Reviews

Germinal by Émile Zola

clemo's review against another edition

emotional sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

sba_reads's review against another edition

4.0

What?! Amazing! Just read the book! Oh my... I won't even go into details about my feelings. Just read it.

I was recommended this book by one of our literature lecturers as she is a huge fan of all of Zola's works, and she also specialises in class structure in the canon. I'm not sure if it's his writing style or the fact that it's a glimpse into the past in a creative manner, but I was hooked. I love French classic literature so much, and to read this after Maupassant was a delight. I had to sneeze in chapters between studies and I'm glad I did. I will definitely revisit this book over the coming years.

There are a few other Zola books I want to devour, and I only have a few titles so far. He is amazing.

Happy Reading!

mhazz's review against another edition

challenging dark sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

mindyb33's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

3.0

jayisreading's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective sad slow-paced

4.0

Zola’s Germinal is not a novel that I would normally pick up on my own accord, especially because I’m not particularly interested in the subject matter (though, I guess the average reader probably won’t be that invested in mining in France during the 1800s). When it comes to personal enjoyment, I would say that the novel fell in the middle ground, and I didn’t love or hate it. I think what really won me over, though, was Zola’s socio-political commentary, especially if you take into consideration who and what he may have been engaging with during the period he worked on this novel.

Directly inspired by the miners’ strikes that occurred in the 1860s, Zola crafted a fictional version of a miners’ strike in Northern France to dig deep into class struggle, particularly the exploitation of the working class by the bourgeoisie. There were other ideas that he considered as well, with I think the most surprising being the role of women in these spaces. I will say that the treatment of women in this novel was anything but great (to put it lightly), but I did appreciate Zola’s consideration of how women contributed to the labor movement. The living conditions that Zola described in Germinal were unbelievably bleak, but, in many ways, it did give him the chance to create powerful (even if, at times, heavy-handed) symbols reflecting on struggle and survival, particularly through his characters, notably Étienne and Catherine. On the note of his characters, I appreciated that Zola didn’t follow the good vs. evil model and, instead, chose to place them in murkier spaces.

Again, based on personal enjoyment alone, I would say that I don’t have any strong opinions and found the novel to be just okay. However, I have to fully acknowledge the richness of Zola’s symbolism, graphic details, and commentary in Germinal. I do think it’s worth picking this up, should you be able to handle the overwhelming bleakness, as it is a great exploration of class struggle while also giving a glimpse into how people such as Zola may have been reacting to Marxism. I was also a little surprised by his prose, which I found a bit different from his contemporaries. Relatedly, I thought it was more accessible to a modern reader who might be intimidated by nineteenth-century French literature, should that mean anything. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Misogyny, Sexism, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, and Alcohol

amirmasoud's review against another edition

5.0

شرح رنج‌های کارگران معدن در فرانسه‌ی پس از انقلاب صنعتی. با نثری مجذوب کننده.

hungerford's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

bibliotequeish's review against another edition

2.0

Well... I didn't like it.
I think I may not have been in the proper mindset for such a dark story... and this is DARK.

This is probably a book I will revisit in a couple years and see if my opinion changes.
I mean the first time I read Catcher in the rye I hated it.
I re read it a couple years later and Loved it.

For right now, its a two stars, but will put it on me re-read list.

samlucas's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

jmoravec's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

Easily one of my favorite books after reading it. The way the book shows the conditions of the miners and the mine itself is engrossing and some of the best writing (even when translated) that I think I've read. You don't really expect a book from the 1800s to be as riveting or as comfortable with topics such as sex and violence as Germinal turned out to be. And the themes of the union and strike are still very relevant to the modern day struggles we have, although thanks to the real folks that did go through this type of work in the real life, we have much better standards of living than they did in the past.