the belly of paris jan 2008

[...]... transferred to the Panthéon This page intentionally left blank THE BELLY OF PARIS This page intentionally left blank CHAPTER 1 Through the deep silence of the deserted avenue, the carts made their way towards Paris, the rhythmic jolting of the wheels echoing against the fronts of the sleeping houses on both sides of the road, behind the dim shapes of elms A cart full of cabbages and another full of peas had... Spies The characterization of Florent as a political fantasist, the farcical nature of the ‘conspiracy’ itself, and the equation—highlighted by Claude of the artist and the revolutionary, give The Belly of Paris a high degree of ideological ambiguity There is no equivocation, however, in Zola’s satirical critique of the bourgeoisie and the ‘high’ capitalism of the Second Empire The last words of the. .. conception of his novel, is Les Halles themselves: The general idea is: the belly, the belly of Paris, Les Halles, where food floods in and piles up before flowing out to the various neighbourhoods; the belly of humanity, and by extension the belly of the bourgeoisie … People gorging themselves and growing fat is the philosophical and historical side of my novel The artistic side is the modernity of Les... lingerie in The Ladies’ Paradise; the devouring pithead in Germinal, lit by strange fires, rising spectrally out of the darkness; and the fantastic visions of food in The Belly of Paris, in which the monstrous markets swallow Florent, like the whale swallowing Jonah, and spew him out eventually like a piece of waste matter xii Introduction The Fat and the Thin The dominant symbol of The Belly of Paris, ... Emblematic features of contemporary life the tenement building, the laundry, the mine, the apartment house, the department store, the stock exchange, the theatre, Les Halles, the city itself—are used as giant symbols of the society of his day Zola sees allegories of the modern world everywhere In The Kill, the new city under construction at the hands of Haussmann’s workmen becomes a vast symbol of the corruption,... deplore the triumph of the ‘Fat’ Beneath the outward ‘respectability’ of the bourgeoisie there is a venality and brutality that Zola portrays as monstrous Marjolin, the young woman in the pink bonnet, and above all, Florent, are sacrificed on the altar of bourgeois greed The brutality of the bourgeoisie is matched, moreover, by the authoritarianism of the Government One of the most striking features of The. .. Halles, the gigantic still lifes of the eight pavilions, the avalanches of food to be seen every morning in the centre of Paris. 4 The markets assume multiple symbolic forms, partaking of an ambivalence characteristic of Zola—sometimes vibrant and creative, often apocalyptic and destructive The charcuterie of the Quenu-Gradelles is the central symbol of the larger symbolic world of the markets A temple of. .. stripes, over their backs Every now and then a gas lamp, looming out of the darkness, would illuminate the nails of a boot, the blue sleeve of a smock, or the peak of a cap, in the midst of this huge mass of vegetables—bunches of red carrots, bunches of white turnips, and the rich greenery of peas and cabbages All along the road, and the neighbouring roads, in front and behind, the distant rumbling of carts... impressions of the teeming life of the markets: the sights and sounds; the myriad types of food; the fantastic shapes of the pavilions; the various vendors and tradespeople; the colourful types (the market-porters with their wide-brimmed hats, the road-sweepers with their big brooms, the sellers of rat-poison, etc.) He even arranged for a security guard to show him round the cellars under the markets... the text of The Belly of Paris, giving it a richly documentary, even encyclopedic, quality.3 Zola’s ambition to render the world of Les Halles in its totality corresponds to his extremely systematic treatment of his material and to the most striking feature of his novel: the dominance of description The originality of The Belly of Paris has nothing to do with its plot (there is little suspense: the plot . of his material and to the most striking feature of his novel: the dominance of description. The originality of The Belly of Paris has nothing to do with its plot (there is little suspense: the. prede- cessor in the series, The Kill (La Curée, 1872). Zola wrote in his planning notes for the novel: The Belly of Paris complements The Kill, it is the scramble for spoils of the middle classes, the. in The Ladies’ Paradise; the devouring pithead in Germinal, lit by strange fires, rising spectrally out of the darkness; and the fantastic visions of food in The Belly of Paris, in which the