Beautiful Graphic Novel: The Zolas by Méliane Marcaggi and Alice Chemama

The Zolas by Méliane Marcaggi - text - and Alice Chemama - beautiful illustrations - made it for a perfectly loveable hour of reading and food for the eyes for several literary and intellectual reasons. 

First, the painted-like illustrations of this graphic novel are a full feast for the eyes. The choice of pastel colours and the minutiae of every installment are worth a prize. Second, for the quality of the writing reducing Zola´s long and adventurous life - both as a human and as a writer - to a couple of lines while keeping the essential of the story. A story that includes his wife, Alexandrine, as a full character. With a life that inspired some of his characters in the Rougon-Macquart series, Alexandrine was a simple woman, without education, but a supporter of his works and furtrher on, of his intense social and political engagement - particularly during the notorious Dreyfus Affair after he authored J´accuse denouncing the lack of evidences in accusing Alfred Dreyfus, a general in the French Army of Jewish origin, of espionage. Zola had a more or less secret life as well, which involved two children fathered with Jeanne Rozerot, his misstress. To her he dedicated the last volume of Rougon-Macquart, Le Docteur Pascal, a fact that no matter how open his relationship with his wife become, was for sure not an easy burden for his wife. After all, she was the one who was on his side during all those years of writing, during which he turned from a poor copywriter for Hachette into a successful writer. 

In the end, after Zola´s accidental death, the two women are portrayed together in the book as partners involved in raising Rozerot´s children, but the truth as it was is probably different, at least for coming to terms with the reality of this double life.

Personally, this book took me back to my teenage years, when I had the chance to read Zola in the original French. Zola took his inspiration as journalists do - or used to before the Google searches - going out on the streets, checking the pulse of the markets and observing people on the move. The realism of his books that were often prohibited by the Ministry of Interior were due to their rough description of the life as it was during the intense process of industrialism that involved changes of fortune and a challenge to the personal relationship and everyday life psychology. From the mundane, the journalist was extracting facts and further describing in the news reports. The writer was able to create stories out of nothing that were rooted in the reality, but whose characters were imaginary.

Besides Balzac, Zola was the original inspiration for my writing - although I haven´t returned to those writings ever since - and even as a graphic novel, While following the texts and illustrations of this book, I welcomed the thoughts and questions, old and new, about my intellectual roots.

Rating: 5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review