The Fortune of the Rougons by Emile Zola was the first novel in the series and this was the book which brought him genuine literary fame, and the foundation of what must necessarily be regarded as his life-work. The idea of writing the "natural and social history of a family under the Second Empire," extending to a score of volumes, was doubtless suggested to M. Zola by Balzac's immortal "Comedie Humaine." He was twenty-eight years of age when this idea first occurred to him; he was fifty-three when he at last sent the manuscript of his concluding volume, "Dr. Pascal," to the press. He had spent five-and- twenty years in working out his scheme, persevering with it doggedly and stubbornly, whatever rebuffs he might encounter, whatever jeers and whatever insults might be directed against him by the ignorant, the prejudiced, and the hypocritical.
- ISBN13 9781105691126
- Publish Date 22 April 2012
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 25 June 2021
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Lulu.com
- Format eBook (OEB)
- Language English