The anti-Dreyfusard hysteria prompted by the Zola letter may have pressured the Jewish Pissarro to tone down his artistic commentary in the Avenue de l’Opera series. Major Esterhazy, the actual traitor in the Army, was acquitted of charges of treason in a second court-martial on January 11, 1898, an enormous setback for the Dreyfusard cause. As a result, Emile Zola penned a letter addressed to the president of the Republic and published it in the newspaper L’Aurore on January 13, 1898, hoping to expose the deceit of the Dreyfus Affair. Under the huge front page headline, “J’accuse” (I accuse), Zola retold the events of the affair and the indictment based on faulty evidence, concluding with a lengthy list of accusations at specific people involved in the scandal (Derfler 127). The high-profile novelist’s dramatic piece set off a dramatic result: an explosion of anti-Semitic violence wreaked havoc throughout France. According to the Socialist Jules Guesde, Zola’s letter was “the greatest revolutionary act of the century” (qtd. Derfler 113).
The hysteria did not abate during Zola’s trial in February 1898, where anti-Dreyfusards thronged outside of the courtroom, shouting death threats to Jews and Dreyfusards alike. According to Michael Burns in France and the Dreyfus Affair, the crowd of thugs and curious onlookers numbered six thousand by the end of the trial. After ten days, Zola was convicted of libel and sentenced to the maximum punishment, a three thousand franc-fine and a year of prison amidst a jeering courtroom and gangs shouting, “Long live the army!” (Burns 104-105) Persuaded to accept exile instead of imprisonment, Zola fled to Britain; he later returned to France the following year in 1899 for Dreyfus’s retrial. Zola died from carbon monoxide poisoning under mysterious circumstances in 1902 (Derfler xx, 114).
Zola’s accusatory language set off a flurry of debate, ensuring that the public could no longer ignore the Dreyfus Affair. While Zola dared to risk imprisonment through his actions, the Jewish, anarchist Pissarro could not afford to become a target. Here are excerpts from the conclusion of Zola’s controversial letter (translated by Leslie Derfler):
“The Affair has only now begun because only now are the positions clear; on the one hand, the guilty who do not want to see justice done; on the other, those who seek justice and will give their lives to see that it is carried out. Only time will tell whether we have been prepared for the most resounding disaster.
But this letter is long, Mister President, and it is time to bring it to an end:
[...]
I accuse Generals de Boisdeffre and Gonse of having made themselves accomplices in the same crime, one no doubt because of his impassioned clericalism, the other, perhaps, by that esprit de corps which makes the War Office the holy Ark, unattackable.
I accuse General de Pellieux and Major Ravary of having carried out a villainous investigation, by which I mean the most monstrously biased investigation whose own report creates for us an imperishable document of naive audacity.
[...]
I accuse the War Office of having waged an abominable press campaign, particularly in L’Eclair and L’Echo de Paris, to mislead public opinion and conceal their misdeeds.
Finally, I accuse the first Court-Martial of having broken the law by condemning a defendant on the strength of a single document, and I accuse the second Court-Martial [Esterhazy’s] of having followed orders to cover up that illegality by committing, in turn, the judicial crime of knowingly acquitting a guilty man.
In making these accusations, I am aware that I am liable under Articles 30 and 31 of the Law of 29 July 1881 relating to the press, which punishes acts of defamation. I am willingly exposing myself to that law.
[...]
And the act I am performing here is only a revolutionary means to hasten the explosion of truth and justice.
I have only one passion, to shed light in the name of humanity, which has suffered so and which has a right to happiness. My fiery protest is no more than the cry of my soul. Let them dare, then, to bring me to the Court of Appeal, and let an inquiry be held in the light of day!
I am waiting.
Mister President, please accept the assurance of my deepest respect.” (qtd. Derfler 127-128)