Zola (1840-1902) was a French novelist, playwright and journalist, and the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism. He was nominated for the first and second Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901 and 1902. More than half of Zola's novels were part of a set of 20 known collectively as Les Rougon-Macquart, examining two branches of a family - the respectable Rougons and the disreputable Macquarts - over five generations. This novel, the 6th in the series first published in the original French in 1876, is set in the highest echelons of Second Empire government, following the career of Eugene Rougon and his cronies as they jockey for political favour and personal gain. Reprinted from Ernest A Vizetelly's authorised English translation of 1897.