1. How successful do you consider Flaubert in writing "Madame Bovary" as "a book about nothing"?
Discuss
what "a book about nothing" means. What are the major events in the novel? Are there any 'events' that
have a fundamental impact on the development of the story? Things do actually happen, and there
is a 'real life' source for Emma Bovary. Is a "book about nothing" the same as a book in which nothing
happens?
Compare the novel to the Romantic literature which Emma enjoyed reading, which is packed
full of events. Would Emma's understanding of "nothing" be the same as Charles's?
If this is a book in
which very little happens, how does Flaubert retain our interest? Is his style successful in creating an
entertaining read out of a featureless plot? What are the key features of this style and how do they
differ from his contemporaries (use of narrative perspective, realist detail, anticlimax, neo-poetic form).
Do
you consider Flaubert's supposed intention to be oxymoronic? If yes, does that doom Flaubert's project
to failure? If not, why not?
2. "Flaubert could not prevent himself injecting virile blood into his creation's
veins and Madame Bovary remained a man" (Baudelaire). Is this a fair assessment of Flaubert's depiction
of gender in the novel?
Flaubert famously wrote that "Madame Bovary, c'est moi". Is Madame Bovary
the character inseparable from Flaubert the man and author? Can men write effectively about female
experience? (see also other nineteenth century novelists e.g. Stendhal or Tolstoy) What does Baudelaire
mean by this quotation and where does his idea of virility come from? Discuss how Emma differs from
other women in the book. Discuss the nature of gender and the position of women in nineteenth century
France. Show how these exacerbate Emma's feelings of entrapment. Note Baudelaire's own misogyny.
Emma is a victim of society and of her own character rather than of any one man: is this more often a
characteristic of male heroes? How might she have been more 'feminine'? Ultimately this question is
one of plausibility: is Emma a convincing heroine? If not, why not and if so, how does Flaubert generate
this impression (use of style indirect libre, dialogue, attention to realist detail etc.)?