Emile Zola details the lives of middle and lower class individuals in the fictional novel Germinal. In doing so, he reveals much about the effects class and gender have on people 's lives in mid nineteenth century France. According to Zola and the information contained in Germinal in mid nineteenth century Europe class and gender were determinants for how individuals and families behaved, influencing every part of a person’s life. In the novel, class and gender influence minor day to day activities, as well as major institutions such as marriage and family life. Zola creates many contrasting characters within his work and these contrasts serve to highlight the differences between lower and middle class people. The contrasting roles of
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Zola references this directly when La Maheude asks Maheu how she is expected to manage the home on only nine francs a week (Zola 20). La Maheude also does not work, instead managing their home and looking after the small children. Catherine wakes up earliest and wakes all her siblings, manages the fire and prepares the coffee and sandwiches and Zola refers to these as her “domestic tasks” (Zola 23). The domesticity of women in the working class is not only true of the Maheus, as evidenced when Zola writes, “the women and small children resumed their rests in bed where there was now more room” (Zola …show more content…
In the upper class the marriage is seen as a manner of uniting two families and parents arrange marriage for the children. In fact Paul Negrel is not even attracted to Cecile. Such is the case with Madame Hennebeau and Monsieur Hennebeau as well, she has had numerous affairs and they do not even share a bed. In the lower class marriage is a result of sexual relations between two teenagers generally and is seen as part of the natural cycle of a miner 's life in the novel. Parents in poverty such as La Maheude dread this, because it means less income for the family as a whole. La Maheude did not let Zacharie get married for two years because the family needed his income. Philomene and Zacharie have two children before they are married. Parents have little or no control over who their children marry and in this way it is more of a marriage based upon love or at least attraction instead of an extension of capitalist intentions as it is in the middle
Zola references this directly when La Maheude asks Maheu how she is expected to manage the home on only nine francs a week (Zola 20). La Maheude also does not work, instead managing their home and looking after the small children. Catherine wakes up earliest and wakes all her siblings, manages the fire and prepares the coffee and sandwiches and Zola refers to these as her “domestic tasks” (Zola 23). The domesticity of women in the working class is not only true of the Maheus, as evidenced when Zola writes, “the women and small children resumed their rests in bed where there was now more room” (Zola …show more content…
In the upper class the marriage is seen as a manner of uniting two families and parents arrange marriage for the children. In fact Paul Negrel is not even attracted to Cecile. Such is the case with Madame Hennebeau and Monsieur Hennebeau as well, she has had numerous affairs and they do not even share a bed. In the lower class marriage is a result of sexual relations between two teenagers generally and is seen as part of the natural cycle of a miner 's life in the novel. Parents in poverty such as La Maheude dread this, because it means less income for the family as a whole. La Maheude did not let Zacharie get married for two years because the family needed his income. Philomene and Zacharie have two children before they are married. Parents have little or no control over who their children marry and in this way it is more of a marriage based upon love or at least attraction instead of an extension of capitalist intentions as it is in the middle