La langue de Flaubert

Madame Bovary is an adventure to read in French, but one of the most beautiful adventures I've experienced. Flaubert's language is exquisite, every word fits like a glove, nothing stands out, nothing interrupts the smooth ride you are experiencing. Listen to this-yes listen-it's music:

«L'hiver fut rude. La convalescence de Madame fut longue. Quand il faisait beau, on la poussait dans son fauteuil auprès de la fenêtre, celle qui regardait la Place, car elle avait maintenant le jardin en anthipathie, et la persienne de ce côté restait constamment fermée(...) Cependant, la neige sur le toit des halles jetait dans la chambre un reflet blanc, immobile; ensuite, ce fut la pluie qui tombait» Flaubert, Madame Bovary p.281

Charles Bovary has the time of his life

Charles Bovary was once married to a much older wife, it was his first marriage but she was a widow, 45 years old with some money to support them (or so they thought). The short marriage ended abruptly when his wife died of a stroke after discovering that her fortune had vanished. He wasn't at all happy with her and his life changed for the better when he married young and pretty Emma.

For Emma the marriage was necessary, she had few other options, if any. Had she been of working class her life would, ironically, have been less restricted. But she was of a striving middle-class, the class that realistic novels in France were most interested in. She was a wealthy farmers daughter and her other options were waiting for  husband of som other wealthy farmer or staying with her parents to take care of them when they got old under the surveillance of one her brothers who would own the farm and sprinkle some of its incomes on her when she begged for it. 

Her poor education and social background prevented her from working as a governess or chambermaid. It seems as if she made a lucky catch when Charles Bovary fell in love with her, and Flaubert is convinced that she did. However, when you take a closer look, Emma seems to have reasons for her "malaise" which she feels even under the most perfect conditons. 

Emma is intended to be a person who becomes a victim of her own delusions. Emma is, like Don Quixjote (or in that case, Alma, herself), addicted to reading, or rather; Emma Bovary is addicted to stories. It all began when  she was a girl at a convent school run by nuns (in fact the only schools that would educate teenage girls at that time in France, public schools were for adolescent boys only). An old woman who did the laundry for the convent school, entertained her with stories and later on Emma discovered the library and sir Walter Scott.  She seems to be full of fantasy and creativity. The only use she will have of that fantasy and creativity for the rest of her life is to make the perfect home for her husband. 


When Charles comes home in the evenings after a full days work he is greeted with a fire burning on the hearth, a beautifully laid table and delicious food. If the food wasn't all that nice, Emma gave the course some interesting name. Emma herself was neatly dressed and smelled nicely, seemingly without any perfume. She took an orphaned girl to be her chamber maid and wait by the table. 

 

Charles had the time of his life. But Emma? Using all her creativity, intelligence, fantasy and energy to prepare a welcoming home for her husband? Is there any just cause for blaming novel reading for the coming tragedy?

Madame Bovary and dangerous literature

I happened to overhear a philosophical conversation this afternoon, it was arranged by Filosofiska rummet and took place in a library since the subject was literature and what use we have of literature, if there is any use at all.

I thougt of course of my dear Dorothea, the fictional character who kindly has lent her name to this blog. She means a lot to me, and has meant a lot to many a reader throughout the years. In the radio show they mentioned novels like Uncle Tom's Cabin which is said to have changed the course of history when Abraham Lincoln was inspired by it, which led to the civil war and slavery was abolished in all united states of America.

Both Middlemarch and Uncle Tom's Cabin are exemples of novels who have had a positive impact on readers, culture and society. However, a man in the audience of Filosofiska rummet asked about dangerous books and he mentioned Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther (Die Leiden des jungen Werthers) which inspired young men to commit suicide when it first was published. Then I thought of the novel I am reading for the moment: Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert.

This novel is about a young woman married to a widower who admires her youth and beauty, but doesn't give her the life she dreams of. Through reading novels she has gained a world view which differs a lot from the daily life in a small rural town in 19thC France. In fact, the novels are depicted as if they are poisoning her mind with unrealistic expectations eventually leading her into disaster.

«Pendant six mois, à quinze ans, Emma se graissa donc les mains à cette poussière des vieux cabinets de lecture. Avec Walter Scott, plus tard, elle s'éprit de choses historiques, rêva bahuts, salle des gardes et ménestrels. Elle aurait vivre dans quelque vieux manoir, comme ces châtelaines au long corsage qui, sous le trèfle des ogives, passaient leurs jours, le coude sur la pierre et le menton dans la main, à regarder venir du fond de la campagne un cavalier à plume blanche qui galope sur un cheval noir. Elle eut dans ce temps-là le culte de Marie Stuart et des vénérations enthousiastes à l'endroit des femmes illustres ou infortunées.» Flaubert p.96-97

The dangerous reading of Emma Bovary ends in tragedy. Like the historical women she admired, her end is terrible. So why do teachers of language persist in forcing children and adolescents to read novels at school? Maybe because of the fact which one of the philosophers pointed out; "People don't kill themselves today when they read about Werther." But is that because literature doesn't matter that much to young people any more, or is it because good literature, in the long run, only brings tolerance, maturity, empathy and linguistic brilliance, as we language teachers claim?

Madame Bovary and the importance of being correctly dressed

When Flaubert wrote Madame Bovary authors normally strived for realism in literature. Romanticism had lost its status among literary cristics, although e.g. Victor Hugo still wrote romantic masterpieces like Les Misérables, a realist theme treated with his masterly  romantic touch. 

                                                      Gustave Flaubert

 

Flaubert, on the other hand, was a realist and tried to be as true to nature as possible and he closely observed human behaviour to be able to write as realistically as possible.He therefore described both physical appearances and psychological facts with utmost exactitude. 

                                                        
                                                                 Charles Bovary

Already in the first chapter, when we first meet Charles Bovary, the main character in the first part of the novel, as he comes to school in the rural hamlet where he is about to spend his life, the reader is informed of how the characters are dressed: «le proviseur entra, suivi d'un nouveau habillé en bourgeois» (the head master entered, followed by a new comer dressed in city clothes). After his entrance, the young Charles Bovary continues with fumbling with his cap in an akward manner since he doesn't want to throw it on the floor. None of the other boys cares about where their caps are dropped, so he immediately distinguishes himself both in his clothes and in his behaviour regarding his garments.

Welcome to Middle Earth

"There is no creature whose inward being is so strong that it is not greatly determined by what lies outside it." This quote from George Eliot's Middlemarch concludes the fascinating novel of a town in the middle of Britain in the middle of history. 

This blog deals with all sorts of things concerning life in the middle; the middle of life in the middle of Lapland surrounded by children, books and wildlife. And how to live a life as true as that of Dorothea Brooke's, the heroine of Middlemarch.