ZOLA (Émile). Autograph manuscript signed entitled "Correspo - Lot 124

Lot n° 124
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ZOLA (Émile). Autograph manuscript signed entitled "Correspo - Lot 124
ZOLA (Émile). Autograph manuscript signed entitled "Correspondance de Paris". Paris, March 1879. 57 ff. in-8 with a few erasures and corrections, on blue linen paper, mounted on green paper leaves bound in a volume in-4 of blue half-maroquin with corners, spine ribbed, gilt head, spine faded, restorations on the back of the last leaf (Semet & Plumelle), in a black morocco spine and flap folder, lined case. COMPLETE MANUSCRITE OF HIS LONG STUDY " LA RÉPUBLIQUE ET LA LITTÉRATURE ", in which he defends naturalist literature as the only one that can reflect rational republican principles. It appeared in 1879 in the Russian newspaper Le Messager de l'Europe, where, thanks to Ivan Tourgueniev, Émile Zola kept a monthly "correspondence" from 1875 to 1880. The present text was published in bookshops by Georges Charpentier in 1879, and then included in the 1881 collection Le Roman expérimental. "f° 1 :] I have no attachment to the political world, and I do not expect from the Government either a place, a pension, or a reward of any kind. This is not pride, it is... a necessary observation. I AM ALONE AND FREE, I worked and I work: my bread comes from there. On the other hand... I am a republican of the day before. I mean that I defended Republican ideas in books and in the press, when the Second Empire was still standing. I could have been part of the curse, I would not have had to rally, to convert myself to the triumphant cause, if I had had the slightest political ambition. It would have been enough for me to bend down to pick up the ears of corn, after having mowed them... Thus my situation is clear. I AM A REPUBLICAN WHO DOES NOT SEEK TO LIVE OFF THE REPUBLIC. WELL! THE IDEA HAS COME TO ME THAT THIS SITUATION IS EXCELLENT FOR SAYING ALL THAT I THINK... The question is to know what kind of marriage, good or bad, the Republic and literature will make together, I mean our contemporary literature, this broad naturalistic or positivist evolution, as you will, of which Balzac set the pace. For a long time now I have been hesitating, because the ground seemed to me to be burning. Then, for the last eight years, the uproar has been so great, the complications have arisen so quickly, that it was difficult for a man of learning to make a serious investigation and, above all, to reach a wise conclusion. But today, although the uproar continues, the incubation period has ceased, the Republic exists in principle and in fact. It works, and can be judged by its actions. The time has therefore come to put the Republic and literature face to face, to see what the latter should expect from the former, to examine in a word whether we analysts, anatomists, collectors of [f. 4] human documents, scholars who admit only the authority of fact, will find in the Republicans of the present day friends or adversaries. The solution of this question is of extreme gravity. For me, the existence of the Republic itself depends on it. THE REPUBLIC WILL LIVE OR THE REPUBLIC WILL NOT LIVE, DEPENDING ON WHETHER IT ACCEPTS OR REJECTS OUR METHOD. THE REPUBLIC WILL BE A NATURALIST OR IT WILL NOT BE... Every definitive and lasting government has a literature. The Republics of '89 and '48 had none, because they passed over the nation like crises. Today, our Republic appears to be well founded, and from then on it will have its literary expression. This expression, in my opinion, will necessarily be NATURALISM, I MEAN THE ANALYTICAL, AND EXPERIMENTAL METHOD, THE MODERN INVESTIGATION [F. 57] OPERATED BY FACTS AND BY HUMAN DOCUMENTS. There must be agreement between the social movement, which is the cause, and the literary expression, which is the effect. If the Republic, blinded to itself, not understanding that it exists at last by the force of a scientific formula, came to persecute this scientific formula in letters, it would be a sign that the Republic is not ripe for facts, and that it must disappear once more before a fact, dictatorship... »
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