The Train by Georges Simenon

First published in French in 1961; reviewed edition published in English by Melville House on July 19, 2011

Belgian-born Georges Simenon's The Train was first published in 1961. Marcel Feron lives in France, near the Belgian border, with his daughter and pregnant wife. On the morning of May 10, 1940, Marcel hears a radio broadcast announcing that Germany has invaded Holland and that tanks are crossing the Belgian frontier. Deciding to flee to the south of France, Marcel feels a "somber joy," for he isn't running from the invasion, but from responsibility. He is relieved that the welfare of his family will be in the hands of Fate rather than his own.

Women and children board the southbound train first, separating Marcel from his wife and daughter. He eventually boards one of the last freight cars but that car is later linked to a different train. Officials cannot tell Marcel where his wife and daughter have gone but he thinks of them "without overmuch anxiety, indeed with a certain serenity." Although Marcel tells us that he loves his wife, that she meets all of his expectations, he is happy to abandon the life he has built. It is as if "the world had recovered its savor." A break has occurred that causes him to live "on another level, where the values had nothing in common with those of my previous existence." Marcel believes he has surrendered to Fate.

If Fate is really a force, will we recognize it when it comes calling? During the train journey, Marcel befriends a formerly imprisoned woman named Anna. Feeling that he has also been released from prison, Marcel bonds with Anna. Were they fated to meet? Or is it Marcel's destiny to be with his wife and child?

The train, I suspect, is a metaphor. The train rolls down the tracks, transporting its passengers from station to station, its next destination determined by the progress of the Germans, the availability of food and lodging, and other factors that the passengers cannot influence. Marcel is happy to be borne along, to have decisions about the course of his life made by others. Marcel's journey on the train represents his idealized journey through life, a journey in which he is the passenger, not the driver. Once he is on the train, he has no worries; life just happens and he contentedly takes it as it comes. Marcel reinvents himself as a man who lives entirely in the moment.

Is this a good way to live? What Marcel sees as fate is in some sense an abdication not just of responsibility but of free will. Although there are costs to taking control of your life (including the burden of responsibility that torments Marcel) there are also benefits. Is it better (or even possible) to seize control of your life rather than taking life as it comes? Simenon poses these questions but leaves it to the reader to answer them, just as it is for the reader to decide whether Marcel is following fate or free will at the novel's end. Clearly he makes a decision (although, according to Marcel, not one to which he gives any thought) but whether the decision is to accept fate or to follow a path of his own choice is ambiguous, and I'm not at all sure that Marcel's opinions on the matter are the product of a reliably introspective mind.

This short, stimulating book tells a deceptively simple story while raising provocative questions. The ending holds a surprise that requires the reader to rethink one of the main characters. The Train is an intriguing character study with existential overtones but it is also worth reading for its fascinating story of people set adrift in newly occupied France. It is a buried treasure that has lost none of its power in the half century since its first appearance.

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Nana by Émile Zola

First published in 1880

You don't have to be a scholar of French literature (I'm not) to appreciate Nana. Set in the late 1860's and early 1870's, Zola's novel (the ninth in his Rougon-Macquart series) follows a talentless but beautiful stage actress whose physical charms (which she generously shares with upscale men) make her the talk of Paris. Nana is soon living well beyond the means of the various men who support her; their desire for her inevitably leads to their downfall, while the smiling Nana simply moves on to the next admirer.

Zola paints beautifully detailed portraits: the theater, the city, Parisian aristocracy and the crowds that clog the streets all come alive in vibrant color. The characters peopling the novel represent all the traits, good and (mostly) bad, that a sharp-eyed writer could hope to put on display: cruelty, lechery, indifference, pompousness, greed and corruption, occasionally offset by kindness and generosity. Zola was apparently saying something about the superficiality and decadence of society (Nana is ultimately doomed, as is the French empire), but from the modern reader's standpoint, the novel works as sort of an entertaining soap opera, a spoof of the upper class, an old school view of the sexual power women wield over men. Above all, it's often very funny. The novel is easy to read and well worth the time.

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