Therese Raquin

A gothic tale of murder and adultery, Therese Raquin was denounced as

pornography on its publication in 1867. "Putrid literature" was how

Louis Ulbach described the novel in a contemporary review. Zola

defended himself against these attacks in his preface to the second

edition, in which he outlined his aim to produce a new, "scientific"

form of realism. The novel marks a crucial step in Zola's development

and is a major early work of Naturalism.

In his introduction to

Therese Raquin, Brian Nelson places the novel in its cultural,

intellectual and artistic contexts, and compares Zola's scientific aims

with his actual practice in this work. The scientific status of

Naturalist fiction remains problematic; in the final analysis it is

influenced by literary models and conventions. Zola's powerful

mythopoeic imagination does much to counteract the mechanistic view of

humanity the novel was intended to embody. The myth of the fall is,

indeed, fundamental to Zola's Naturalistic vision."

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