Nana

Émile Zola’s Nana, published in 1880, is the ninth novel in Zola’s 20-volume Les Rougon-Macquart series, published between 1871 and 1893. Taken together, these 20 novels depict the impact that heredity and environment can have on an individual’s life. They are meant to faithfully represent French society during the Second French Empire, the reign of Napoleon III, which lasted from 1852-1870. Zola considered himself a literary naturalist, meaning that he wanted to represent life not as the outcome of supernatural or divine forces, but as the outcome of biological and social forces.

Nana, one of the most famous novels in the Rougon-Macquart series, was both popular and controversial at the time of its publication because of its frank descriptions of bodies and sexuality. Initially depicted in another of the series’ novels, L’Assommoir, the character of Nana rises from a childhood as the daughter of a lower-class family beset by alcoholism and starvation to become the most elite and popular courtesan in all of Paris. However, in ascending the social ladder, she drags down every lover she has financially and spiritually. Ultimately, Zola uses her story as an indictment of the excesses of the Second Empire, including what he saw as excessive female sexual freedom.