A more deliberate kind of realism in novels, stories, and plays, usually involving a view of human beings as passive victims of natural forces and social environment. As a literary movement, was initiated in France by Jules and Edmond Goncourt with their novel Germinie Lacerteux (1865), but it came to be led by Émile Zola, who claimed a “scientific” status for his studies of impoverished characters miserably subjected to hunger, sexual obsession, and hereditary defects in Thérèse Raquin (1867), Germinal (1885), and many other novels. This fiction aspired to a sociological objectivity, offering detailed and fully researched investigations into unexplored corners of modern society, while enlivening this with a new sexual sensationalism.
(Chris Baldick.
The concise Oxford dictionary of literary terms, 2001. Adaptado.)
O texto trata do movimento
O texto descreve o movimento Naturalista, explicitamente nas seguintes partes:
- "[...] usually involving a view of human beings as passive victims of natural forces and social environment". Ou seja, destaca-se que os comportamentos, desejos e vontades humanas são resultados da predisposição hereditária em associação com o meio social. Trata-se da visão determinista de Hippolyte Taine, que compreendia como motivadora do comportamento humano a tríade: meio ambiente, raça e momento histórico – ideia encampada pelos naturalistas.
- "[...] it came to be led by Émile Zola, who claimed a ‘scientific’ status for his studies of impoverished characters miserably subjected to hunger, sexual obsession, and hereditary defects". Émile Zola é o representante mais expressivo da escola literária naturalista. Além disso, a passagem também ressalta a visão que ele tinha do romance, a de ser um estudo científico do comportamento humano, destacando as influências da hereditariedade e do meio na formação da personalidade das personagens e, consequentemente, de suas ações.