The novel was not as successful as his previous efforts , and Hugo himself began to comment on the growing distance between himself and literary contemporaries such as Flaubert and Émile Zola , whose realist and naturalist novels were now exceeding the popularity of his own work .
However , the novel was not as successful as his previous efforts , and Hugo himself began to comment on the growing distance between himself and literary contemporaries such as Flaubert and Émile Zola , whose realist and naturalist novels were now exceeding the popularity of his own work .