Madame Bovary
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3.9 • 314 Ratings
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Publisher Description
The story focuses on a doctor's wife, Emma Bovary, who has adulterous affairs and lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life. Though the basic plot is rather simple, even archetypal, the novel's true art lies in its details and hidden patterns. Flaubert was a notorious perfectionist and claimed always to be searching for le mot juste.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Glenda Jackson hits the mark in this superb narration of Flaubert's classic novel. Her reading perfectly captures the restlessness of Emma Bovary, a character perpetually dissatisfied with her solid, steady husband and bourgeois life in provincial 19th-century France. Emma's unrealistic dreams (she yearns for a perfect, romantic love that will sweep her away into perpetual bliss) lead her into one affair after another, and then to financial ruin and suicide. Jackson is especially outstanding in the scene which takes place the night before Emma plans to run off with her lover, Rudolf. To Rudolf, Emma is just one in a long series of conquests, and he gets cold feet at the thought of being permanently responsible for her welfare and that of her child. In a swoony, sighing voice full of noble suffering, Jackson reads his flowery letter of tears and regret, saying he loves her too much to ruin her life and her reputation. Then, without missing a beat, she switches to smug, cynical satisfaction, as Rudolf admires the letter and congratulates himself on his close escape.
Customer Reviews
Hard to interpret
I don’t think I really understood the Novel unitl part 3, and it broke my heart.
Flaubert once said “Je suis Madame Bovary”. I still don’t understand why this is so. The book is so tragic, it makes you take a close look at the world around you. Definitly worth the read if you can get to part 3.
Madame Bovary ruined everyone
It starts with Charles Bovary but he soon is married to widow he doesn't love but had money his mother thought. Soon the widow dies and the first Madame Bovary was not as wealthy as he thought. Charles encounters his true love, Emma. Emma is happy to get away from her dull life with her dad and marries Charles, not for love.
This union soon has Charles in love with Emma and Emma not so much.
Emma has several affairs, Charles is gone all day he is a doctor. So Emma is left alone to spend money on clothes and furnishings. Between affairs and bills she gets in over head.
Love it
Very interesting. I love it