Madame Bovary, often ranked among the greatest novels of all time, is Flaubert’s first novel, and considered to be both his masterpiece and one of the most influential works in literary history, with authors from Henry James to Proust to Nabokov heaping it with praise.
Edmond Dantès is a young man about to be made captain of a cargo vessel and marry his sweetheart.
Candide is the picaresque tale of the titular character’s fantastical journey from an insular, idealized life in a picturesque castle through the difficulties and evils of the real world.
Germinal, named after the spring month in the French Republican Calendar, is often considered to be Zola’s masterpiece.