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The Jewish Question in Zola's L'argent

1955; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 70; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/459879

1938-1530

Richard B. Grant,

French Literature and Criticism

Coinciding roughly with the establishment of the Third Republic, there developed in France a wave of anti-Semitism that was to lead ultimately to the Dreyfus affair. Thousands of Jews had moved to Paris, Marseilles, and Lyons after Germany took Alsace and Lorraine, bringing with them competition in finance, as well as a thick accent and coarse manners. It was also at this time (1882) that the great Catholic bank, the Union Générale, failed, ruining thousands of small investors. The action of the government in suddenly arresting for fraud the President and the Director of the firm just as they were attempting to rebuild their bank, and the subsequent accusation by the President, Eugène Bontoux, that the Jews, in league with the “Freemason” government, were responsible for having ruined him because he was a Christian, gave rise to one of the great anti-Semitic myths of the age. It was fully exploited by Edouard Drumont in La France juive (1886), a book that was widely sold and passionately discussed.