Madame Sourdis

Madame Sourdis is a little-known short novel by Zola, published in Russian translation in 1880 in a Saint Petersburg review, Le messager de l’Europe, and later published in France in May 1900 in La Grande revue.

It would take nearly thirty years before it was finally issued in book form, by Zola’s longtime publisher. The story is set in the world of painting and follows Adèle, a young provincial woman who paints watercolors and unexpectedly becomes an heiress. She marries Ferdinand Sourdis, and the fairy tale quickly turns into a nightmare for the young woman: her husband’s debauchery and nocturnal outings reduce their marriage to a sham, as Zola draws an unsparing portrait of a man who exploits his wife’s weaknesses in order to fully indulge his idleness.

A copy with wide margins.