Germinal (Penguin Classics)
Language: English
Pages: 592
ISBN: 0140447423
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
The thirteenth novel in Émile Zola’s great Rougon-Macquart sequence, Germinal expresses outrage at the exploitation of the many by the few, but also shows humanity’s capacity for compassion and hope.
Etienne Lantier, an unemployed railway worker, is a clever but uneducated young man with a dangerous temper. Forced to take a back-breaking job at Le Voreux mine when he cannot get other work, he discovers that his fellow miners are ill, hungry, and in debt, unable to feed and clothe their families. When conditions in the mining community deteriorate even further, Lantier finds himself leading a strike that could mean starvation or salvation for all.
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New translation
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Includes introduction, suggestions for further reading, filmography, chronology, explanatory notes, and glossary
Sense the repression to come. Though no one had any idea where it started, a new rallying cry sent them all rushing off to another pit. ‘La Victoire! La Victoire!’ Were there no gendarmes or dragoons at La Victoire, then? Nobody could say, but everyone seemed reassured. And so they turned on their heels and raced down the Beaumont hill, cutting across the fields to rejoin the Joiselle road. The railway line stood in their path, but they knocked down the fences and passed over it. They were now.
Bending her neck to the yoke, a shift had thus taken place, for now she was certain that the injustice could not go on, and that just because the gates of heaven hadn’t opened this time, it didn’t mean they wouldn’t open one day and offer vengeance to the poor. She spoke quietly, looking about her furtively as she did so. When Pierron approached, she added in a loud voice: ‘Well, if you’re leaving, you’d better come and collect your things from the house…There are still a couple of shirts,.
Sipped what was left of his beer. Maheu looked around him and, seeing only Étienne, said: ‘Only that there’s been another bloody row…Yeah, about the timbering.’ He related what had happened. The blood had rushed to Rasseneur’s face, which seemed to swell as burning excitement blazed in his eyes and cheeks. ‘Well, now! The minute they decide to cut the rate, they’re sunk.’ The presence of Étienne made him uneasy. Nevertheless he continued, watching him out of the corner of his eye as he did.
Eye gave periodic glimpses of a more savage side. His room, which was otherwise like that of any impoverished workman, contained just a single chest full of books and papers. He was Russian, but he never talked about himself and was content to let various tales circulate on his account. The miners, being deeply suspicious of foreigners and sensing from the sight of his small, bourgeois hands that he belonged to a different class, had originally imagined some story about his being a murderer on.
Deep in thought, Étienne was gazing down at the beer she had brought him. Eventually he looked up: ‘Everything our friend here says is perfectly possible, and we simply will have to strike if they force us to it…As it happens, Pluchart’s recently sent me some sound advice on the subject. He’s against a strike, too, because the workers suffer as much as the bosses but end up with nothing to show for it. Except that he sees the strike as a great opportunity to get our men involved in his grand.