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Gustave Flaubert Rouen 12 Dec.1821 - Croisset 8 May 1880 • French novelist full text search: the ledge - flash version* *	The French novelist Gustave Flaubert is regarded as one of the supreme masters of the realistic novel. He was a scrupulous, slow writer, intent on the exact word (le mot juste) and complete objectivity. The son of a surgeon, he studied law unsuccessfully in Paris and returned home to devote himself to writing. Because of a severe nervous malady he spent most of his life at Croisset, near Rouen, with his mother and niece. In 1856, after five years of work, Flaubert published his masterpiece, Madame Bovary, in a Paris journal. Portraying the frustrations and love affairs of a romantic young woman married to a dull provincial doctor, the novel is	written in a superbly controlled style. The book resulted in his being prosecuted on moral grounds, but he won the case. This was followed by Salammbô (1863), a meticulously documented novel of ancient Carthage; a revision of an earlier novel, L’Éducation sentimentale (1870); The Temptation of St. Anthony (1874); and Three Tales (1877), which contained the great short story “A Simple Heart.” After his death his unfinished satire Bouvard and Pécuchet was published (1881). His correspondence, including that with George Sand and the letters to his niece Caroline, appeared in nine volumes (1926–33). (from: www.bartleby.com)
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ON FLAUBERT'S BOOKSHELF The Red and the Black Stendhal, 1830 The rise and fall of Julian Sorel. Born into peasantry, he connives his way into aristocratic circles, but his powers of seduction lead to his downfall when he commits a crime of passion. Don Quixote Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, 1605 / 1615 A comic study of delusion and its consequences; Don Quixote, the old gentleman of La Mancha, takes to the road in search of adventure and remains undaunted in the face of repeated disaster. Les misérables Victor Hugo, 1862 France in the first quarter of the 19th century: Jean Valjean, a poor man, steals a loaf of bread and then spends years trying to escape his reputation as a criminal. In later years he rises to become a respectable member of society; but policeman Javert will not allow him to forget his past. The Count of Monte Cristo Alexandre Dumas-père, 1845 Edmund Dantes, unjustly convicted of aiding the exiled Napoleon, escapes after fourteen years of imprisonment and seeks revenge in Paris. 'La Comédie Humaine' Honoré de Balzac, 1830-1850 Multi-volume collection of interlinked novels and stories (nearly 100!) depicting French society in the period of the Restoration and the July Monarchy 1815-1848. Atala / René Chateaubriand, 1801 / 1805 Two tales: 'Atala' (a Christian girl takes a vow to remain a virgin, but falls in love with a Natchez Indian) and 'René' (a young woman enters a convent rather than surrender to her passion for her brother).	BOOKS BY GUSTAVE FLAUBERT: Madame Bovary: Patterns of Provincial Life 1857 Emma Bovary, a young country doctor' s wife, seeks escape from the boredom of her existence in love affairs and romantic yearnings, but is doomed to disillusionment.	WHAT TO READ AFTER MADAME BOVARY? ADULTERY, PAST AND PRESENT Anna Karenina Leo N. Tolstoy, 1877 Anna Karenina abandons her empty existence as a society wife and embarks on a doomed love affair with the passionate but emotionally bankrupt Vronsky. The Deeps of Deliverance Frederik van Eeden, 1900 A woman who gives up a life of affluence to be with an artist is increasingly plagued by psychoses. Effi Briest Theodor Fontane, 1895 The story of a woman's adultery. The story of Effi and the Chinaman's ghost, the forest and dunes that are its setting, the stern Prussian code that makes the climax both terrible and absurd, are unique to Fontane and to German literature. A Handful of Dust Evelyn Waugh, 1934 After seven years of marriage, the Lady Brenda Last is bored with country life at Hetton Abbey. She drifts into an affair with shallow young socialite, John Beaver, and forsakes her unsuspecting husband as she becomes involved with the glamorous Belgravia set. Roger's Version John Updike, 1986 Divinity professor Roger Lambert is visited by Dale Kohler, an earnest young student who wants a grant to prove the existence of God by computer. The visit disrupts Roger's ordinary existence, bringing him into contact with the wild and sexy Verna (his half-sister's daughter), and leading to his wife's affair with Dale. [De buitenvrouw] Joost Zwagerman, 1994 Multicultural adultery in a Northern-Dutch suburb. FOR THE LOVE OF BOVARY The Perpetual Orgy: Flaubert and Madame Bovary Mario Vargas Llosa, 1975 Deeply passionate and personal examination of Flaubert and his famous heroine, by the noted Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa. [Het zwart uit de mond van Madame Bovary] Willem Brakman, 1974 Man obsessed by Bovary. Flaubert's Parrot Julian Barnes, 1984 A retired English doctor, in solitary widowhood, makes a pilgrimage through the life and art of Gustave Flaubert, whose work he has always venerated. As he meditates on his passion, he reveals as much about himself as he uncovers about Flaubert. MADAME BOVARY'S INFLUENCE The Awakening Kate Chopin, 1899 Edna Pontellier, a young married woman with two small children gradually awakens - to her individuality and sexuality, and experiences love outside of her passionless marriage. 'In Search of Lost Time' Marcel Proust, 1913-1927 Marcel Proust's famous seven-part cycle. See also: Swann's Way, Within a Budding Grove, Guermantes Way, Sodom and Gomorrah, Captive, Fugitive, and Time Regained. Mademoiselle Fifi and Other Stories Guy de Maupassant, 1887-1891 Twenty stories: Shepherd's Leap; Mademoiselle Fifi; Call It Madness?; Two Friends; At Sea; The Tribulations of Walter Schnaffs; Miss Harriet; A Duel; A Vendetta; The Model; Mother Savage; The Little Keg; The Dowry; The Bequest; Monsieur Parent; This Business of Latin; Madame Husson's May King; Hautot and Son; The Grove of Olives; Who Can Tell? Cousin Basilio José Maria Eça de Queirós, 1878 A Flaubertian study of a middle-class Lisbon family. The novel has been praised for its female characters: the romantic and sensual (and happily married) Luiza, who falls in love with her cousin Basilio; and Luiza's servant, Juliana, embittered and virginal, who scorns her.
	Salammbo 1862 Carthaginian mercenaries revolt after the First Punic War with Rome, led by Matho, a Libyan involved with Salammbo, priestess in the temple of the Goddess Tanit.
	Sentimental Education 1869 This novel begins with the hero - Frederic Moreau - leaving Paris and returning to the provinces and his mother. Part love story, part historical novel and satire it tells of how Moreau is driven by passion for an unattainable older woman.
	Bouvard et Pécuchet 1913 (posthumous) Two retired clerks set out in a search for truth and knowledge with persistent optimism, in light of the fact that each new attempt at learning about the world ends in disaster.
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