرده بود .شده یه رمان جدید.کلا عجیب بود به پای ژرمینال نمی رسید ولی خیلی حس حال غریبی داشت
Profile Image for Chrissie.
2,811 reviews1,438 followers
July 18, 2020
The Beast in Man (La Bête Humaine) is set in the late 1860s, the end of the Second French Empire, concluding at the start of the Franco-Prussian War. The title makes clear the message and the focus of the book. It is a book depicting a cast of characters brimming over with bestial passion. Not one, not two, but many such characters. In fact every single one of the characters are of this temperament. What is in our heredity will come forth. This is Zola’s message.

There is an additional character, a non-human one, La Lison, a steam locomotive in use on the Paris - Rouen - Le Havre railway line. It is Jacques Lantier (the son of Gervaise) who drives the steam engine. The power of the engine is as a beast too!

Who holds the reins? Is it man under the thumb of heredity? Is it our brains, our intellect, or our emotions? How is the behavior of those holding high positions in society and the government? Who is in control and ultimately is justice attained? These are the topics around which the characters circle.

Zola has a message to deliver. It is through the characters that message is delivered.

I find the characters excessively passionate and evil. I am into realism. Zola priorities the relaying of a message over realism. Of course, there exist evil people. Of course, there exist passionate people, but Zola draws here in this story only such people and he ties passion and evil together . He goes too far, for my taste. The characters are not credible. They have become stick figures, Zola’s puppets pressing upon readers Zola’s message.

I am giving the book three stars because there are sections I do like. Zola draws magnificently the rail industry and the many who work there. What Zola has written of the industry is based on an in-depth study. He weaves in that which is important into the telling of the tale. He does not heap on unnecessary details. His studies enable him to speak naturally and accurately at the same time. To this is added Zola’s talent at drawing exciting episodes. He has a knack for this. Momentum mounts and you cannot look away. There is something in the writing that pulls the reader in.

There are a number of fantastically well written episodes involving the train. My favorite is one where the train is caught in a blizzard.

Peter Newcombe Joyce narrates the audiobook. His French pronunciation is off, but his words are spoken clearly, and he is easy to understand. Although he does dramatize, something I don’t usually like, he does it well. Three stars for the narration.

I like this but I have liked others by Zola more! This is too exaggerated. The characters have lost credibility.

**************
Family Tree:
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Rou...

*******************************

*Thérèse Raquin 4 stars

Les Rougon-Macquart Books:
*(#13)Germinal 4 stars
*(#14)The Masterpiece (L’Oeuvre) 4 stars
*(#12)The Bright Side of Life (La Joie de vivre) 3 stars
*(#17)The Beast in Man (La Bête Humaine) 3 stars
*(#7)The Drinking Den (L'Assommoir) 3 stars
*(#9)Nana 1 star
*(#11)The Ladies' Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames) TBR
*(#2)The Kill (La Curée) TBR
*(#18)Money (L’Argent) TBR
*(#3)The Belly of Paris (Le Ventre de Paris) TBR
*(#1)The Fortune of the Rougons (La Fortune des Rougon) TBR
February 26, 2024
Ανατριχιαστικο, τρομαχτικό μα τόσο καλογραμμένο! Εξαιρετικός ερμηνευτης της ανθρώπινης ψυχης, ακόμα και της πιο αρρωστημένης, ο Ζολα. Διαβασμένο χρόνια πριν και από τα πιο αγαπημένα μου κλασσικά έργα!
Profile Image for Carmo.
704 reviews535 followers
November 9, 2016
Émile Zola fazia parte da minha lista de leituras há muitos anos, mas só em 2014 li o primeiro deles - Naná. A partir daí todos os que li me pareceram melhores, todos se tornaram inesquecíveis, e A Besta Humana é, sem dúvida, o melhor de todos eles.
E no entanto, é uma história tenebrosa; tão crua, tão brutal, tão avassaladora! É um livro que nunca mais se esquece, que choca por revelar o Ser humano nas suas piores vertentes.
Aqui não há inocentes, todos são culpados; da inveja, da ganância, do ciúme, da traição, todos são vítimas de si próprios, ou, segundo o raciocínio do autor, vítimas da sua herança genética. Zola acreditava que o factor hereditário determinava a personalidade e o comportamento do ser humano, seria inútil tentar contrariar esse destino.

Se em Germinal fiquei sensibilizada com a "humanidade" que atribuiu aos cavalos, aqui aconteceu o mesmo com os comboios. Atrevo-me a dizer que as máquinas foram tão humanamente caracterizadas que sofremos por elas cada vez que têm um acidente ou algo corre mal.

Soberbo também no final! O último parágrafo é uma visão algo apocalíptica do futuro, do mundo que vivemos hoje; um mundo que viria a tornar o homem um ser dependente da indústria e da tecnologia.
Profile Image for Catherine Vamianaki.
463 reviews48 followers
March 18, 2021
Ενα βιβλίο γεμάτο ένταση και αισθήματα, πάθη, έρωτες, εκδίκηση, απογοήτευση.
Σίγουρα δεν είναι το καλύτερο του Zola κατ' εμέ, όμως και αν δεν το αγαπήσεις αρκετά, σε κάνει να σέβεσαι το έργο του και να τον θαυμάζεις απεριόριστα.
Το διάβασα με μεγάλη ευχαρίστηση!
Profile Image for Emilio Gonzalez.
185 reviews126 followers
May 2, 2020
Una magnifica novela, que siendo la primera que leo de Emile Zola me deja con muchísimas ganas de continuar leyendo mas novelas suyas.

La novela comienza con el subjefe de una estación, el Sr. Roubaud, que se entera que su esposa, Severine, había sido violada cuando aun era una menor por el presidente del ferrocarril donde él trabaja y decide asesinarlo. Testigo accidental de ese crimen será el maquinista Jacques Lantier, y para evitar que los delate, Roubaud le pedirá a la esposa que lo seduzca y persuada de no hablar con la policía, abriendo así la puerta a una ardiente relación entre Jacques y Severine sobre la que girara gran parte de la historia, principalmente porque Lantier luchará a lo largo de toda la novela para contener una salvaje pulsión que lleva consigo desde siempre que lo incita a asesinar mujeres.
De esa tensión entre instintos versus la razón se vale muy bien Zola para desarrollar un thriller de intrigas interesantísimo porque uno nunca termina de saber hasta donde estará dispuesto a llegar Lantier con su vehemencia.

La novela es durísima y en base a una impecable construcción psicológica de los personajes refleja con mucho realismo y crudeza lo peor de las pasiones humanas en una historia plagada de celos, lujuria, manipulaciones y violencia física.
El marco de la novela es el ambiente ferroviario de fines del siglo XIX que Zola describe de manera brillante produciendo con el andar de las viejas locomotoras a vapor escenas visualmente extraordinarias de carácter muy cinematográfico.

Una novela mas que recomendable, imperdible.

"Mientras apresuraba furtivamente el paso, se excitaba pensando, repasando las razones que iban a convertir aquella muerte en una acción sabia, legítima, lógicamente debatida y decidida. Era un derecho que ejercía, el derecho de vida, puesto que aquella sangre de otro le era a él indispensable para su propia existencia. Solo había que dar un navajazo, y ya habría conquistado la felicidad."
Profile Image for Teresa.
1,492 reviews
November 11, 2016
"De um clássico toda a releitura é uma leitura de descoberta igual à primeira."
Italo Calvino

Li A Besta Humana quando tinha vinte e poucos anos e apaixonei-me por Emílio Zola. Na altura, li tudo o que encontrei dele (anos depois comprei mais alguns livros mas, não sei porquê, não os li). Sempre que apanhava algum potencial leitor a jeito impingia-lhe A Besta Humana, que foi tão lido que o meu primeiro exemplar está que parece um baralho de cartas (entretanto já comprei mais dois).
Agora, voltei a lê-lo - confesso com algum receio de que, mais de três décadas depois, a magia se tivesse perdido. Mas Calvino tem razão. Embora eu me lembrasse de tudo, li-o com a mesma paixão da primeira vez. Porque este é um livro de paixões. Arrasadoras que só se saciam com a morte. Com o crime. Gosto de ler policiais violentos, e já li muitos, mas nenhum me transmitiu tão fortemente a compulsão de matar. Matar por amor. Matar por ambição. Matar por ciúme. Matar por prazer.

Há duas coisas neste romance que me assombraram ao longo dos anos:
A humanidade que Zola transmite aos comboios - particularmente à máquina Lison - símbolos de vida, no sentido de futuro e de evolução, e simultaneamente de morte;
E Flore. Uma mulher solitária, independente e corajosa; uma guerreira selvagem que sabe o que quer e executa, sem hesitar, o que decide fazer.

O final é sublime. Julgamos saber qual é, mas não sabemos...

Para terminar, deixo a bonita opinião da Carmo, com quem, em boa hora, me aventurei a repetir esta viagem. Obrigada Carmo.

description
(Alex Colville, Horse and Train, 1954)
Profile Image for Ben Loory.
Author 4 books723 followers
January 1, 2013
i avoided naturalism for a long time, i always thought it was going to be really dry and boring stuff, social criticism and whatnot, stories about people reduced to poverty by unfair labor practices who then get caught stealing shoes or something and get executed in the town square... but these zola books are the exact opposite, all the conflict is coming from inside the characters, everyone's bursting with hatred and jealousy and nebulous urges to kill and maim and destroy; everyone in this book is on the verge of killing someone, and most of them actually do! though sometimes the wrong people... it's basically like a bret easton ellis novel except everyone's good too, they are human as well as human, they're not all just a bunch of sociopathic morons... anyway, this thing MOVES like crazy and it's just one white-knuckle suspense sequence after another, it's kind of incredible really. reading this, the thing that pops into my head is, "oh, and then everybody just copied this for another 120 years??" i don't really see a lot of advancement from here. things went interior and got a little more high-falutin' i guess... but there's not really much to be improved upon in this... it's pretty much perfect i think.


Clenching his teeth, he pursued her without a word. There was a brief struggle and she was back by the bed. She shrank away, desperate, defenceless, her nightdress torn off.
"Why, oh God, why?"
He brought down his fist and the knife nailed the question in her throat.
Profile Image for Jason.
114 reviews823 followers
February 21, 2016
Okay folks, my first 5-star rating in 2009. I'm stingy with 5-stars, but Emile Zola delivered, again, after about 25 other books this year. When I enjoy classic writers like Thoreau, Dickens, Hawthorne or playwrights like Shakespeare or Whitman, I sometimes overlook nuances or miss the unexpected metaphor or misinterpret the character flaw that destroys the protagonist. Not so with Zola. No way! His themes and messages come at you like an over-steamed locomotive. Zola's characters wield their Shakespearian flaws with brute force. There's no time or space for nuance, for subtleties, for guesswork. Instead, Zola bangs the reader over the head with attributes that can only be described as beastly. The actors in The Beast in Man are absolutely spring-loaded from the first 2 chapters. Jealousy, rage, spousal abuse, murder, poisoning, and a perverse, australopithecine compulsion to kill women.

Zola's greatest gift as a writer is dredging up the most repugnant, atavistic urges in man—-urges about which your own superego may have had unintentional, fleeting, nightmarish thoughts, but never told anyone, and then hid safely away from your id—-and carrying them out to their mesmerizing conclusion. I was drawn to the story like a lurid onlooker at a street fight before the cops arrive, afraid to intervene, but overcome by an unexplainable need to watch the beating, punch for punch, busted nose for broken rib, and shaking afterward with an overload of adrenalin.

Zola is a naturalist. Wikipedia defines Naturalism as a literary movement that began in mid-nineteenth century France and, in the introductory paragraph, specifically affirms Zola's contributions, later declaring that the word 'naturalism' actually came from Zola himself, describing the departure his writing took from the overused literature of Realism. Wikipedia states that Naturalistic works:

“often include uncouth or sordid subject matter... a frankness about sexuality along with a pervasive pessimism...exposed the dark harshness of life, including poverty, racism, sex, prejudice, disease, prostitution, and filth...as a result, naturalistic writers were frequently criticized for being too blunt...another characteristic of naturalism is determinism...basically the opposite of the notion of free will...a character's fate has been pre-determined, usually by environmental factors, and that he/she can do nothing about it...there tends to be in naturalist novels a strong sense that nature is indifferent to human struggle.”

The Beast in Man takes place on, near, and around trains. The movement of these heavy, belching transports is an awesome milieu, as it seems each character is inexorably moved, equally without the power of immediate brakes, toward their final destination. And the destination for these characters is adultery, homicide, suicide, and prison. The actors challenge their fates, but are relentlessly tormented to act on impulse, to act as if they were scripted to do this (and only this) from birth. In the case of X___X, his compulsions are so overwhelming and his tendencies written so convincingly that readers want him to kill—need him to kill—to comprehend the universal question, can man live after satisfying such beastly urges? How does society deal with such a creature? The naturalist's answer: by accusing the wrong man, thus ascribing a fate 'by environmental factors...that [the accused] can do nothing about.”

The Beast in Man is not a mass market paperback, so don't expect a story like the current page-turners on sale at your large grocery store book aisle. Zola takes his time to build characters, but his delivery is outstanding. His writing is beautiful, powerful, mellifluous. Some scenes are shocking and graphic, all the more testament to his break from Realistic literature. Two examples of his writing that I especially liked:

While beating his wife: ”There was no abating Y___Y's fury. The moment it did seem to have begun to wane, it would flare up again, like a sort of intoxication, wave on wave of it, increasing and carrying him away in fits of dizziness. He was no longer master of himself fighting empty space, tossed by every gust of the hurricane of violence which lashed him, till he was reduced to the utter depths of all-absorbing need to assuage the howling beast deep within him. It was an immediate physical need, a starvation of a body which hungered for vengeance, a force contorting him and giving him no respite till he should satisfy his need. Still striding up and down, he began to thump his temples with his fists, crying in agonized tones: 'Oh, whatever shall I do, whatever shall I do?' Since he had not killed this woman at once, now he could not kill her at all. His poltroonery in letting her live made him itch with rage."

While fighting on the small engine platform of a speeding train: ”He had managed to catch hold of the side of the tender. They both slithered on their constricted deck, the steel plates dancing dangerously under their feet as they wrestled silently, their teeth grinding, each trying to heave the other through the narrow cab doorway, which as only protection had a single bar across. It was no easy task. Fed to the full, the locomotive rushed on and on. They swept through Barentin and plunged into Malaunay tunnel, still at death grips, backs straining against the coals, heads banging against the water-cistern, trying to avoid the red-hot firebox door, which scorched their legs every time they stretched out. For a moment, X___X thought he might be able to raise himself up enough to shut off steam, to bring help and get free from this lunatic, out of his mind through drink and jealousy. For, being the smaller man, he was beginning to lose strength, knew there was already no hope of throwing Z___Z off. He was already beaten. He felt his hair rise on his head as the fear of falling swept through him. But as he made a supreme effort, and felt out with one hand, the other guessed what he was at and with iron grip on X___X's haunches, suddenly lifted him off the ground as if he had been a little child. The locomotive rushed on and on. The train burst noisily out of the tunnel and swept through the grim, bleak countryside. They dashed through Malaunay station at such speed that the A.S.M on the platform there did not even see the two men destroying each other on the moving thunderbolt. Then, with a final effort, Z___Z flung X___X out, but, just as X___X felt space round him, in his desperation he succeeded in clutching at Z___Z's neck, so convulsively that he dragged his murderer down with him. A double wild cry, voices of murderer and murdered confused in one, broke against the wind and was dispersed into nothingness. They fell together and as these two men, who so long had been like two brothers, went down, the draught of the train drew them in under the wheels, to be cut up, chopped to pieces, still laced together in a terrible embrace. Their bodies were afterwards found headless, legless, two bleeding trunks, with arms still enlaced one about the other, in suffocating grasp.”

A friend says that Zola's writing is a bit overwrought. I disagree. That's why I read Zola, to be shocked. To see a side of humanity that you know exists, but rarely see. How many movies have you seen in the last couple years where there was a discharge of gunfire? Quite a few. How many times in your real life have you seen a discharge of gunfire in public? Probably none. The comparison works for Zola. I know man can be a beast, but I don't see it that often, so I read Zola for an up-close view.
Profile Image for Alexander Carmele.
352 reviews179 followers
December 25, 2023
Mechanik der Gefühle und Gefühle der Mechanik. Die Eisenbahn als Metapher zwischenmenschlicher Entgleisungen. Ein Allegorienfest.

Émile Zolas „Die Bestie im Menschen“ erschien 1890 als 17. Teil des Rougon-Macquart-Zyklus. Vordergründig liest er sich als ein fehlgeleiteter Kriminalroman, in dessen Zentrum der rätselhafte Tod des Präsidenten der Eisenbahngesellschaft, Grandmorin, steht:

»Wie?« fragte Roubaud. »Ein Mord unter unserem Personal?«
»Nein, nein, an einem Fahrgast in einem Halbabteil ... Die Leiche ist ungefähr an der Ausfahrt des Tunnels von Malaunay bei Kilometerpfahl einhundertdreiundfünfzig aus dem Zug geworfen worden ... Und das Opfer ist einer unserer Aufsichtsräte, der Präsident Grandmorin.«


Grandmorins Leiche wird auf halber Strecke zwischen Paris und Le Havre gefunden. Ein Mord hat stattgefunden, in welchem der Untersuchungsrichter Denizet ermittelt, vor allem auch deshalb, um sich endlich das Kreuz der Ehrenlegion zu verdienen und eine Versetzung nach Paris zu erzwingen. Tatverdächtige sind der stellvertretende Bahnhofsvorsteher Roubaud und der bereits vorbestrafte Cabuche. Jacques Lantier, der den Mord im vorüberfahrenden Zug bezeugt hat, verbleibt im Vagen, vor allem weil ihn Roubauds Ehefrau Séverine bezirzt. Eine Affäre bahnt sich an.

„Den Mann [Roubaud] kannte er, da er ihm manchmal die Hand drückte, seitdem er im Schnellzugverkehr eingesetzt war; die Frau hatte er hin und wieder flüchtig gesehen, in seiner krankhaften Scheu hatte er sie wie die anderen Frauen gemieden. In dieser Minute aber fiel sie ihm auf, wie sie so weinend und blaß, mit der verstörten Sanftmut ihrer blauen Augen unter der schwarzen Last ihres Haars dastand. Er wandte keinen Blick mehr von ihr, und auf einmal war er geistesabwesend […]“

Ein naturalistisch-verfasstes Shakespeare’sches Komplott zieht sich zusammen, in welchem viele sterben und nur wenige davonkommen. In nüchterner Sprache beschreibt Zola die Zusammenhänge, die ihre Wucht durch die Mechanik der absolut gesetzten Wünsche und Triebe der Figuren erhalten, die diesen wie eine führerlos gewordene Lokomotive nicht mehr Einhalt gebieten können. Die Technologie als Metapher zieht, da der Kopf der Eisenbahngesellschaft, Grandmorin, selbst ein Lüstling ist, und die eigentlich empfindsamen Wesen in „Die Bestie im Menschen“ dessen Geschöpfe selbst sind, die Maschinen:

„Dort unten, jenseits der Brücke, kreuzte sie sich mit einer Lokomotive, die wie eine einsame Spaziergängerin, allein vom Depot kam; ihre Achsen und Kupfertheile leuchteten, als hatte sie soeben frisch und keck sich zur Reise angekleidet. Die große Maschine hielt jetzt und forderte durch zwei kurze Pfiffe den Weichensteller auf, die Geleise passirbar zu machen; dieser that es sofort und die Lokomotive rollte auf den in der Halle für den Fernverkehr abgangsbereit stehenden Zug zu.“

Wahrhaft unschuldig können nur die Maschinen sein, und Zola lässt daran stilistisch auch keinen Zweifel aufkommen, wenn er mit aller Empathie das Schicksal der Lokomotive Lison beschreibt:

„Die Riesin mit dem aufgeschlitzten Bauch wurde noch stiller, sank nach und nach in einen ganz leisen Schlaf, verstummte schließlich. Sie war tot. Und der Haufen aus Eisen, Stahl und Kupfer, den sie hier hinterließ, dieser zerschmetterte Koloß mit seinem gesprungenen Rumpf, den verstreuten Gliedern, den zerschundenen, frei zutage geförderten Organen nahm die gräßliche Traurigkeit eines ungeheueren menschlichen Leichnams an, einer ganzen Welt, die gelebt hatte und aus der das Leben soeben unter Schmerzen herausgerissen worden war.“

Émile Zola führt eine Welt vor, in der die Triebe zu Mord und Totschlage führen, in welcher alle Menschen bis auf den Naturburschen Cabuche Schuld auf sich laden und sich doch alle als Opfer fühlen. Die Zeitkritik à la Jean-Jacques Rousseau wirkt hart. Der Blick fährt in die vernunftlose Mechanik der Menschen, die ihre Begehren nicht zu bremsen mögen.

Literarisch eiskalt und Wort für Wort überzeugend, kompositorisch ausgeführt, eine Allegorie auf Julien Offray de La Mettries „Der Mensch als Maschine.“, die im Gegensatz zu Günther Anders „Die Antiquiertheit des Menschen“, den Ausweg mehr im entweder ganz Artifiziellen oder ganz Natürlichen sieht, jedenfalls nicht im kopflosen Gewoge eines bedürfnisgetriebenen, Waren umherschiebenen Güterbahnhofs.
Profile Image for Elham Fathi.
23 reviews21 followers
August 19, 2020

قبل از اين ژرمينال رو از اين نويسنده خوندم و به نظرم واقعا شاهكاره. تلاشم بر اين بود كه سايه هاى شب رو فارغ از مقايسه با ژرمينال كه توقعم رو از نويسنده خيلى بالا برده بود، بخونم ولى خيلى موفق نبودم. ترجمه نسبتا خوب بود ولى ويراستارى بعضى جاها خيلى آزار دهنده بود.
برخلاف ژرمينال، توى اين اثر به خواننده اصلا فرصت درك اتفاقات رو نميده و خيلى سريع از روى حوادثى كه ميتونست نفس مخاطب رو توى سينه حبس كنه ميگذره و از جذابيت داستان كم ميكنه. كششى كه ژرمينال در من ايجاد ميكرد كه وقتى به اجبار كتاب رو زمين ميذاشتم ذهنم درگير ماجرا بود و ميخواستم زودتر برگردم سر خوندنش، در اين كتاب اين كشش رو احساس نكردم. شايد دليلش همين بود كه اصلا فرصت نداشتى با وقايع درگير بشى، انگار خود زولا عجله داشته زودتر داستان رو به آخر برسونه🤷🏻‍♀️

امتياز واقعيم: ٣/٥
Profile Image for K.D. Absolutely.
1,820 reviews
January 13, 2013
My first Emile Zola and I am impressed.

Emile Zola (1840-1902) was a French novelist who attempted to do an Honore de Balzac (1799-1850), another French novelist. The young Zola read Balzac's La Comedie Humaine (The Human Comedy) that consists of 91 finished and 46 unfinished works (stories, novels, essays and for some of the unfinished ones, just titles). Definitely inspired to have his own, Zola wrote interrelated 20 novels and collectively called them Les Rougon Macquart. The series follows a fictional family living during the Second French Empire (1852-1870) and is said to be an example of French naturalism.

I found the novel very engaging. It deals about the frailty of human beings and the fact that a dark side, i.e., the human beast lurks somewhere in the recesses of our minds. While reading I was choosing the character that the title refers to and my pick was Jacques Lantier, seemingly the most evil of them all. However, upon closing the book, I felt that almost all the characters contributed to the what happened in their lives and all of those characters had that beast in them. This proved for me, that, not only we decide for our lives but also some of our decisions are influenced by our emotions that can be traced from past events.

I am planning to read five or six more novels from this series, so for my own record, I'd like to put here where is Jacques Lantier in the scheme of things. Wiki says: Lantier is an engine driver on the line and the family link with the rest of Les Rougon-Macquart series. He is the son of Gervaise (L'Assommoir), the brother of Étienne Lantier (Germinal) and Claude Lantier (L'Œuvre), and the half-brother of the eponymous Nana. I will have this as a quick reference when I read those other 1001 books.

And I am raring to find copies of them. I am sure they are as engaging as this one.
Profile Image for Greg.
532 reviews127 followers
December 21, 2024
Without question, the most accessible of the fifteen of twenty Zola’s Rougon-Macquart novels I have yet read. It could be described as a psychological murder mystery but, as the translator makes clear, the story is a “whydunnit,” not a “whodunnit.” This time the setting is the French railway, which during the Second Empire, as in other industrially advanced countries, was making travel easier. Jacques Lantier is a train conductor with an overwhelming compulsion, who had “always wanted to kill someone since he was a child, and he’d been tortured to screaming-point by the horror of this obsession”. We readers know it’s just a matter of “when,” not “if.” He’s prevented from realizing his urge in almost comic ways, bad timing, scruples, being witness to another murder, and—strangest of all—falling in love.

We all have inner compulsions to a greater or lesser degree. What happens when they become irresistible or create a sense of inevitability? If they are kept at bay, is the respite only temporary? And when it comes back, is it the same, stronger, or weaker? And how do temptations of doing what we know is wrong satisfy? Or just push reckoning sometime into the future?

Perhaps my favorite relationship in this story is one between Lantier and his locomotive, La Lison. “The mystery of manufacture had given her a soul, that something that the chance blows of a hammer can bring to metal, that an assembly worker’s hand can lend to the individual parts: the engine’s personality, its life.” La Lison is just one of the many colorful characters who fill the nooks of two sequential but related plot lines. The ending must have had quite an effect on its readership when it was first serialized and later published. It’s symbolically tragic.

For those considering dabbling in Zola and have never done so before, this would be a good place to start.
Profile Image for Nataša Bjelogrlić .
107 reviews29 followers
December 20, 2020
4,5* Jedan od najuzbudljivijih Zolinih romana. Sama fabula, likovi vođeni iskonskim i prirodnim nagonima, izgradili su priču koja svojim zapletima vodi kraju kakav neizbježno mora biti. Ima tu šokantnih scena, gdje protagonisti čitaocu prvo izazivaju grčenje želuca pa ga lagano vode osjećaju empatije prema istim. Ima tu odličnih prikaza, fenomenalna izgadnja atmosfere, ponešto bliža psihološka analiza likova, zanimljivo sprovođenje istrage ubistva, uticaja politike na pravosuđe. Ima tu maestralnih scena, temeljanih opisa kako diše radnička klasa ovoga puta u službi francuske željeznice a i opisa kako dišu sami vozovi. Ima simboličnih metaforičnih momenata. A sve zajedno, najviše imamo jednu veliku istinu koju nam je Zola, u svom stilu, sasvim hladnokrvno servirao.
Profile Image for Orçun Güzer.
Author 1 book53 followers
February 20, 2018
Hayvanlaşan İnsan, psikolojik romanın (ve hatta, kimi yönleriyle psikolojik gerilimin) öncülerinden biri sayılabilir. Zola, bu olgunluk dönemi başyapıtında, sadece toplumsal gerçekliği ve acımasız modern hayatı tüm yönleriyle kuşatmakla kalmıyor, derinlerdeki psikolojik gerçekliğe de dokunuyor. Roman boyunca, trenlerin mekanik mükemmelliğiyle yarış halinde, insan zaaflarının, karanlık içgüdülerin geçit töreni yaptığını görüyoruz. Sevme tutkusuyla yok etme tutkusunun iç içe geçtiği, her bir karakterin karanlık yönünün incelikle işlendiği bu romanın, şimdiye kadar okuduğum en iyi kurmaca yapıtlardan biri olduğunu rahatlıkla söyleyebilirim.
Profile Image for Jonathan.
966 reviews1,111 followers
February 14, 2020
Zola, oh Zola, this book is
Not like Ebola
Because I am happy to have it.

It is more like Granola.
Yum. Granola.
I really like Granola.
But it has too much sugar.

It’s healthy facade
It a lie.

Screw you Granola.

But you are addictive
Regardless
Displaying 1 - 30 of 650 reviews

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