Brian Nelson

Brian Nelson is Professor Emeritus of French at Monash University, Melbourne. He read modern languages at Cambridge and took a D.Phil. at Oxford. He was lecteur d’anglais at the Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, and senior lecturer at Aberystwyth University, Wales, before being appointed Professor of French at Monash in 1985. He has held visiting fellowships at New College (Oxford), Indiana University (Bloomington, US), the Salzburg Global Seminar, the Camargo Foundation (Cassis, France), the Dora Maar House (Menerbes, France), and the Institut d’études avancées de Paris (Paris Institute for Advanced Study). He was founding president of the Australian Society for French Studies, president of the Australian Association for Literary Translation (2007-15), and editor of the Australian Journal of French Studies (2002-20). He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and an Officier dans l'Ordre des Palmes academiques. 

He is the author, translator, editor or co-editor of 27 books. He is best known for his translations and critical studies of the novels of Emile Zola. These include The Cambridge Companion to Zola, Zola and the Bourgeoisie, Naturalism in the European Novel, and translations, for Oxford World’s Classics, of L'Assommoir, The Belly of Paris, Earth (with Julie Rose), The Fortune of the Rougons, His Excellency Eugene Rougon, The Kill, The Ladies’ Paradise and Pot Luck. He has also translated The Swann Way by Marcel Proust. He won the 2015 New South Wales Premier’s Prize for Translation.

His most recent critical works are Emile Zola: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2020) and The Cambridge Introduction to French Literature (Cambridge, 2015). Since 2020 he has been engaged as general editor (with Adam Watt) and contributing translator on a new edition of Proust's In Search of Lost Time for Oxford World's Classics.

MAJOR PUBLICATIONS

2023  Marcel Proust, The Swann Way. A new translation. Introduction and notes by Adam Watt. Oxford University Press. 480pp. 

2021  Emile Zola, The Assommoir. A new translation. Introduction and notes by Robert Lethbridge. Oxford University Press. xlvii + 411pp. Shortlisted, NSW Premier's Prize for Literary Translation (2023).

2020  Emile Zola: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press. 160pp. Released as an audiobook by Recorded Books.

2018  Emile Zola, His Excellency Eugene Rougon (Son Excellence Eugene Rougon). A new translation with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. xxxi + 343pp.

2017  Marcel Proust, Swann in Love (Un amour de Swann). A new translation. Introduction and notes by Adam Watt. Oxford University Press. xxxvii + 194pp.

2016  Émile Zola, Earth (La Terre). A new translation (with Julie Rose) with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. xxvii + 433pp.

2015  The Cambridge Introduction to French Literature. Cambridge University Press. 296pp. Arabic language edition 2022.

2013 Perspectives on Literature and Translation: Creation, Circulation, Reception. Co-ed. with Brigid Maher. New York and London: Routledge. 224pp. Paperback release 2016.

2012  Émile Zola, The Fortune of the Rougons (La Fortune des Rougon). A new translation with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. xxx + 301pp.  

2007  The Cambridge Companion to Émile Zola. Cambridge University Press. 214pp.

2007  Émile Zola, The Belly of Paris (Le Ventre de Paris). A new translation with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. xxxiii + 287pp.   

2005  After Blanchot: Literature, Philosophy, Criticism. Co-ed. with Leslie Hill and Dimitris Vardoulakis. Newark: University of Delaware Press. 286pp.

2004  Practising Theory: Pierre Bourdieu and the Field of Cultural Production. Co-ed. with Jeff Browitt. Newark: University of Delaware Press. 131pp.

2004  Émile Zola, The Kill (La Curée). A new translation with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. xxxix + 275pp.

2001  Telling Performances: Readings of Gender, Narrative and Performance. Co-ed. with Anne Freadman and Philip Anderson. Newark: University of Delaware Press. 265pp.

2000  Women Seeking Expression: France 1789–1914. Co-ed. with Rosemary Lloyd. Melbourne: Monash Romance Studies. 275pp.

1999  Émile Zola, Pot Luck (Pot-Bouille). A new translation with introduction and notes. Oxford University Press. 1999. xxiv + 381pp.

1999  The People’s Voice: Essays on European Romanticism. Co-ed. with Andrea Ciccarelli and John C. Isbell. Melbourne: Monash Romance Studies. 150pp.

1995 Émile Zola, The Ladies’ Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames). Oxford University Press, xxxi + 438pp. BBC tie-in edition Oct. 2012. Used as the basis of two BBC TV series, The Paradise (2012–13); dramatized as the “Classic Serial”, BBC Radio 4, 1997.

1995  Forms of Commitment: Intellectuals in Contemporary France.Melbourne: Monash Romance Studies. An edited collection. 192pp.

1993  Émile Zola: “Thérèse Raquin”. London: Bloomsbury (formerly Bristol Classical Press). A critical edition. xxxviii +150pp.

1992  Naturalism in the European Novel: New Critical Perspectives. New York/Oxford: Berg. An edited collection. 280pp.

1992  The Idea of Europe. Co-ed. with David Roberts and Walter Veit. New York/Oxford: Berg). 180pp.

1992  The European Community in the 1990s. Co-ed. with David Roberts and Walter Veit. New York/Oxford: Berg. 220pp.

1986  Jean Giono: “Colline”. Oxford: Blackwell. A critical edition. xxxii + 96pp.

1983  Zola and the Bourgeoisie: A Study of Themes and Techniques in Les Rougon-Macquart. London: Macmillan. 230pp. 

1982  Émile Zola: A Selective Analytical Bibliography. London: Grant & Cutler. 150pp.