The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1932-11-01
Nv PAIL FRIEDLANDER


IN the night of September %, 1902,
the great writer Emile lola died
at the age of &c. His life was cut
short just when he was working on
new series of social novels, in
which there should ripen the fruit
of his development into a critic and
accusser of bourgeois society, into a
champion of Socialism.
lola, who was born in Paris on
April 2, 1910, after a care-free child
hood spent in the South of France,
had to fight hard for his profession
and his bread. When he was rs
years old, he decided to devote his
life to a great literary work; to
write the epos of the bourgeois So
ciety of his time. He carried out
his plan with tenacious energy. The
sensational success of his novels
brought him also material security,
so that he could devote himself
wholly to his work. After the con-
illusions of 20-volume series of
novels, the 'ROugon Marcquart," he
came to be regarded as the repre-
sentative epic writer of bourgeois
France.
DREYFUSS CASE
TURNED HIM INTO FIGHT
1t was the Dreyfuss case which
made him from an artist into a
fighter, from an observer into an
accuser. His famous Open Letter
to the President of the French Re
public, "J'accuSe," had the effect of
a bombshell. 1t was an Indictment
of the French Republic and of its
military and judicial apparatus.
zola was aware of the tremendous
effect his letter would have. He
himself declared at the conclusion
of his indictment: 1.-THE act which
I accomplish is a revolutionary
means in order to accelerate the
explosion of Truth and Justice"
The effect of his action was enor-
nous. There set in an unsurpassed
Indictment against lola and his
fellow champions. He was sentenced
to Imprisonment and had to go into
exile. Then the Supreme Court,
which could not longer Withstand
the exposures and proofs, cancelled
the verdict against lola. lola
himself, who during his earlier
creative period refrained from any
statement of political views and
together wi TIL the so-called
naturalist school, had condemned
the political writer, now became a
conscious critic of society. He drew
the consequences from his, already
completed work, in which were de-
scribed the conditions of bourgeois
society. Death prevented him from
completing his second great work.
IN his recently published book on
Emile lola, Henri Barbusse sets
himself the task of examining the
life work of lola in regard to his
Importance for our time and MAX
ing clear to the present generation
"the pain appeal which zola's life
speaks.".)
zola'S life synchronized with the
flourishing period of the capitalist
social order. He was witness to
the "joie de vivre" (joy of life)
and orgies of the prosperous bour-
geoisie, and he saw at the same
time how there was terminating in
it's womb the seeds of its disintegra-
ton. lola came to realize bourgeois
society not from the social classes.
and their struggle, but from the
individual, from the family and
their fate. Thus he lacked the key
to the historical meaning of the
time in which he lived and which
he portrayed. Nevertheless he was
able to produce in rich colors and
in epic breadth a colossal work
dealing with the life and fate of
family, which rounded off into a
picture of society.
THE CONTENT OF
ZOLA'S WORK
The epoch-making, in fact In
many respects revolutionary, i'm
portance of Zolas novels arises, as
we can so rightly recognize today,
less out of the form than out of
the content of this works. Thus
the great series of novels became a
rousing document that discovered
the new land of social literature.
The substance, therefore, gave the
historical value to his work; it de-
termined also the artistic presenta-