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Madame Bovary became notorious and a bestseller after Gustave Flaubert was acquitted from charges of obscenity in 1856. It details the many adulterous affairs and extravagances of Emma Bovary, a provincial doctor's wife. Her behaviour explores the banality and emptiness of rural life.
Flaubert considered himself a perfectionist, which is mirrored in the immaculate style of his writing. Madame Bovary is still considered one of the greatest literary texts of all time.
DLSmithies: Don Quixote was Flaubert's favourite book, and I've read somewhere that the idea of Madame Bovary is to re-tell the story of Don Quixote in a different context. Don Quixote is obsessed with chivalric literature, and immerses himself in it to the extent that he loses his grip on reality. Emma Bovary is bewitched by Romantic literature in the same way. There are lots of parallels between the two novels, and I think putting them side by side can lead to a better understanding of both.… (more)
Limelite: Essentially the same greedy, social climbing woman who gets herself into money troubles and manipulates men to get out of them -- but with more success. Similar commentary on society, but instead of the bourgeoisie of village France it's the upper crust of NYC of nearly the same time but without the trenchant humor of Flaubert.… (more)
browner56: The stories of two women, separated by 150 years, who search desperately for something they never find. Flaubert's legendary protaganist is the role model for Vargas Llosa's "bad girl".
soylentgreen23: 'Mrs Craddock' evidently shares a lot in common with Flaubert's masterpiece, especially in terms of its representation of a woman married to a dull man, who wishes to have a renewed taste of passion, despite the likely terrible consequences.
Lapsus_Linguae: Both heroines love novels and wish to lead an adventurous life but instead, they both get married to down-to-earth medical men who, despite a sincere affection, never understand them.
I did not set out to meet the most infamous unfaithful women of literature, and yet that's just what I've done in my quest to read more classic literature. First, I spent nearly a month with [b:Anna Karenina|15823480|Anna Karenina|Leo Tolstoy|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1601352433l/15823480._SX50_.jpg|2507928] in Imperial Russia (and traipsing about other parts of Europe). Next, I followed Kitty Fane from England to Hong Kong, then into mainland China in [b:The Painted Veil|99664|The Painted Veil|W. Somerset Maugham|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1320421719l/99664._SY75_.jpg|1069201]. Emma Bovary and I met in the French countryside, and while she desperately wanted much more than her provincial life, she never got very far.
***SPOILER WARNING: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS AHEAD FOR ALL THREE NOVELS.***
What do all three of these women have in common? All are the creations of male authors: Flaubert and Maugham are widely acknowledged to have been bisexual, while prolific Papa Tolstoy appears to have been as straight as straight can be. All are beautiful women married to less attractive men, simply for the social and financial security. All of them are disenchanted by their monotonous lives, influenced by romantic novels that portray a life much different than their own. And when they pursue love in the arms of other man, all are met with tragedy of one kind or another.
Emma Bovary is actually the third Madame Bovary in the novel. The first is Mama Bovary, overbearing mother of Charles, who wants more from life for her only son, an awkward schoolboy. The second is the much older widow Charles marries (at Mama's urging, of course) for her money. Shortly after Charles meets lovely Emma, his wife loses all her money and conveniently dies. Emma initially sees him as a dashing young doctor, but then the reality of domestic life shatters that delusion. An invitation to a society event (and of course, those troublesome novels) give Emma a glimpse of another world, one with balls and gowns and romance. She remains faithful to Charles for a long time, bearing him a daughter that she treats like an afterthought, refusing to act on her attraction to a young clerk in the town where they relocate. But then a dashing rake spots her, seduces her, and she is undone. He's less honorable than Anna's Count Vronksy and less established than Kitty's Charlie Townsend. He loves her and swiftly leaves her a ruined woman, even though no one else knows about their affair.
Like Anna Karenina, Emma Bovary is dead by her own hand before the last act. (I find it really interesting that the 19th century Russian and French women had to kill themselves, while the 20th century English woman is allowed to grow and learn from her experience.) Unlike Anna, Emma's infidelity is never exposed. Her husband only learns about her affairs after her death, and it ruins him. Doctor Bovary is a sympathetic character, the bumbling innocent always trying to make Emma happy. He even attempts an experimental surgery on a club-footed stable boy at her urging, with disastrous results. (The surgery works as a metaphor for Emma's attempts to "fix" her own life.) He eventually chooses Emma over his domineering mother. Emma, in turn, treats him terribly: deceiving him, selling his inheritance, getting them deeper and deeper in debt without his knowledge. (Flaubert's misogyny really shines through, along with his obvious distain for bourgeois values.)
In short: the message of the novel is kind of terrible. The writing redeems it. I read Lydia Davis's translation and found it lovely. I don't, however, feel any driving need to read more Flaubert. ( )
2024 Advent, Day 1: I Fully understand why this book is a classic. It is very well written and the themes remain ever relevant. Would have given 5 stars except that I just simply die not like any of the characters (for example: I get strong #boymom vibes and MC isn't even the mother of a son). It was actually so bad I almost knocked it down to 3. Still, good book, excellent themes, awful people. 4 stars ( )
A richly detailed story about an unhappy woman living in provincial France. Flaubert achieves an impressive balance of making Emma Bovary both despicable and sympathetic. Though Emma's experience is at the heart of this story, the background characters are compelling as are the descriptions of life in provincial France... balls, fairs, public amputations... good times! ( )
February book club: AM The introduction said it best when it said: "So, dear reader, if you are a woman, don't expect to see yourself in these pages; if you are a man, don't expect this book to teach you anything about women"
This book was awful. The only reason this book gets a star at all is because a) I have to.... and b) the introduction. She does a better job explaining the character than the author EVER did. she touches on the realities of being a woman in those times.
The part of the book that surprised me, and the introduction doesn't discuss it to much, is the first affair.....that it is almost rape. Let me set this up: He leads her off all on their own by horseback very far into a forest and fields near no one else then, he leads her away from the horses. Then he makes her walk and walk. She is short of breath and becoming disoriented and she wants him to take her back to the horses because she can't remember how to get back to them. It's at THIS point that he starts to kiss her hand and cheecks. He starts telling her that he wants her and loves her. She fights him at first and starts begging again to be taken back to the horses. This is also the male of the story that decided "he would have her". I coudln't help but wonder if any women, in those times or now, would feel like they have the option to say no and go home.....
Needless to say, there are plenty other classics. Skip this one, move on to the better ones!!! ( )
To Marie-Antoine-Jules Sénard Member of the Paris Bar Ex-President of the National Assemly Former Minister of the Interior
To Louis Bouilhet
First words
We were in study hall when the headmaster walked in, followed by a new boy not wearing a school uniform, and by a janitor carrying a large desk.
We were at prep, when the Head came in, followed by a new boy not in uniform and a school-servant carrying a big desk.
We were at prep when the Headmaster came in, followed by a 'new boy' not wearing school uniform, and by a school servant carrying a large desk.
We were in class when the head master came in, followed by a "new fellow," not wearing the school uniform, and a school servant carrying a large desk.
We were in the prep.-room when the Head came in, followed by a new boy if "mufti" and a beadle carrying a big desk.
Quotations
What would they be doing now? ... the sort of life that opens the heart and the senses like flowers in bloom. Whereas for her, life was cold as an attic facing north, and the silent spider boredom wove its web in all the shadowed corners of her heart.
Surprised by the strange sweetness of it, they never though to describe or to explain what they felt. Coming delights, like tropical beaches, send out their native enchantment over the vast spaces that precede them – a perfumed breeze that lulls and drugs you out of all anxiety as to what may yet await you below the horizon.
'Have you got your pistols?' 'What for?' 'Why, to defend yourself,' Emma replied. 'From your husband? Ha! Poor little man!'
Gone were those tender words that had moved her to tears, those tempestuous embraces that had sent her frantic. The grand passion into which she had plunged seemed to be dwindling around her like a river sinking into its bed; she saw the slime at the bottom.
She repented her past virtue as though it were a crime; what still remained of it collapsed beneath the savage onslaught of her pride.
Madame Bovary became notorious and a bestseller after Gustave Flaubert was acquitted from charges of obscenity in 1856. It details the many adulterous affairs and extravagances of Emma Bovary, a provincial doctor's wife. Her behaviour explores the banality and emptiness of rural life.
Flaubert considered himself a perfectionist, which is mirrored in the immaculate style of his writing. Madame Bovary is still considered one of the greatest literary texts of all time.
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"Madame Bovary", apparso a puntate sulla "Revue de Paris" nel 1856 e integralmente un anno dopo, incontrò subito un grande successo di pubblico - dovuto anche al clamore del processo a cui il suo autore, incriminato per oltraggio alla morale e alla religione, fu sottoposto -, imponendosi all'attenzione della critica come il capolavoro assoluto del romanzo moderno. Incentrato sulla superba figura di Emma Bovary - donna inquieta, insoddisfatta, simbolo di un'insanabile frustrazione sentimentale e sociale - e giocato su un antiromanticismo ideologico e formale di fondo, "Madame Bovary" come ha scritto Vladimir Nabokov, "dal punto di vista stilistico è prosa che fa ciò che si suppone faccia la poesia. Senza Flaubert non ci sarebbe stato un Marcel Proust in Francia, né un James Joyce in Irlanda. In Russia, Cechov non sarebbe stato Cechov". (piopas)
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Madame Bovary- Bowie's top 100 Group Read
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***SPOILER WARNING: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS AHEAD FOR ALL THREE NOVELS.***
What do all three of these women have in common? All are the creations of male authors: Flaubert and Maugham are widely acknowledged to have been bisexual, while prolific Papa Tolstoy appears to have been as straight as straight can be. All are beautiful women married to less attractive men, simply for the social and financial security. All of them are disenchanted by their monotonous lives, influenced by romantic novels that portray a life much different than their own. And when they pursue love in the arms of other man, all are met with tragedy of one kind or another.
Emma Bovary is actually the third Madame Bovary in the novel. The first is Mama Bovary, overbearing mother of Charles, who wants more from life for her only son, an awkward schoolboy. The second is the much older widow Charles marries (at Mama's urging, of course) for her money. Shortly after Charles meets lovely Emma, his wife loses all her money and conveniently dies. Emma initially sees him as a dashing young doctor, but then the reality of domestic life shatters that delusion. An invitation to a society event (and of course, those troublesome novels) give Emma a glimpse of another world, one with balls and gowns and romance. She remains faithful to Charles for a long time, bearing him a daughter that she treats like an afterthought, refusing to act on her attraction to a young clerk in the town where they relocate. But then a dashing rake spots her, seduces her, and she is undone. He's less honorable than Anna's Count Vronksy and less established than Kitty's Charlie Townsend. He loves her and swiftly leaves her a ruined woman, even though no one else knows about their affair.
Like Anna Karenina, Emma Bovary is dead by her own hand before the last act. (I find it really interesting that the 19th century Russian and French women had to kill themselves, while the 20th century English woman is allowed to grow and learn from her experience.) Unlike Anna, Emma's infidelity is never exposed. Her husband only learns about her affairs after her death, and it ruins him. Doctor Bovary is a sympathetic character, the bumbling innocent always trying to make Emma happy. He even attempts an experimental surgery on a club-footed stable boy at her urging, with disastrous results. (The surgery works as a metaphor for Emma's attempts to "fix" her own life.) He eventually chooses Emma over his domineering mother. Emma, in turn, treats him terribly: deceiving him, selling his inheritance, getting them deeper and deeper in debt without his knowledge. (Flaubert's misogyny really shines through, along with his obvious distain for bourgeois values.)
In short: the message of the novel is kind of terrible. The writing redeems it. I read Lydia Davis's translation and found it lovely. I don't, however, feel any driving need to read more Flaubert. (