Tuesday, December 22, 2015

How Gustave Flaubert showed his disaappointment with middle class in his novel Madam Bovary?

The disappointment experienced by the characters is mainly
the lack of money versus the fantasized version they have of what happiness and
contentment should be. Madame Bovary had come from a well-to-do family when she married
Dr. Bovary. Both were at first content with what they
had.


Yet, Flaubert lets us in the know of Emme's tendencies
when she was younger in the convent, how she lived on romance novels and romantic
stories where people always dressed well, and nice aromas always filtered, and she
stayed in that fantasy. Hence, the preoccupation she has with money and riches occupied
her mind and put values and common sense in second place. She felt of her current status
as dull, boring, intolerable, and classless and kept day dreaming about a life of
richness.


Later in the story, when the Bovaries receive the
invitation to the Marquess home and she dances with the Viscount, she sees THAT as the
perfect moment of her life. Nothing is important: Not health, nor family- just the
fantasy.


Therefore, Flaubert may show dissappointment
through his characters in that all that was material and superficial was what was
important to Emma, and that there is a massive chasm between her comfortable life and
that she aspires to live in opulence and ritual.

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