The story of the wife of a provincial doctor, Emma Bovary, would be quite banal if it were invented by someone else - not Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880). Honing every line, every episode, Flaubert created an undeniable masterpiece, forcing even the judges who reviewed the novel to agree with this " Madame Bovary"on charges of immorality. It was the acquittal of the court that made it possible to publish the novel as a separate book. Subsequent reprints of the novel in dozens of languages, and then film adaptations, are countless. The heroine became a symbol of loneliness and book captivity. Trying to change her own destiny in accordance with the recipes of popular novels, she failed. Why? - It's up to the readers. By the way, you probably heard Flaubert's famous saying "Madame Bovary is me." And if you did not take him too seriously, then here's another phrase from his letter: "When I described scene of the poisoning of Emma Bovary, I tasted the arsenic so clearly and felt so truly poisoned that I suffered...
Read completelyThe story of the wife of a provincial doctor, Emma Bovary, would be quite banal if it were invented by someone else - not Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880). Honing every line, every episode, Flaubert created an undeniable masterpiece, forcing even the judges who considered the novel Madame Bovary to agree with this on charges of immorality. It was the acquittal of the court that allowed the novel to be published as a separate book. The subsequent reprints of the novel in dozens of languages, and then film adaptations, are countless. The heroine has become a symbol of loneliness and book captivity. Trying to change her own destiny in accordance with the recipes of popular novels, she failed. Why? - to solve to readers. By the way, you must have heard Flaubert's famous saying, "Madame Bovary is me." And if you did not take him too seriously, then here is another phrase from his letter: "When I described the scene of the poisoning of Emma Bovary, I so clearly felt the taste of arsenic and felt so really poisoned that I suffered two attacks of nausea, quite real , one after the other, and the monster from the stomach the whole dinner." Not very appetizing, but extremely reliable.
Translation from French by Nikolay Lyubimov. Accompanying article by Veronica Dolina
Veronika Arkadyevna Dolina (b. 1956) is a Russian poetess, author and performer of songs known to the public since the 70s of the last century. Graduate of the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute. Lenin, Faculty of French. In 1986, her first CD was released, since then several dozen have been released. Books of poems and translations by Veronika Dolina are regularly published; since 2006, seven of her books have been published by the Vremya publishing house.
HideGustave Flaubert
Madame Bovary
Louis Buile1
Marie-Antoine-Julie Senard, a Parisian lawyer,
former President of the National Assembly
and Minister of the Interior
Dear and famous friend!
Let me put your name on the front page
of this book, before dedication, for to you mainly I
owes its publication. Your brilliant protective
speech pointed out to me its meaning, which I did not
gave it to her before. Accept this feeble tribute
my deepest gratitude for your eloquence and
for your self-sacrifice.
PART ONE
As we were preparing our lessons, the headmaster came in, leading a home-dressed "novice" and an attendant carrying a huge desk. Some of us were dozing, but then we all woke up and jumped up with an air as if we had been suddenly interrupted from our studies.
The director signaled us to take our places, and then, turning to the class teacher, said in an undertone:
The newcomer was still standing in the corner, behind the door, so that we could hardly see this country boy of about fifteen, taller than all of us. His hair was cut in a circle, like that of a rural psalmist, he behaved sedately, despite his extreme embarrassment. He did not differ in particular strength of build, and yet his green cloth jacket with black buttons, apparently, stung him in the armholes, red hands protruding from the cuffs, not accustomed to gloves. He pulled the harness up too high, and blue stockings peeked out from under his light brown trousers. His shoes were rough, poorly polished, lined with nails.
They started asking for lessons. The newcomer listened with bated breath as they listened to the sermon in the church, he was afraid to cross his legs, he was afraid to lean on his elbows, and at two o'clock, when the bell rang, the mentor had to call him, otherwise he would not have become a couple.
When entering the classroom, we always wanted to free our hands as soon as possible, and we usually threw our caps on the floor; they were supposed to be thrown right from the threshold under the bench, but in such a way that, when they hit the wall, they raised as much dust as possible: this was a special chic.
Perhaps the newcomer did not pay attention to our trick, perhaps he did not dare to take part in it, but as soon as the prayer ended, he still held his cap on his knees. It was a complex headdress, a mixture of a bear's cap, a bowler hat, an otter-fur cap, and a downy hat - in a word, it was one of those trashy things whose mute ugliness is no less expressive than the face of a fool. Egg-shaped, stretched out on a whalebone, it began with three circular rollers; further, separated from the rollers by a red band, there were interspersed diamonds of velvet and rabbit fur; above them rose something like a bag, which was crowned with a cardboard polygon with intricate braid embroidery, and from this polygon hung a tassel of gold thread on a long thin cord. The cap was brand new, its visor shone.
"Get up," the teacher said.
He got up; the cap has fallen. The whole class laughed.
He bent down and picked up his cap. The neighbor threw her off with his elbow - he again had to bend down after her.
“Get rid of your wagon!” said the teacher, not devoid of wit.
The unanimous laughter of schoolchildren confused the poor boy - he did not know whether to hold his cap in his hands, whether to throw it on the floor or put it on his head. He sat down and laid her on her knees.
“Get up,” the teacher turned to him again, “and tell me your last name.”
The newcomer muttered something unintelligible.
- Repeat!
In response, there was the same swallowing of whole syllables, drowned out by the whooping of the class.
- Louder! the teacher shouted. - Louder!
The newcomer, with the determination of despair, opened his mouth and blurted out with all the strength of his lungs, as if calling someone:
- Sharbovari!
Then an unimaginable noise rose up and began to grow crescendo, with sonorous cries (the class rumbled, cackled, stomped, repeated: Sharbovari! Sharbovari!), And then broke up into separate voices, but for a long time could not subside and from time to time ran through the rows of desks, on which muffled laughter flashed here and there like an unextinguished cracker.
Under a hail of shouting, order was gradually restored, the teacher, having forced the beginner to dictate, pronounce in warehouses, and then read his name and surname again, finally made out the words "Charles Bovary" and ordered the poor fellow to sit down at the "lazy" desk, at the very departments. The newcomer took a step, but immediately stopped in indecision.
- What are you looking for? the teacher asked.
“My truck...” the newcomer spoke timidly, looking around uneasily.
- Five hundred lines to the whole class!
This formidable exclamation, like Quos ego2, subdued the storm that had risen again.
- Will you stop or not? the angry teacher shouted once more and, taking out a handkerchief from under his cap, wiped the sweat from his forehead. - And you, newbie, will conjugate ridiculus sum twenty times in my notebook (I'm ridiculous, lat.). - Relenting somewhat, he added: - Yes, there is your cap! Nobody stole it.
Finally, everyone calmed down. Heads bowed over notebooks, and for the remaining two hours the newcomer behaved approximately, although from time to time balls of chewed paper, aptly thrown from the tip of a pen, hit him right in the face. He wiped his face with his hand, but did not change his posture and did not even raise his eyes.
In the evening, before preparing his lessons, he laid out his school supplies, carefully lined the paper. We saw how conscientiously he studied, constantly looking into the dictionary, trying his best. He knew grammar quite well, but his phrases turned out to be clumsy, so he was apparently transferred to the senior class only for diligence. Parents, prudent people, were in no hurry to send him to school, and the basics Latin he was taught by the village priest.
His father, Mr. Charles-Denis-Bartholome Bovary, a retired company paramedic, in 1812 came out with an ugly story related to recruiting, and he had to leave the service, but thanks to his personal qualities, he managed to grab in passing a dowry of sixty thousand francs, which the owner of a hat shop gave for his daughter, who was seduced by the appearance of a paramedic. Handsome, a talker, who knew how to dashingly jingle his spurs, wore a mustache with a mustache, humiliated his fingers with rings, loved to dress up in everything bright, he gave the impression of a brave fellow and behaved with traveling salesman glibness. Having married, he lived for two or three years on a dowry - he had a hearty dinner, got up late, smoked china pipes, went to theaters every evening and often looked into cafes. The father-in-law left behind a little; out of vexation, M. Bovary started a factory, but, burnt out, retired to the countryside to straighten out his affairs. However, in agriculture he knew no more than calico, he rode his horses instead of plowing them, he pulled whole bottles of cider instead of selling it by barrels, he ate the best living creatures from his poultry yard himself, he smeared his hunting boots with the fat of his pigs - and soon came to the conclusion that all sorts of economic undertakings should be abandoned.
For two hundred francs a year, he rented in a village located on the border of Co and Picardy, something between a farm and a landowner's estate, and, dejected, full of late regrets, grumbling at God and resolutely envious of everyone, disappointed, in his words, in people, forty-five years old has already decided to shut up and retire from business.
Once upon a time, his wife was crazy about him. She loved him with a slavish love, and this only pushed him away from her. From her youth, cheerful, sociable, affectionate, in old age she, like spent wine that turns into vinegar, became quarrelsome, quarrelsome, irritable. At first, without showing it, she suffered severely because her husband was chasing after all the village girls, because, having been in all the haunting places, he came home late, exhausted, and he smelled of wine. Then self-esteem woke up in her. She withdrew into herself, buried her anger under a slab of silent stoicism - and remained so until her death. She always had so much running around, so much trouble! She went to lawyers, to the chairman of the court, remembered the terms of bills, sought a delay, and at home she stroked, sewed, washed, looked after workers, paid bills, while her careless husband, chained by a grumpy half-sleep, from which he returned to reality only in order to say some taunt to his wife, he smoked by the fireplace and spit into the ashes.
When they had a child, he had to be given to a wet nurse. Then, taking the boy home, they began to spoil him, as they spoil the crown prince. His mother fed him sweets; his father allowed him to run around barefoot and even, pretending to be a philosopher, claimed that the boy, like baby animals, could well walk completely naked. In contrast to maternal aspirations, he created for himself the ideal of a courageous childhood and, in accordance with this ideal, he tried to develop his son, believing that only severe, Spartan education can strengthen his health. He forced him to sleep in an unheated room, taught him to drink rum in large sips, taught him to mock religious processions. But the naturally meek boy was not instilled with all this. His mother dragged him everywhere with her, cut out pictures for him, told stories, uttered endless monologues filled with sorrowful merriment and eloquent tenderness. Tired of spiritual loneliness, she concentrated on her son all her unsatisfied, deceived ambition. She dreamed of how he would take a prominent position, imagined how he, already an adult, handsome, intelligent, enters the service of the department of communications or the court. She taught him to read, moreover, she taught him to sing two or three romances to the accompaniment of an old piano. But M. Bovary did not attach much importance to mental development. "It's all for nothing!" he said. Are they in a position to send their son to a state school, buy him a position or a trade? "Happiness is not in learning - whoever is victorious will always come out among the people." Madame Bovary bit her lip, while the little boy ran about the village.
The novel is quite simple and even banal, the true value of the novel is in the details and forms of presentation of the plot. Flaubert as a writer was known for his desire to bring each work to the ideal, always trying to find the right words.
Encyclopedic YouTube
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The novel was published in the Parisian literary magazine Revue de Paris from October 1 to December 15, 1856. After the publication of the novel, the author (as well as two other publishers of the novel) was accused of insulting morality and, together with the editor of the magazine, was brought to trial in January 1857. The scandalous fame of the work made it popular, and the acquittal of February 7, 1857 made it possible to publish the novel as a separate book that followed in the same year. At present, it is considered not only one of the key works of realism, but also one of the works that had greatest influence to literature in general. The novel contains features of literary naturalism. Flaubert's skepticism towards man manifested itself in the absence of positive characters typical of a traditional novel. Careful drawing of the characters also led to a very long exposition of the novel, which allows a better understanding of the character. main character and, accordingly, the motivation of her actions (as opposed to voluntarism in the actions of the heroes of sentimentalist and romantic literature). Rigid determinism in the actions of the characters became a mandatory feature of the French novel in the first half of the 19th century.
The thoroughness of the depiction of the characters, the mercilessly accurate drawing of details (the novel accurately and naturally shows death from arsenic poisoning, the efforts to prepare the corpse for burial, when dirty liquid pours out of the mouth of the deceased Emma, etc.) were noted by critics as a feature of the writer's manner Flaubert. This was reflected in the cartoon, where Flaubert is depicted in the apron of an anatomist, exposing the body of Emma Bovary.
According to a 2007 poll of contemporary popular authors, Madame Bovary is one of the two greatest novels of all time (immediately after Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina). Turgenev at one time spoke of this novel as the most the best work throughout the literary world.
According to the literary critic Alexei Mashevsky, there are no positive characters in the novel: there is no hero who could be perceived by the reader as a hero. We can say that the "death of a hero", which was heralded by the novel of the same name by Richard Aldington, came back in the 19th century - in Madame Bovary.
Plot
Charles Bovary, after graduating from college, by the decision of his mother, begins to study medicine. However, he turns out to be not very smart, and only the natural diligence and help of his mother allow him to pass the exam and get a doctor's job in Toast, a provincial French town in Normandy. Through the efforts of his mother, he marries a local widow, an unattractive but wealthy woman who is already over forty. One day, on a call to a local farmer, Charles meets the farmer's daughter, Emma Rouault, a pretty girl whom he becomes attracted to.
After the death of his wife, Charles begins to communicate with Emma and after some time decides to ask for her hand. Her long-widowed father agrees and arranges a magnificent wedding. But when the young people begin to live together, Emma very quickly realizes that she no longer loves Charles and that before that she did not know what love was at all. However, he loves her without memory and is truly happy with her. She is weary family life in a remote province and in the hope of changing something, insists on moving to another (also provincial) city of Yonville. This does not help, and even the birth of a child from Charles does not evoke tremulous feelings in her (the scene when she, despondent from the burden of life, pushes her daughter in a fit of indignation, and she hits, which does not cause regret in her mother).
In Yonville, she meets a student, assistant notary Leon Dupuis, with whom they talk for a long time about the charms of life in the capital at dinners in a tavern, where Emma comes with her husband. They have a mutual attraction. But Leon dreams of life in the capital and after a while leaves for Paris to continue his studies. After some time, Emma meets Rodolphe Boulanger, a wealthy man and a famous womanizer. He begins to woo her, speaking words of love, which she so lacked from Charles, and they become lovers in the forest, "under the nose" of an unsuspecting husband in love, who himself bought a horse for Emma so that she could take useful walks on a horse with Rodolphe in the same forest. Wanting to please Rodolphe and give him an expensive whip, she gradually gets into debt, signing bills to Leray, a crafty shopkeeper, and spending money without her husband's permission. Emma and Rodolphe are happy together, they often meet in secret and begin to prepare to escape from her husband. However, Rodolphe, a single man, is not ready to go for it and breaks the connection by writing a letter, after reading which Emma falls ill and goes to bed for a long time.
Gradually, she recovers, but she finally manages to move away from a depressed state only when in Rouen, a rather large city near Yonville, she meets Leon, who has returned from the capital. Emma and Leon first engage in a relationship after visiting the Rouen Cathedral (Emma tries to refuse not to come to the cathedral, but in the end does not overdo herself and comes) in a hired carriage, which rushed around Rouen for half a day, making a mystery to the locals. In the future, a relationship with a new lover forces her to deceive her husband, saying that on Thursdays she takes piano lessons from a woman in Rouen. She gets entangled in debts made with the help of the shopkeeper Leray. Having tricked Charles into disposing of his property, Emma secretly sells his small-income estate (this will be revealed to Charles and his mother later). When Leray, having collected bills signed by Emma, asks her friend to sue, which decides to seize the property of the spouses on account of the debt, Emma, trying to find a way out, turns to Leon (he refuses to risk for his mistress, stealing several thousand francs from the office), to the Yonville notary (who wants to have an affair with her, but is disgusting to her). In the end, she comes to her former lover Rodolphe, who treated her so cruelly, but he does not have the required amount, and does not intend to sell gizmos (which make up the furnishings of his interior) for her sake.
Desperate, she secretly takes arsenic in Mr. Ome's pharmacy, after which she comes home. Soon she becomes ill, she lies in bed. Neither her husband nor the invited famous doctor can do anything to help her, and Emma dies. After her death, Charles reveals the truth about the amount of debts she has incurred, even about betrayals - but he continues to suffer for her, breaks off relations with his mother, keeps her things. He even meets Rodolphe (having gone to sell a horse) and accepts Rodolphe's invitation to have a drink with him. Rodolphe sees that Charles knows about his wife's infidelity, and Charles says that he is not offended, as a result of which Rodolphe recognizes Charles as a nonentity in his soul. The next day, Charles dies in his garden, his little daughter finds him there, who is then handed over to Charles's mother. A year later, she dies, and the girl has to go to a spinning mill to earn a living.
History of creation
The idea for the novel was presented to Flaubert in 1851. He had just read the first version of another of his works, The Temptation of Saint Anthony, to his friends and was criticized by them. In this regard, one of the writer's friends, Maxim du Can, editor of La Revue de Paris, suggested that he get rid of the poetic and stilted style. To do this, du Kang advised choosing a realistic and even everyday story related to life events. ordinary people, contemporary Flaubert French philistines. The plot itself was suggested to the writer by another friend, Louis Buille (the novel is dedicated to him), who reminded Flaubert of the events associated with the Delamare family.
I spent five days on one page...
In another letter, he actually complains:
I struggle with every offer, but it just doesn't add up. What a heavy oar is my pen!
Already in the process of work, Flaubert continued to collect material. He himself read the novels that Emma Bovary liked to read, studied the symptoms and effects of arsenic poisoning. It is widely known that he himself felt bad, describing the scene of the poisoning of the heroine. This is how he recalled it:
When I described the scene of the poisoning of Emma Bovary, I tasted the arsenic so clearly and felt so truly poisoned that I suffered two attacks of nausea, quite real, one after the other, and vomited the whole dinner out of my stomach.
In the course of the work, Flaubert repeatedly redid his work. The manuscript of the novel, currently held in the municipal library of Rouen, is 1,788 corrected and transcribed pages. The final version, stored there, contains only 487 pages.
The almost complete identity of the story of Delphine Delamare and the story of Emma Bovary described by Flaubert gave reason to believe that the book describes real story. However, Flaubert categorically denied this, even arguing that Madame Bovary had no prototype. He once declared: "Madame Bovary is me!" Nevertheless, now on the grave of Delphine Delamare, in addition to her name, there is an inscription "Madame Bovary".
Original language: Original published: "Madam Bovary" (Madame Bovary, fr. Madame Bovary listen)) is a novel by Gustave Flaubert, first published in 1856. Considered one of the masterpieces of world literature.
The main character of the novel is Emma Bovary, the doctor's wife, living beyond her means and having extramarital affairs in the hope of getting rid of the emptiness and routine of provincial life. Although the plot of the novel is quite simple and even banal, the true value of the novel lies in the details and forms of presentation of the plot. Flaubert as a writer was known for his desire to bring each work to the ideal, always trying to find the right words.
The novel was published in the Parisian literary magazine " Revue de Paris» from October 1 to December 15, 1856. After the publication of the novel, the author (as well as two other publishers of the novel) was accused of insulting morality and, together with the editor of the magazine, was brought to trial in January 1857. The scandalous fame of the work made it popular, and the acquittal of February 7, 1857 made it possible to publish the novel as a separate book that followed in the same year. It is now considered not only one of the key works of realism, but also one of the works that had the greatest influence on literature in general. The novel contains features of literary naturalism. Flaubert's skepticism towards man manifested itself in the absence of positive characters typical of a traditional novel. Careful drawing of the characters also led to a very long exposition of the novel, which makes it possible to better understand the character of the main character and, accordingly, the motivation for her actions (as opposed to voluntarism in the actions of the heroes of sentimentalist and romantic literature). Rigid determinism in the actions of the characters became a mandatory feature of the French novel of the first half. 19th century The coloring of provincial life, in which all the ugliness of bourgeois culture condensed, makes it possible to classify Flaubert as one of the writers focused on "anti-provincial" themes. The thoroughness of the depiction of the characters, the mercilessly accurate drawing of details (the novel accurately and naturally shows death from arsenic poisoning, the efforts to prepare the corpse for burial, when dirty liquid pours out of the mouth of the deceased Emma, etc.) were noted by critics as a feature of the writer's manner Flaubert. This was reflected in the cartoon, where Flaubert is depicted in the apron of an anatomist, exposing the body of Emma Bovary.
According to a 2007 poll of contemporary popular authors, Madame Bovary is one of the two greatest novels of all time (immediately after Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina). Turgenev at one time spoke of this novel as the best work "in the entire literary world."
Plot
Wedding of Emma and Charles.
Charles Bovary, after graduating from college, by the decision of his mother, begins to study medicine. However, he turns out to be not very smart, and only the natural diligence and help of his mother allow him to pass the exam and get a doctor's job in Toast, a provincial French town in Normandy. Through the efforts of his mother, he marries a local widow, an unattractive but wealthy woman who is already over forty. One day, on a call to a local farmer, Charles meets the farmer's daughter, Emma Rouault, a pretty girl whom he becomes attracted to.
After the death of his wife, Charles begins to communicate with Emma and after some time decides to ask for her hand. Her long-widowed father agrees and arranges a magnificent wedding. But when the young people begin to live together, Emma very quickly realizes that she does not love Charles. However, he loves her and is truly happy with her. She is burdened by family life in a remote province and, in the hope of changing something, insists on moving to another city. However, this does not help, and even the birth of a child, a girl, does not change anything in her attitude to life.
In a new place, she meets an admirer, Leon Dupuis, with whom she has a relationship, while platonic. But Leon dreams of life in the capital and after a while leaves for Paris. After some time, Emma meets Rodolphe Boulanger, a very wealthy man and a famous womanizer. He starts courting her and they become lovers. During this relationship, she begins to get into debt and spend money without her husband's permission. The relationship ends when she begins to dream and prepare to run away from her husband abroad with her lover and daughter. Rodolphe is not satisfied with this development of events, and he breaks the connection, which Emma takes very hard.
She finally manages to move away from her depressed state only when she again meets Leon Dupuis, who has returned from the capital, who resumes his courtship. She tries to refuse him, but she can't. Emma and Leon first bond in the carriage they hired to tour Rouen. In the future, relations with a new lover force her to deceive her husband, weaving more and more lies into family life. But she gets entangled not only in lies, but also in debts made with the help of the owner of the shop, Mr. Leray. This turns out to be the worst. When the usurer no longer wants to wait and goes to court to seize the property of the spouses on account of the debt, Emma, trying to find a way out, turns to her lover, to other acquaintances, even to Rodolphe, her former lover, but to no avail.
Desperate, she secretly from the pharmacist, Mr. Ome, takes arsenic in the pharmacy, which she immediately takes. She soon becomes ill. Neither her husband nor the invited famous doctor can do anything to help her, and soon Emma dies. After her death, Charles discovers the truth about the number of debts she has incurred, and then about the presence of relationships with other men. Shocked, he is unable to survive it and soon dies.
History of creation
The idea for the novel was presented to Flaubert in 1851. He had just read to his friends the first version of another of his works, The Temptation of St. Anthony, and was criticized by them. In this regard, one of the writer's friends, Maxime du Can, editor of La Revue de Paris, suggested that he get rid of the poetic and stilted style. To do this, du Kang advised choosing a realistic and even everyday story related to events in the lives of ordinary people, contemporary French philistines Flaubert. The plot itself was suggested to the writer by another friend, Louis Buile (the novel is dedicated to him), who reminded Flaubert of the events associated with the Delamare family.
Eugene Delamare studied surgery under Flaubert's father, Achille Clefoas. Possessing no talents, he was able to take the place of a doctor only in a remote French province, where he married a widow, a woman older than him. After the death of his wife, he met a young girl named Delphine Couturier, who later became his second wife. The romantic nature of Delphine could not bear, however, the boredom of the provincial philistine life. She began to spend her husband's money on expensive outfits, and then cheat on him with numerous lovers. The husband was warned about the possible infidelity of his wife, but he did not believe it. At the age of 27, entangled in debt and losing attention from men, she committed suicide. After the death of Delphine, the truth about her debts and the details of her betrayals was revealed to her husband. He could not bear it and a year later he also died.
Flaubert was familiar with this story - his mother was in contact with the Delamare family. He seized on the idea of a novel, studied the life of the prototype, and in the same year set to work, which, however, turned out to be excruciatingly difficult. Flaubert wrote the novel for almost five years, sometimes spending whole weeks and even months on individual episodes. This was written evidence of the writer himself. Thus, in January 1853, he wrote to Louise Colet:
I spent five days on one page...
In another letter, he actually complains:
I struggle with every offer, but it just doesn't add up. What a heavy oar is my pen!
Already in the process of work, Flaubert continued to collect material. He himself read the novels that Emma Bovary liked to read, studied the symptoms and effects of arsenic poisoning. It is widely known that he himself felt bad, describing the scene of the poisoning of the heroine. This is how he recalled it:
When I described the scene of the poisoning of Emma Bovary, I tasted the arsenic so clearly and felt so truly poisoned that I suffered two attacks of nausea, quite real, one after the other, and vomited the whole dinner out of my stomach.
In the course of the work, Flaubert repeatedly redid his work. Manuscript of the novel, which is currently kept in the municipal library
Gustave Flaubert
French realist prose writer, considered one of the greatest European writers of the 19th century. He worked a lot on the style of his works, putting forward the theory of the "exact word". He is best known as the author of Madame Bovary.
Gustave Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821 in the city of Rouen into a petty bourgeois family. His father was a surgeon in the hospital of Rouen, and his mother was the daughter of a doctor. He was youngest child in family. In addition to Gustave, the family had two children: an older sister and brother. Two other children did not survive. The writer spent his childhood bleakly in the doctor's dark apartment.
The writer studied at the Royal College and Lyceum in Rouen, starting in 1832. There he met Ernest Chevalier, with whom he founded Art et Progress in 1834. In this edition, he first printed his first public text.
In 1849 he completed the first edition of The Temptation of Saint Anthony, a philosophical drama on which he subsequently worked all his life. In terms of worldview, it is imbued with ideas of disappointment in the possibilities of cognition, which is illustrated by the clash of different religious trends and corresponding doctrines.
"Madam Bovary" or "Madame Bovary"- the history of the creation of the novel
Madame BovaryFlaubert's fame was brought about by the publication of Madame Bovary (1856) in a magazine, work on which began in the autumn of 1851. The writer tried to make his novel realistic and psychological. Soon after, Flaubert and the editor of the Revue de Paris were sued for "insulting morality." The novel turned out to be one of the most important forerunners of literary naturalism.
The novel was published in the Parisian literary magazine Revue de Paris from October 1 to December 15, 1856. After the publication of the novel, the author (as well as two other publishers of the novel) was accused of insulting morality and, together with the editor of the magazine, was brought to trial in January 1857. The scandalous fame of the work made it popular, and the acquittal of February 7, 1857 made it possible to publish the novel as a separate book that followed in the same year. Currently, it is considered not only one of the key works of realism, but also one of the works that had the greatest influence on literature in general.
The idea for the novel was submitted to Flaubert in 1851. He had just read the first version of another of his works, The Temptation of Saint Anthony, to his friends and was criticized by them. In this regard, one of the writer's friends, Maxime du Can, editor of La Revue de Paris, suggested that he get rid of the poetic and stilted style. To do this, du Kang advised choosing a realistic and even everyday story related to events in the lives of ordinary people, contemporary French philistines Flaubert. The plot itself was suggested to the writer by another friend, Louis Buile (the novel is dedicated to him), who reminded Flaubert of the events associated with the Delamare family.
Flaubert was familiar with this story - his mother was in contact with the Delamare family. He seized on the idea of a novel, studied the life of the prototype, and in the same year set to work, which, however, turned out to be excruciatingly difficult. Flaubert wrote the novel for almost five years, sometimes spending whole weeks and even months on individual episodes.
The main characters of the novel
Charles Bovary
Boring, assiduous slow-witted, without charm, wit, education, but with a full set of banal ideas and rules. He is a tradesman, but also a touching, pathetic creature.
EMMA ROO
Daughter of a prosperous peasant from the Berto farm, wife of Dr. Charles Bovary. A married couple arrives in the small provincial town of Yonville. Emma, who was brought up in a monastery, is distinguished by a romantic and sublime idea of \u200b\u200blife. But life turns out to be completely different. Her husband is an ordinary provincial doctor, a mentally narrow-minded person, "whose conversations were flat, like a street panel." This becomes the reason that Emma rushes in search of love romantic adventures. Her lovers - Rodolphe Boulanger and the clerk Leon Dupuis - are vulgar, selfish, leaving Emma for personal gain.
The real prototype is Delfina Delamar, the wife of a doctor from the city of Ree near Rouen, who died at the age of 26, poisoned by arsenic. However, the writer himself assured that "all the characters in his book are fictitious." The theme of a woman bored in marriage and discovering "romantic" aspirations appears in Flaubert's early story "Passion and Virtue" (1837), then in the first novel, entitled "Education of the Senses".
"Madam Bovary" summary of the novel
Charles Bovary, after graduating from college, by the decision of his mother, begins to study medicine. However, he turns out to be not very smart, and only the natural diligence and help of his mother allow him to pass the exam and get a doctor's job in Toast, a provincial French town in Normandy. Through the efforts of his mother, he marries a local widow, an unattractive but wealthy woman who is already over forty. One day, on a call to a local farmer, Charles meets the farmer's daughter, Emma Rouault, a pretty girl whom he becomes attracted to.
After the death of his wife, Charles begins to communicate with Emma and after some time decides to ask for her hand. Her long-widowed father agrees and arranges a magnificent wedding. But when the young people begin to live together, Emma very quickly realizes that she no longer loves Charles and that before that she did not know what love was at all. However, he loves her without memory and is truly happy with her. She is weary of family life in a remote province and, hoping to change something, insists on moving to another (also provincial) city of Yonville. This does not help, and even the birth of a child from Charles does not evoke tremulous feelings in her (the scene when she, despondent from the burden of life, pushes her daughter in a fit of indignation, and she hits, which does not cause regret in her mother).
In Yonville, she meets a student, assistant notary Leon Dupuis, with whom they talk for a long time about the charms of life in the capital at dinners in a tavern, where Emma comes with her husband. They have a mutual attraction. But Leon dreams of life in the capital and after a while leaves for Paris to continue his studies. After some time, Emma meets Rodolphe Boulanger, a wealthy man and a famous womanizer. He begins to woo her, speaking words of love, which she so lacked from Charles, and they become lovers in the forest, "under the nose" of an unsuspecting husband in love, who himself bought a horse for Emma so that she could take useful walks on a horse with Rodolphe in the same forest. Wanting to please Rodolphe and give him an expensive whip, she gradually gets into debt, signing bills to Leray, a crafty shopkeeper, and spending money without her husband's permission. Emma and Rodolphe are happy together, they often meet in secret and begin to prepare to escape from her husband. However, Rodolphe, a single man, is not ready to go for it and breaks the connection by writing a letter, after reading which Emma falls ill and goes to bed for a long time.
She gradually recovers, but she finally manages to move away from her depressed state only when in Rouen, a rather large city near Yonville, she meets Leon, who has returned from the capital. Emma and Leon first engage in a relationship after visiting the Rouen Cathedral (Emma tries to refuse not to come to the cathedral, but in the end does not overdo herself and comes) in a hired carriage, which rushed around Rouen for half a day, making a mystery to the locals. In the future, a relationship with a new lover forces her to deceive her husband, saying that on Thursdays she takes piano lessons from a woman in Rouen. She gets entangled in debts made with the help of the shopkeeper Leray.
Having tricked Charles into disposing of his property, Emma secretly sells his small-income estate (this will be revealed to Charles and his mother later). When Leray, having collected bills signed by Emma, asks her friend to sue, which decides to seize the property of the spouses on account of the debt, Emma, trying to find a way out, turns to Leon (he refuses to risk for his mistress, stealing several thousand francs from the office), to the Yonville notary (who wants to have an affair with her, but is disgusting to her). In the end, she comes to her former lover Rodolphe, who treated her so cruelly, but he does not have the required amount, and does not intend to sell gizmos (which make up the furnishings of his interior) for her sake.
Desperate, she secretly takes arsenic in Mr. Ome's pharmacy, after which she comes home. Soon she becomes ill, she lies in bed. Neither her husband nor the invited famous doctor can do anything to help her, and Emma dies. After her death, Charles reveals the truth about the amount of debts she has incurred, even about betrayals - but he continues to suffer for her, breaks off relations with his mother, keeps her things. He even meets Rodolphe (having gone to sell a horse) and accepts Rodolphe's invitation to have a drink with him. Rodolphe sees that Charles knows about his wife's infidelity, and Charles says that he is not offended, as a result of which Rodolphe recognizes Charles as a nonentity in his soul. The next day, Charles dies in his garden, his little daughter finds him there, who is then handed over to Charles's mother. A year later, she dies, and the girl has to go to a spinning mill to earn a living.
The reason for Emma's death lies not only in the discord between dream and reality, but also due to the oppressive bourgeois environment in which Flaubert's characters live. The image of the main character of the novel is complex and contradictory. The monastic education and the inert philistine environment led to the limitations of her horizons.
Sources - Wikipedia, rlspace.com, Vsesochineniya.ru, Literaturka.info.
Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary - summary novel (world classic) updated: December 8, 2016 by: website
