14 minSummaryRead it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook editionPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What does a priest who has lost his faith owe to a friend who still hopes for a miracle?
In Émile Zola's Lourdes, Pierre Froment joins the pilgrimage from Paris with a private purpose. His childhood friend, Marie de Guersaint, has been paralyzed for years. She believes the Virgin will heal her. Pierre no longer shares her faith, but he wants to stand beside her and see what happens.
The crowded white train carries them into a town of stretchers, hospital rooms, candles, and processions. Nurses, doctors, priests, and sellers of medals surround the sick. Behind the shrine lies Bernadette Soubirous's account of seeing the Virgin Mary. Among these voices, Pierre faces questions about belief, evidence, and the comfort people need when their bodies fail them.
What you’ll discover
- A priest divided Follow Pierre as loyalty to Marie brings his private doubt into the pilgrimage's public life.
- Hope aboard the train Enter carriages where hymns mingle with rattling wheels and the needs of the gravely ill.
- A friendship under strain Feel the quiet pull between Marie's complete trust and Pierre's need to seek the truth.
- A town around belief Move among devoted nurses, busy sellers, and pilgrims gathered before the smoke-darkened Grotto.
- Questions without easy comfort Consider what a miracle means, what faith offers, and how doubt can answer suffering.
Who will love it
This book is for readers who love big, richly peopled novels, firsthand portraits of a real place, and stories where faith and science face each other.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Suffering travels beside hope
- Pierre serves without believing
- Stories give hope a shape
- Bernadette emerges beneath the legend
- The Grotto gathers human longing
- A cure does not settle belief
- Devotion stands beside commerce
- Compassion remains beside unanswered questions
Who’s who
- Pierre FromentA priest of thirty who has lost his faith but keeps his vows, and who longs to see Marie healed and himself believing again.
- Marie de GuersaintA young woman paralysed for seven years who prays with burning faith to be cured and to win back her friend's belief.
- M. de GuersaintMarie's father, a cheerful, absent minded architect and inventor who loves nature, dreams of balloons and trusts everything to God.
- Sister HyacintheA young Assumptionist nun, once a foundling, who cares for the sick with cheerful energy and leads their prayers.
- Madame de JonquièreA widow who directs a ward at the Hospital of Our Lady of Sorrows and gives herself tirelessly to the patients.
- Dr. ChassaigneAn old Pyrenean doctor and friend of Pierre's father, broken by grief, who now believes in the miracles of Lourdes.
- FerrandA young unbelieving doctor who rides the train and meets again the nun who once nursed him.
- Madame VincentA poor seamstress who carries her dying daughter Rose to Lourdes with almost no money and an unbending hope.
Formats and delivery
- eBook
- On your phone, tablet, computer or Kindle, with the type as large as you like.
- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 14 minutes, to read today.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
Every printed copy is made when you order it and shipped worldwide; shipping is shown at checkout. The eBook opens when the book texts go online.
How it works
- Start free. Nothing to pay today; the eBook of this book is yours to keep.
- Read and print. 200,000+ classics as eBook, large-print eBook and 15-minute summary, and any book printed at cost as a paperback, hardcover or large print, 5 accounts for the price of one.
- We remind you first. Free for 3 months, and we email you 7 days before your first payment. Then USD 0.14 a day in your first year on the yearly plan and USD 0.27 a day after, or USD 0.66 a day on the monthly plan. Cancel online in two clicks.
Bought on its own? Every eBook and printed book you buy without the plan carries our 30-day money-back guarantee.
25 languages, side by side
Lourdes in 25 languages, side by side, paragraph by paragraph, once the book texts are online: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Lourdes
by Émile Zola · 1894
A white train carries hundreds of the sick toward Lourdes, and a priest who has lost his faith rides with them.
Challenging10–20 hours to read20 languages
Learn a language with challenging classicsSpanishFrenchGermanItalianJapanesePortugueseEnglishHow we measure levels
Excellent
Free for 3 months · starts right away, on any device
Read free3 months free · cancel anytimeRenews every year · Cancel anytimeHow it works
- Read, large type too
- 25 languages, side by side
- Print and large print at cost
- 5 accounts for the price of one
“Zola was an artist, and one of the very greatest, but even before and beyond that he was intensely a moralist, as only the moralists of our true and noble time have been.”
In short
What happens when a priest who no longer believes boards a train full of the dying and the hopeful? Émile Zola's Lourdes opens on Friday, August 19, at half past five in the morning, as the white train leaves Paris. Abbé Pierre Froment rides beside Marie de Guersaint, his childhood friend, who has lain paralysed for seven years and hopes the Virgin will heal her.
Lourdes at a glance
- Reading time
- About 12 h 15 min9 h 40 min fast, 14 h 35 min slow
- Length
- 174,500 words
- Library level
- Challenging long sentences, a rich vocabulary
- First published
- 1894by Émile Zola
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
The white train leaves Paris at dawn
A train pulls out of Paris at half past five in the morning. It is the white train, the one for the gravely ill, and the most pitiful of fourteen pilgrimage trains bound for Lourdes. About five hundred healthy pilgrims ride with nearly three hundred sick.
In a third class car, Marie lies in a narrow wheeled box where she has lived for seven years. She is twenty three, thin and pale, but her blond hair is still magnificent. Her father, a cheerful and distracted inventor, sits beside her. Pierre, a priest of thirty, has joined the stretcher bearers to come along.
Renews every year · Cancel anytime
You looked at
Which edition is right for me
- eBook
- On your phone, tablet or computer. Your place follows you, and you can make the type as big as you like.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 14 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1894
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 13 h 30 min
- Level
- Challenging
Cite this edition
Zola, Émile. Lourdes. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/lourdes.
Zola, É. (2026). Lourdes. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/lourdes (Original work published 1894)
Zola, Émile. Lourdes. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/lourdes.
@book{zola2026lourdes,
author = {Zola, Émile},
title = {Lourdes},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/lourdes},
note = {First published 1894}
}
Free gifts
USD 580 in free gifts when you start
Every book in every format and in 25 languages, 5 accounts for the price of one. Nothing to pay today.
- 200,000+ classic eBooksIn 25 languages, side by side
USD 170FREE - Every eBookIn 25 languages, any device
USD 120FREE - 15-minute summariesRead in 25 languages
USD 60FREE - Print at cost, no markupPaperback, hardcover, large print
USD 60FREE - 5 accounts for the price of oneA shelf for everyone at home
USD 170FREE - A part in rebuilding the libraryNew languages and books for all
FREE
Questions about Lourdes
Can I read it free?
Yes. The first key idea of the 15-minute summary is free with no sign-up. Start free and the whole book is yours for 3 months, with the eBook to keep, plus 200,000+ more classics and any book printed at cost as a paperback, hardcover or large print. Nothing to pay today: we email you 7 days before your first payment, and you can cancel online in two clicks.
Can I buy the printed book?
Soon. The paperback, hardcover and large print editions are being prepared. Choose Paperback or Hardcover above, leave your email, and we tell you the day you can order it, printed at cost.
How many accounts do I get?
Five, for the price of one: you and 4 more people, each with their own login, shelf and their own place in every book.
Can I cancel anytime?
Yes. Cancel online in two clicks at any time and nothing more is charged. Nothing is charged in your first 3 months, and we email you 7 days before your first payment.
What is Lourdes by Zola about?
It follows a national pilgrimage from Paris to Lourdes. A priest who has lost his faith, Pierre Froment, accompanies his childhood friend Marie, who is paralysed. Around them, the sick, nuns, doctors and priests meet the Grotto, the baths and the crowds.
Is Lourdes by Zola a true story?
The novel combines its fictional pilgrims with real places and historical figures such as Bernadette Soubirous. Zola published the novel in 1894 after visiting Lourdes, and it draws on the real history of Bernadette Soubirous, the apparitions of 1858 and the organised pilgrimages of his day.
Who is Bernadette in Lourdes?
Bernadette Soubirous is the poor girl of Lourdes who, in 1858, said a Lady in white appeared to her at the grotto of Massabielle. Pierre tells and retells her story to the sick on the train, and Zola treats her with great tenderness.
The author
Émile Zola
1840–1902 · French novelist
Émile Zola (1840–1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, and poet. He was born in Paris, grew up in Aix-en-Provence, and later lived in Paris and Médan. He wrote Thérèse Raquin (1867), Nana (1880), and Germinal (1885). His twenty-novel series, Les Rougon-Macquart, appeared between 1871 and 1893.
“Lord, heal our sick!”
More by Émile Zola
See all their booksMore like this
Our mission
The library burned once. We are building it back.
Every great book, in every language and every format, for every family. Every plan helps pay for new languages and books for readers who have never had them. Join the movement.
Read our story- Every language25 languages today, side by side, and more every year
- No wastePrinted on demand: no warehouses, no unsold stock, no pulped copies
- For everyonePaperback, hardcover and large print at the cost of printing
