Nana - Emile Zola
I would like to start doing brief reviews of the novels I read, so here is my first go at it. I finished this one a few months back, but it's worth commentary.
Nana by Emile Zola (1880; my specific copy was translated from the French in 1972)
This is the first novel I have read by Zola, and to be honest it is just something I picked up in the used book store out of curiosity and familiarity with the name. This novel, from what the introduction tells me, is part of a larger collection of novels that he wrote (twenty-something?) that explores Zola's theories on heredity and environment, and now with age has the authority to claim paramount in the French Naturalist movement.
Plot overview: Presumably linked to some earlier novel, the reader enters this one through the world of Nana, an emerging actress and harlot of the Paris underworld pre-1870. We follow her from her premier in a production of The Blonde Venus through to her debauchery and ostensible destruction of the Parisian bourgeoisie; "Her success was sudden and decisive, a swift rise to gallant fame, in the garish light of lunatic extravagance and the wasteful follies of beauty." (311) Nana is an actress in the production, but as is made clear in the first few pages, she is and will always be a whore, in whatever capacity that is best served, and that this seems to have been a common thing in the over-indulgent society that was Paris of the time. While the story starts out pretty slow, it is worth hanging on for some of the gruesome details and social commentary that may not be expected. Nana rises from near-poverty (the start of the novel describes her shabby apartment and the multitude of bill-collectors calling) to a member of society with enough wealth to influence fashion and politics. She gains this wealth and influence by becoming the mistress of any man she sees having the money that she needs for her extravagant lifestyle; however, she keeps a few men on the side that she is with purely for fun, or because they are easy to manipulate. The end of the novel sees her fall from this power to a lowly (and explicit) death from smallpox in a hospital room where her petty women friends are waiting around for her to die. Before this her youngest lover has tried to kill himself in her hallway over heartbreak, she has financially ruined a Count, and caused another man to burn himself alive with all his race horses in his barn, among other gossip-worthy escapades (there is lesbian love and a physically abusive relationship also, to name some).
Although Nana is the title character, the supporting characters are who flesh out the novel and give it meaning, and it is their story that is central despite the focus on Nana's affairs. Nana is never so much an actual person as just a grand metaphor, the all-encompassing "Golden Fly."
This is a good novel to read if you have any interest in getting a gritty look at the demimonde of Paris at the time before the Empire's final collapse (the book is wrought with examples of catalysts for political upheaval) and if you have interest in daily social life at the time. As is characteristic of French writers of the time (in my experience) the novel is written in a somewhat bombastic and prolific way, but that is something you either like or fall asleep to.
A few reviews I read on Nana condemned it or frankly seemed bored with the idea of a another story of the "vagina dentata," which I guess is what this is in many ways; a sexually free woman enjoys all the men she cares to, but each one she comes into contact with she brings to destruction, most of the time on purpose or else without a care. As a woman, I of course wondered about Zola's characterization of women throughout the novel. Having read a few other novels from roughly the same time period and geographical location, the men writing at that time seemed to have a few very defined ideas about women. The most popular is the idea of the woman as an innocent child-like being, ignorant to the harsh ways of the world, full of beauty and sweetness and needing much protecting. We also have the elderly women or motherly characters, who cannot still be held up with that innocence (since they have born children) but are now simply frail and lacking much significance in daily life, yet still seen with respect as they are naturally what the first category ought to age into. And then of course there is the dirty, corrupted women of which we must fear and crusade against. Nana falls into this last category. This is the grayest category, in my opinion, and the implicated debate could be carried forward to modern times if desired.
The entire novel is written in third-person, but I don't recall a single time we as readers get a glimpse into the thoughts of Nana or any other woman for that matter. Probably the most revealing character is the Comte Muffat, of whom we get many peeks into his psychiatry (particularly a rainy night of him roaming the streets after he finds out that his wife is, and has been, cheating on him, which upsets him greatly despite the fact that he has been uncontrollably lusting over Nana for months at this point.) Nana we only get to watch from the outside, and I equate her with many of the spoiled celebrities of today: throwing tantrums when she does not get her way, sleeping until noon and pampering herself, concern over material possessions and her appearance alone, vanity to the utmost degree, and total usury of all those around her - but why? It might be a more compelling story in some ways if we were given more insight into her motivation for this disgusting lifestyle, but alas we readers are left mostly to imagination here. What I can gather is a not-too-flattering portrait of the female gender - as I wrote in the margins of one page, of being stupid, greedy, and shallow. However, men don't fare too much better on this one. While woman may be that, I conclude from Zola that he feels that if women are this way it is because of the men who created the society in which this would be their role. I struggled for a good part of the novel to answer the question of which sex was getting the upper-hand here (was Zola just some woman-hater?) but no, neither holds more power in this story. The men of this story are completely ruled by the flesh, overcome with lust and shortsightedness, crumbling their own system due to overindulgence. And maybe that is all that Zola was trying to accomplish with this work - an objective (insomuch as it can be) account of how and why everything was falling apart.
Case in point for there is no hero in this one, this is a sample line from the many: "In the bedroom he made an even greater effort to be amiable. Normally he referred to women as camels, and encumbering himself with one of those filthy animals stirred him to the only sort of indignation of which, in his drunken disdain of the whole world, he was capable." (245) Or, in a scene speaking of the relationship between Nana and her best friend/lesbian lover: "Satin would accompany her back to her own door, and would linger outside in the street for an hour to see whether he murdered her. And the next day the two women would enjoy reliving the reconciliation all afternoon, though they secretly preferred the days when thrashings were in the air, for the prospect of a beating was more exciting." (255) Now, I've never been in any kind of relationship like this, and I doubt that Zola ever was, either, but what the hell kind of way is it to talk about it in this way?! : "By dint of being beaten, Nana became as supple as fine linen; her skin grew delicate, all pink and white, so soft to the touch and pleasing to the eye that she looked more beautiful than ever." which is closely followed by, "'My dear girl, where there are women there are sure to be slaps. It was Napoleon who said that, I think.... Wash yourself with salt water. Salt water's just the thing for those little bruises. You'll get plenty more like that, but don't complain as long as no bones are broken....'" (266) Which leaves me, the reader, kind of out to lunch on this one. It's shocking for modern times, make no mistake. But then again, is it all just satire? How much of it can I take down as general feelings and habits of the time, how much is Zola's obvious bitterness at the world, how much is just a joke and helps to get the point of the novel across?
"Woman dominated him with the jealous tyranny of a God of wrath, terrifying him but granting him moments of joy as keen as spasms, in return for hours of hideous torments, visions of hell and eternal tortures. He stammered out the same despairing prayers as in church, and above all suffered the same fits of humility peculiar to an accursed creature crushed under the mud from which he has sprung. His carnal desires and his spiritual needs merged together, and seemed to spring from the dark depths of his being like a single blossom on the tree of his existence. He abandoned himself to the power of love and faith, those twin levers which move the world. And in spite of all the struggles of his reason, this bedroom of Nana's filled him with madness, and he would submit shudderingly to the omnipotence of sex, just as he would swoon before the mysterious power of heaven." (440)
And then I think, damn, every single person in this story is pathetic in their own unique, insufferable way. This is a passage describing the Comte Muffat, Nan's main benefactor and only character we get much insight into. The entire work is full of passages like this, which are of course fun to read, but make me question the effectiveness of Zola's Naturalist approach. He wonders (possibly as much to himself as to any one reading it) can an author really just put down what he observes from life? and should he, because aren't these sort of endeavors [novel-writing] meant to be devoured for pleasure? While he does not exactly make explicit commentary on the issues he wishes to discuss, he hardly keeps the neutral 'Naturalist' demeanor about his writing, either.
Overall a well-written (although at times long-winded) book, great for the history enthusiast or if you have a particular penchant for the drama of theater life. Worth reading for the social and political commentary, although I don't think I would recommend this book to anyone who wanted to sit down and read it for fun; once you get into it it's a fast read, but getting started on these 19th century novels can be a real challenge.