Émile Zola

Émile Zola (1840–1902) was a French novelist and the leading figure of literary naturalism. Raised in Aix-en-Provence, he worked for the publisher Hachette before turning to journalism and fiction. His twenty-novel cycle Les Rougon-Macquart traces a family under the Second Empire and includes L'Assommoir, Nana, Germinal and La Bête humaine. He later wrote the trilogy Lourdes, Rome and Paris. In 1898 his open letter "J'accuse...!" defended Captain Alfred Dreyfus and denounced the army, and he had to flee to England. He died in Paris of carbon monoxide poisoning.