En cours de chargement...
Gervaise had waited up for Lantier until two in the morning. Then, shivering from having remained in a thin loose jacket, exposed to the fresh air at the window, she had thrown herself across the bed, drowsy, feverish, and her cheeks bathed in tears.
For a week past, on leaving the "Two-Headed Calf, " where they took their meals, he had sent her home with the children and never reappeared himself till late at night, alleging that he had been in search of work.
That evening, while watching for his return, she thought she had seen him enter the dancing-hall of the "Grand-Balcony, " the ten blazing windows of which lighted up with the glare of a conflagration the dark expanse of the exterior Boulevards; and five or six paces behind him, she had caught sight of little Adele, a burnisher, who dined at the same restaurant, swinging her hands, as if she had just quitted his arm so as not to pass together under the dazzling light of the globes at the door.
L’existence enragée par la misère…
On ne sort pas indemne après avoir lu ce roman et j’en suis encore bouleversée… Je l’ai lu presque d’une traite, ayant du mal à le lâcher tant les vies de Gervaise et d’Auguste Coupeau sont aussi déconcertantes que dramatiques. Emile Zola utilise un vocabulaire populaire afin de restituer le plus fidèlement possible l’existence misérable et laborieuse du milieu ouvrier de son époque. Il met donc un point d’honneur à employer le langage du peuple dont le style prête parfois à sourire, égayant ainsi la trame mélo dramatique et la sombre noirceur de l’histoire. Le lecteur assistera à une véritable descente aux enfers des deux protagonistes du livre, victimes de l’alcool et de la misère, ces deux fléaux qui précipiteront leur chute et leur fin funeste.