THE EMILE ZOLA SOCIETY  

Committee of the Society
President:   Valerie Minogue
Vice-President:   Keith Howell
Bulletin Editor:   David Baguley
Hon Secretary:   Chantal Morel
Hon Treasurer:   Patrick Pollard
Asst Secretary:   Pamela Birley
Publicity Officer:   David King

The Emile Zola Society was founded in 1991 at the Institut Français du Royaume Uni. We offer friendly and well-informed contacts for members who are interested in Emile Zola, his life, works and times. We meet regularly at the Institut Français, 17 Queensberry Place, London SW7 2DT, for talks and discussions (generally in English) on Zola and his contemporaries, on films based on his novels, on fin-de-siècle Paris, Impressionist painters, and other relevant subjects. In the summer and autumn, we organise visits to places of interest. Our annual Bulletin publishes articles, reviews and details of our activities.

In recent years we have, among other things, organised a conference in London with international speakers, and collaborated in another, in Cambridge, on new approaches to Zola. We have published papers from both conferences, as well as an English translation of essays by the distinguished French scholar, Henri Mitterand. In October 2007 we held an International Conference in Aix-en-Provence, with fifty or so contributors from across the world, and with Guests of Honour Henri Mitterand and Martine Le Blond Zola. Selected papers from the Aix conference have been published (Visages de la Provence, Emile Zola Society, 2008) and are available from us.

Every year our Programme is as follows:

- First Sunday in October: Pélérinage de Médan. Meeting at St Lazare Station, train to Villennes, then after a walk (just under an hour) to Médan, lunch at the ‘Plaisirs d’Eté’ restaurant by the river Seine, followed by celebrations at Zola’s House. A coach takes the ‘Pilgrims’ back from Médan to Villennes Station and a train back to St Lazare.

- First Friday in December: AGM, followed by a talk and pre-Christmas drinks.

- Last Saturday in February, our annual ‘Saturday Seminar’ on Zola and his time.

- First Friday in April: our annual dinner, ‘Avec Zola à table’.

- First Friday in June: a talk on Zola and his work.

- Early July: an outing ‘In the footsteps of Zola’ (places visited by Zola: Crystal Palace, Henley, Hatfield, Darwin’s House, etc.)