So I did finish this book, and thought, in a sick and twisted kind of way, the ending where Charles dies was quite funny, but I found a certain passage in the novel, where Léon and Emma discuss which books they enjoy, was quite interesting to me.
Flaubert would pride himself as the kind of author who holds up a mirror to the world, with no fancy descriptions or symbols, and yet in this passage his characters are discussing how they love the Romantic style of writing. They "loathe...the kind of thing you find in real life." In this passage he seems to contradict everything he stands for.
I have talked with a couple people about this passage, and have decide that it could mean two things. Flaubert was either "holding up his mirror" and showing how people tend to enjoy these romantic novels much more than those that he feels are better representations of what literature should do, or he was poking fun at the unreal ideals that Romantic novels, even those such as Jane Eyre where a plain woman was able to find true love on her terms, and how they influence the lives of those who read them.
Emma is a perfect example of this because she is constantly looking for "true love" "true romance" but she can never find it because to Flaubert...it doesn't exist.
In my opinion Flaubert is entertaining, but in his quest to seperate himself from the novel, he inserted an arrogant, elitist tone, and dragged on in descriptions that were very pointless as he was telling you at the same time that these details meant nothing and stood for nothing. In doing so he pushed me away rather engrossing me in what would have been a tragic and amazing story. Maybe this was his goal, maybe it wasn't, either way, the distance did help me find humor in some of the "tragic" scenes, like Charles's death and even Emma's. She thought she was going to acheive some level of "romanticism" in life and kill herself, and instead she dies a horribly painful death.
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2 comments:
I agree with you about his tone and think a large part of his purpose in this book was to mock romanticism and all the ideals it stands for. You make great points though how he lets his bitterness get the best of him and twists his writing.
Nice post. Good of you to pick up on the telling scene between Leon and Emma wherein they do, indeed, seem to be ripping on precisely the kind of book in they find themselves trapped as characters (how delicious is this?). I think arrogance absolutely informs Flaubert's brand of realism (and perhaps all realism--something to think about). It's hard to to call everyone around you stupid without opening yourself up to the charge of being an elitist. Then again, with characters like these, shouldn't we be hoping for some form of an elite?
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