Madame Bovary uses Charles like the H2 in water use O. Sleeping from bed to bed, man to man; she leaches everything from Charles, portraying a gold digger in the most accurate way possible. Charles is passive to Bovary's neglectful mannerisms because he forces his happiness to be based on hers meaning when Bovary sluts and struts herself around town Charles forces himself to be happy simply because she is even though she is neglecting Charles to the fullest extent; something no sane man should allow. When Charles finds the letter between Emma and Rodolphe he reacts in a very passive manner, timidly believing himself to be happy simply because Emma was.
Emma carves Charles into a mere fragment of the man he once was. Consistently deceitfully neglecting Charles until he finally accepts Emma's mischievous ways. True love needs a strong sense of equillibrium to succeed. The difference in respect between Bovary and Charles is similar to that of a detainee at Guantanamo Bay and the interrogator questioning him.
The unhealthy relationship displayed between Bovary and Charles epitomizes the opposite of a successful relationship. In doing whatver she cares to, Emma uses and abuses Charles, finally forcing him into submission.
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A lively post (I enjoyed this one). You seem to be making a n implicit (and legitimate) comparison between Emma's relationship with Charles and Jane's with Rochester's (wherein the latter has achieved an equilibrium undreamed of by the Bovarys). Interesting that, in Flaubert's case, it's the woman whose the "player" (in a novel written by a man), whereas, in Bronte's work, it's the man who is out there playing the field. I wonder of the respective genders of these two authors has influenced their conception of relations between the genders (though, to be fair to Flaubert, plenty of his men, Rodolphe, for example, are just as bad as Rochester at his worst).
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