The tale of a mining community in 19th-century France, Zola's masterpiece of naturalistic fiction portrays the effects of backbreaking physical exertion, undertaken for starvation wages. When a young idealist instigates a strike, the stage is set for a brutal clash between labor and capital. Strikingly frank in its depictions of sex and violence, this 1885 novel is a cri de coeur for the working class.
