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Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert


blackwhiteandgray

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I have much to say on this novel but would rather hear others' opinions. I will choose to interject as I please, offering some opinions.

 

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Just one: the book is tedious, yes, but a rewarding read. The tedium feels exemplified by the very nature of the characters' routines. And while they are not rewarded, we are with our clarity.

 

Ironic, how self-aware. Its attitude calls back to Austen and her approaches.

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It requires patience to read and that patience, I feel, is rewarded. I was able to savour every single word of the novel, as I listened to it in audio format; before that I had already read it twice alone, and I think this last time round listening to it made me love it even more. The details are tedious only if you are in a hurry for action and don't realise how each word and detail is, in fact, linked to the whole. So many words, yet not one wasted, as far as I am concerned. By the end of the book, I was crying.

The thing I like is that Emma is not perfect; she is often not even likeable and I am not sure I would want her as a friend. However, Flaubert is masterful in that he manages to create a deep interest for this woman even though she is not perfect, but often a selfish, deluded woman. She is an extreme version, I feel, of all of us (especially women); she is out for the thrill, the drama, the kick of an affair, and cannot settle down to a mundane existence. She sees nothing beautiful in the every day- she is out for the 'big stuff', the big emotions, a kind of permanent Hollywood movie existence. Yet she is unable to achieve this, of course, and the objects of her desire are not true ones; they do not really care for her and she wouldn't notice even if they did - no one can keep up with her kind of expectations.The food she needs to feed her soul is unattainable in any normal life.

Her husband is wonderfully portrayed and again, is not perfect, but as with Emma, I feel I know him inside-out, which creates the empathy. He knows she is different, he knows deep down he cannot satisfy her. He doesn't condemn her, but tried instead to just ride along, ignoring as much as he can, until it all comes to a dreadful climax. He basically doesn't know what to do with a wife like that; again, I think, very true to real life.

 

Just a  few thoughts...

 

I was touched by the book and I will be re-reading it again and again.

 

 

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  • 1 month later...

Actually that's Gustave Flaubert. ^^

 

In France, this book is totally a classic, and every student works on it at least once! The story is extremely powerful: Emma can be seen simply as an unfaithful woman who can't stand her life because she always expects more, but Flaubert makes a criticism of the power of unrealistic, idealistic novels. Emma used to read romantic books when she was younger and thought her life would be the same as the characters of such books: she thought she would live all her life in passion, true and deep love. The whole book is about a woman who is extremely disappointed by life, and tries to find a meaning to it. 

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  • 2 years later...

I am curious to hear other people's thoughts on this novel.

 

From its description, I didn't think this book would appeal to me, but I decided to give it a go. 

 

I wrongly assumed it was just another love story, but it is so so much more than that. It is a tale of what happens when we allow our fantasies to go too far; when we dwell so long within our steepled palaces inside our minds, that the whole world not only continues to pass us by, but often takes advantage of our delusions along the way.

 

 

The character who I found particularly interesting was the pharmacist, Homais. I felt he illustrated how easy it can often be to fall upon such grand theories and judgements without truly opening the eyes and seeing humanity for what it is.

 

 

I think this novel has a lesson for us all, and for me personally, it really highlighted the lost art of staying in the moment and accepting your blessings. It is so much easier to live in a world of fantasy, yet so much more rewarding to breathe in reality.

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  • 11 months later...

I read it, but I can't say I enjoyed it very much. I have read that Gustave Flaubert took five years to write it, redrafting it until he had it perfect, and that it was inspired by a newspaper report. I think it is an exercise in sympathy. It would be easy to condemn a woman like her.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 4/11/2017 at 11:13 PM, KEV67 said:

I think it is an exercise in sympathy. It would be easy to condemn a woman like her.

 

I agree - it's why I loved the book so much. It makes you see beyond her (selfish) choices, and while it is difficult to try to like such a character, it did make me feel pity for her despite her choices being her own responsibility. I felt the same way when I read Anna Karenina.

 

It's a way of thinking that I've recently tried to adopt more regularly - I've just noticed how easy it is to condemn other people for their life choices without stepping back and realising that everyone is human and therefore fallible.

 

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  • 11 months later...

Being new to this forum I am late to all these threads, so I do apologise for rekindling some!

I read Madame Bovary at school and I loved it so much I "forgot" to return it. This threaad has made  me want to re-read it as, strangely, I never have.

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