Ernest Alfred Vizetelly (1853–1922) was an English journalist, author and translator, best known for translating and editing the works of French novelist Émile Zola into English. He also worked as a war correspondent and published a memoir of his experiences during the Siege of Paris in the Franco-Prussian War.
Life
He was a son of the English publisher Henry Vizetelly, by his first marriage to Ellen Elizabeth Pollard. He was known as a war correspondent.
Ernest was present with his father at the Siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War and wrote a memoir of his experiences, My Days of Adventure: The Fall of France, 1870–71, which also contains an autobiographical introduction.
He edited some translations of Émile Zola's works that had previously been published by his father between 1884 and 1889, as well as producing his own translations.
When Zola fled France for England during the Dreyfus Affair in 1898, Vizetelly supported and advised Zola.
Translations and editions of Zola
Many of Ernest Vizetelly's translations of Zola were based on work done by anonymous translators who, each to some degree, expurgated the texts. Following the publication of the translation of La Terre, Vizetelly & Co. was prosecuted for obscenity by the National Vigilance Association, causing him to re-edit, rewrite, and further bowdlerize the English versions of the Rougon-Macquart series, and as such they are almost universally considered to be of inferior quality.
The Downfall, translated by E. A. Vizetelly (London: Chatto & Windus, 1893)
