How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Laurent was still shaking Camille, with one hand gripped around his throat. [...] As he bent forward, leaving his neck uncovered, his victim, mad with fear and fury, twisted round, bared his teeth and dug them into the neck. And when the murderer, choking back a cry of pain, briskly threw Camille into the river, his teeth took away a piece of flesh. (11.62)
Laurent's murder of Camille is presented as the violent consequence of the guy's adulterous affair with Thérèse. So is Laurent really to blame for Camille's murder then?
Quote #2
Camille's bite was like a hot iron on his skin [...]. It was as though a dozen pins were gradually piercing his flesh. [...] The wound was a red hole, as wide as a small coin. The skin had been torn off and the flesh was visible, pinkish, with black patches. (13.1)
Camille's bite serves as a constant reminder of Laurent's violence. The scar will continue to torment Laurent for the remainder of the novel. Serves him right, you might say. If you believe in vengeance. (And Mme Raquin certainly does.)
Quote #3
He would go directly to the window that separates the spectators from the bodies, and press his pale face against the glass, looking. In front of him were ranks of grey slabs on which, here and there, naked bodies stood out [...]. Some bodies kept their virginal flesh in the rigidity of death, while others seemed like heaps of bloody, rotten meat. (13.6)
The morgue is a key site of death and violence in this book. When Laurent visits the morgue, he is both fascinated and horrified by the sight of the corpses there. A study of human life (and death) indeed, Mr. Zola.