In 1851, Flaubert began to work Madame Bovary, the year he was thirty years old and had not published anything before.
At the time of romanticism, Flaubert did not intend to write romantic stories, he wanted to write a very "realistic" book.
After much deliberation, he intended to write a group of vulgar characters, namely Doctor Bovary, Madame Bovary, Leon, Madame Bovary the Elder, and so on.
After several years of painstaking work, the book Madame Bovary was finally completed.
At the end of the writing, Mrs. Bovary, who has cheated one after another, because of her long-term extravagant life, owes debts that cannot be repaid, receives a summons from the court, and she has to go to find the former lovers who are like glue, and even intends to "sell" her body and let the lovers help her pay off the debt, but when she hears that she borrows money, no one is willing to help her.
Desperate, Madame Bovary committed suicide by taking poison.
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After Madame Bovary dies in the novel, Flaubert sits at the door of the house, crying like a child, and when a friend asks him why he is crying, he says that Madame Bovary is dead.
The friend asked, "Who is Madame Bovary?" ”
He said, "It's a character in my new novel. ”
A friend told him, "You're the author, you can't let her die."
Flaubert said, "No, she had to die."
In 1857, after repeated revisions, the novel was published, but after its publication, Flaubert and the publisher were also prosecuted for the immorality of Madame Bovary, which contained sexual and loving depictions, and the prosecutor also read out some of the more pornographic chapters.
Finally, the defense counsel said: "These plots are necessary for the novel, and the general moral tendencies of the novel are still good, although Madame Bovary's behavior is more debauched, but she finally gets the punishment she deserves." ”
The judge adopted the opinion of the defense lawyer and finally acquitted Flaubert and others.
Madame Bovary is indeed a secular and moral "bad woman", she longs for romantic love, yearns to feel that her husband is ordinary and boring, so after marriage, frequently cheats; she was born ordinary, but longed for a luxurious and unrestrained life, and finally over-consumed, owed unfinished debts, and had to choose suicide.
But Flaubert declared on many occasions, "Madame Bovary, that is me.".
For Madame Bovary, Flaubert did not condemn, he went to explore the causes of Madame Bovary's tragedy, for a book, or a person, if the reader pre-set the position of the commentary, then what he sees, is one-sided, will not understand the strength of the fate behind the characters.
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When Emma was 13 years old, she was sent to the monastery by her father to study.
Teach students to repent of their lives, and Emma always weaves more accusations when she repents, just so that she can stay longer.
While preaching, hearing about fiancés, husbands, heavenly lovers, and eternal marriages made her feel unexpectedly sweet in the depths of her soul.
She read those romantic novels and knew a lot of romantic things, she loved the church for the flowers of the church, she loved music for the romantic lyrics, she loved literature for the stimulation of literary enthusiasm, and the more so, the more she hated the precepts of the church.
The education of the church did not make Emma pure, but made Emma have more expectations for feelings, and by the time she left the church, romance and passion were already rooted in her heart.
Once, Emma's father was injured in the leg and was lying in bed unable to move, so he found the doctor Bovary, and Emma saw Bovary for the first time.
After a long time of bereavement, Dr. Bovary fell in love with the young and beautiful Emma.
The appearance of Bovary made Emma feel that the kind of love like "lightning and thunder" came, but after marriage, life was so bland, bovary although he gave his whole heart to Emma, although he gave all his love to Emma, he was also obedient to Emma, but he was so boring, there was no trick to come and go, and there was no romance that Emma wanted.
What about life?
Although ordinary, I have never seen the luxurious Emma, but I don't feel anything.
At the Marquis's Ball, Emma saw the most extravagant life of high society, their dwellings so elaborate, everything was the best, she saw a lot of things she hadn't seen before, she ate a lot of things she hadn't eaten before.
Emma's heart, once cultivated by wealth, is no longer ordinary.
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When she thought about the rich life she had experienced, the real ordinary days, she couldn't stand it anymore.
Emma became more and more critical, her temper grew, and she thought that she was no inferior to the noble ladies who enjoyed the riches every day, that she was even better in shape than them, and that she behaved more gracefully than them, so why should she live such an unbearable life?
She was constantly complaining and capricious.
What she wants in her heart is exactly that kind of life!
After Emma became pregnant, they moved, Bovary loved him more and more, and after the birth of the child, Emma met Leon again.
The husband was not rich and bored, he never read literature, but Leon was versatile, he could paint watercolors, he could read sheet music, and he would concentrate on reading literature after dinner.
In this contrast, Emma felt that Leon was good everywhere, and her husband was unbearable everywhere.
Therefore, the two secretly communicated with each other and secretly had feelings.
But at this time, Leon suddenly left, and Emma cursed herself, why did she dare not love Leon, how much she longed for Leon.
Leon is gone, she is back in her old life, and the unbearable days begin again, until the mercurial and rich-hearted Rodolfo appears.
When he saw the Bovarys, Rodolfo thought:
She must have been tired of him long ago, and with just three love words, she would obey. But after the fact, how to get rid of her?
He thought so, and did so, and he went until, dealing with a woman like Emma, to talk to her about dreams, to make her feel that there was nothing in her life, he used clever words, Emma was partial to this set.
Emma was hooked, and the two were inseparable.
Emma, nourished by love, began to come alive again. She went out of her way to say to herself, "I have a lover!" A lover! ”
They find ways to meet, and Emma enjoys the sweetness of love while lying to her husband.
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Emma threw herself into her relationship with Rodolph, but Rodolph was a prodigal son of love, and before he could start, he had already figured out how to get rid of Emma, and after getting tired, he wrote Emma a long breakup letter that left plenty of room, and then left.
After Rodolfo left, Emma became depressed and eventually fell seriously ill.
Outside of feelings, Emma, who will not make money, has become more and more luxurious in her life, she constantly buys things, the family is already in debt, and her husband is troubled by this.
But Emma seemed to feel that this was the life she should live, she was originally a peasant's daughter, but she wanted to live like a princess.
She didn't think there was anything wrong with such a life, obviously it was only 100 yuan, but she had to live a thousand yuan life.
Dr. Bovary loved his wife, and he couldn't bear to say anything about him, even trying to tease her when she was in a bad mood.
However, Bovary's approach, in Emma's eyes, is simply a bit "ridiculous".
At this time, Leon appeared again, and Emma fell again.
She finds all kinds of excuses to go out and meet Leon, they are like honeymoons, extremely romantic, Emma is absurd, spending more and more money, and more and more debts.
They make love in their hotel room, and Leon gets tired of Emma.
The debt she owed had no money to change, So Emma secretly mortgaged the property, and finally the property was not enough, and she began to pack up the inheritance left by Farley's father, and because this inheritance was protected by her mother, she encouraged Bovary to win it.
Bovary's mother, however, did not grant their request.
Despite the debt, Emma spent money, not only did not decrease, but more luxurious.
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Finally, one day, Emma was summoned by the court to forcibly auction the family property if she did not pay off her debt of 8,000 francs within 24 hours. Frightened, she borrowed money everywhere, but she could not borrow even a franc.
She asked her lover Leon to help, but When Leon heard about the loan, his legs went soft with fright.
She felt that the most beautiful feelings could not withstand the test of time and reality, surpassed the luxury of her own ability, and finally ushered in the evil consequences.
She went to Rodolfo again, and even planned to sell her "body", but upon hearing the loan, Rodolfo insisted that he had no money, although he had several manors and used the best things.
Emma was desperate.
She swallowed arsenic, and by this time, her husband, distraught because of his worries about her, ran everywhere she could possibly go in search of her.
By the time he got home, Emma was lying on the bed, and arsenic had begun to work.
As he wrote this, Flaubert convulsed and cried out in discomfort, feeling that he was "full of arsenic", as if he had been poisoned.
This experience of Flaubert is the so-called peak experience of artistic creation, in which the writer and the people in the work feel empathy and become one with each other.
When Lu Yao wrote "Ordinary World", Tian Xiaoxia died, Lu Yao cried like a child, and after Emma died, Flaubert also cried like a doll in his thirties.
After Emma's death, Dr. Bovary saw Emma's correspondence with her lover, and he also knew that Emma's lover, not only Leon, but also Rodolph.
By chance, Bovary and Rodolfo met in a narrow way, and the next moment both of them were pale, and Bovary looked at the face opposite, he really thought it was Rodolfo, at least this was what she had loved.
Finally, Bovary said, "I am not angry with you, yes, I am not angry with you, what is wrong is fate." ”
The day after seeing Rodolfo, Bovary died.
After his death, all the belongings were sold for only twelve francs, and the rest were sold out before, and their daughter, after the death of her grandmother, lived with her grandfather, but the grandfather was soon paralyzed in bed, unable to take care of the child, and the child was adopted by a distant aunt, and when he was eight or nine years old, he was sent to do child labor.
It was such a story of explicit cruelty that, when the book was published, caused a sensation, and Flaubert became one of the greatest Writers in France.
This book, in its later years, was also used as a model for realist literature.
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For Madame Bovary, Milan Kundera said: "It was not until the appearance of Flaubert's Madame Bovary that the achievements of the novel caught up with the achievements of poetry." ”
The earliest and most classic Homeric poem in Western literature is poetry, and the narrative tradition of Western literature is separated from poetry.
Thus, poetry has always occupied an important place, but Flaubert's Madame Bovary allowed the achievement of the novel to catch up with the achievement of poetry.
Flaubert himself, who wrote this book, advocated a point of view that "the novel should not carry the subjective evaluation of the author as much as possible, and the author should withdraw from the novel."
He wanted to reflect the real life of society through such a novel, so this book is also one of the most important masterpieces of realism.
Writer Su Tong spoke higher, saying: "In my opinion, 'Madame Bovary' is even a work beyond perfection, which can be said to be a classic in the classics of realist fiction. ”
Madame Bovary, that is, Emma romantic, vain, selfish, rebellious, not willing to be mediocre, she has the content of humanity that everyone has, which is very normal, but in Emma, these things are infinitely magnified, do not know any moderation, and finally evolved into Emma's "hateful".
Su Tong said: "Mr. Flaubert described that under the right social conditions, all the flowers of humanity are blooming freely, including the flowers of evil, and it can also bloom freely. Therefore, the most shocking thing about the image of Madame Bovary is that we see an ordinary tree of human nature, but this tree has an unusual flower of evil! ”
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But if you only blame Emma's tragedy on human nature, and do not delve into the soil that caused this evil of human nature, then Emma is a specimen nailed to the evil of human nature, but if you look a little more relaxed, look at emma's surrounding environment, look at the nineteenth century society, you know that what breeds these human evils in Emma is precisely society.
It can be said that all the evil and weakness of human nature are drawn from the environment in which she lives, Emma was born in a peasant family, but her father, from childhood, did not let her do anything, raised her as a "princess", sent Emma to the monastery for education, Emma did not touch life, first preset the appearance of life in her heart, preset a look for her own life, this look is not in line with reality.
But no one told her what life was like, of course, what life was like, it was not up to others to decide, but at this time, Emma had lost the ability to think, she was addicted to her own world, dreaming of a high life.
When they got married and became Madame Bovary, and her husband was obedient to her, Emma said that her husband would not object, even if it was her excessive consumption, causing them to be in debt, he did not say anything, for fear of upsetting Emma.
Such a person, living in such an environment, how can she not be tragic?
A sapling that has been pested and diseased cannot survive on its own, and no one else has helped, and the result of destruction is almost inevitable.
In nineteenth-century France, vanity prevailed, and people took good dress as the criterion for a good life, and this was the case in society as a whole, and some petty-bourgeois families, in order to maintain this decency, in order to maintain this vanity, went to great lengths and carried the burden forward.
In the context of the times, the individual is like a grain of sand in a river, and if it is not because he is strong enough, or lucky enough, he cannot dominate his own destiny.
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"Madame Bovary" is a microcosm of nineteenth-century France, "Steppenwolf" is a typical example of the twentieth century, and today, information spreads rapidly, and people can get a far more information than they can, but for those who are addicted to their own world, there is still no way.
Today, people have their own new background of the times, which is different from the nineteenth century, different from the twentieth century, different from any other era, this era, the content of human nature is as much as in the past, but the flower of human evil is not less than in the past.
Just like recently, the entertainment industry is in chaos, Wu Yifan's incident, Qian Feng's incident, one scandal after another has been exposed, this is not the evil flower that blooms in the content of human nature, but such a flower of evil, in what kind of soil to absorb nutrients, is the problem that people in this era should think about.
When a person reads a book, he should not forget after reading it, but should talk to himself through books, the times, and himself, leading to a better place, to a more beautiful place.
As Flaubert said, "Art is so vast that it is enough to occupy a lifetime."
We don't need to occupy our lives with art, but we need to live a little more beautifully, and life occasionally needs some sublime.
Wen | not interesting soul