Realism vs Romanticism in Madam Bovary - Essay Example

Realism vs Romanticism in Madam Bovary Gustave Flaubert was one of the most prominent novelists of Realist period. His most famous work Madam Bovary was a theme of severe criticism because of its profound use of romantic elements well contrasted with the present day realities. Madame Bovary is the presentation of realities in the mood of romanticism which affected the life of Emma Bovary the heroine of the novel. The pessimistic view about life generally developed by the writer influenced the characterization and setting of the novel. The essay is an attempt to draw the correlation between the factual experience in the life and the quixotic feeling of mind. . The chief exemplar of realism is Flaubert. His predecessors are the romantic realists like Stendhal, Balzac Merimas. His successors are most of the writers of fiction down to our times. The mood of the second empire was propitious to realism, under which it took shape. Literature is the representation of life, sometimes it is protest against life. Realistic portraits are often far from flattering. Madam Bovary which was realistically presented was denounced by the second empire. According to them Flaubert’s works was negation of these qualities The novel focuses on the conflicts of individual life through which the writer delineates the inconsistent world of 19th century; science vs religion, men and women involved in changing their roles in the society. Parents and children find difficult to tolerate each other. Marriage commitment or relationships in the family ties are weak. The people struggle because of the space between urban and rural life. Flaubert tried to presents these contrasts through the banal story of a woman in the banal situations of life. The ways the writer treat the characters bring out the greatness of the writer. The symbols used in the novel are the powerful expressions of realties, the wedding bouquet , Rudolph’s box of romantic souvenir’s , the operation of Hippolyte, Homaise winning of the Legion of Honor at the end of the novel etc are very careful preparations apt for the situations in the life of characters. What the characters do and say in relation to these objects and events reveal a great deal about the characters and also underline the author’s idea about life. The real feel in the mind of Emma about marriage is very forcefully brought out trough the firing of the bouquet. Thus the fight between romanticism and realism is well depicted in the novel through actions and diction. According to Perkins “Emma’s passionate nature and her vivid imagination combine with the social forces of her age to determine her fate”( Perkins) In Flaubert’s character existed two opposing tendencies. Being excessively emotional, his natural inclination was towards wild lyrics imaginings or romanticism. But he also processed a profound pessimistic scorn of humanity which made him mock all human folly especially his own impulses According to him the world was God’s joke and Flaubert tried to see the world from God’s point of view-which was one of amused contempt. However the inward conflict between poetic fancy and mockery produced one of the world’s great masterpieces, Madam Bovary. Flaubert’s sentimental heroine is a pitiful creature who dreams futilely of escaping from the life that has become a prison to her. She as a romantic thirst for the fulfillment of ill-defined urges. The only important question in her life id to know what ‘bliss’ , ‘passion’, and ‘ecstasy’ mean and it is inconceivable to her that any experience imperfectly formulated could bring happiness, could even be worth living. Thus she herself is the biggest insult to Romanticism. While many heroines of that time were happy with their own status, she strongly feels that she is lower in her status for example when she participates in the ball. The Marquis and his wife welcome the couple. The iced champagne and pomegranates are new to Emma. Emma dresses with meticulous care for the ball. Charles becomes repulsive to her beside the gallant nobleman who dances the quadrille. She crushed Charles desire to dance and she dances with a viscount. Emma stays awake the whole night in order to prolong the illusion of luxurious life. The journey to La Vaubyessard had opened up a yawning fissure in Emma’s life”. The ball lends a touch of reality to her fictitious world. The party there is in striking contrast to the feast of the peasants. Thus this visit shatters Emma’s married life forever. It becomes a turning point, and in order to emulate that kind of life she plunges herself and her family deep into debts. She forsakes her pedestrian but devoted husband for sophisticated selfish lovers. Her relationships with them are insubstantial. They are cowardly and base and jilt her when they have had enough of her. One of Emma’s lovers, Rodolphe Boulanger, possesses a romantic spark. This character is realistically presented by Flaubert. He is a wealthy landowner who visited Charles. Emma suddenly falls victim to Rudolph’s wicked plans which succeeded. Emma thought of Rodolphe as a big and strong aristocrat who would save her from the humdrum life she lived with Charles. But for him she was a sexual pursuit. Fleming says that Emma “fantasizes her life with Rodolphe ( her first lover) in a haze of crags and fountains, fruit and fisherman worthy of the worst of Byron” (Fleming). He is presented as a true romanticist who enjoys the company of women. He received the love of many women. Emma’s proclamation proved no more successful and he had no longing to whip her away. Thus Rodolphe is presented as a womanizer. “A hundred times I was on the point of leaving, and yet I followed you and stayed with you….as I’d stay with you tonight, tomorrow, everyday, all life!...and …so that I will carry the memory of you with me ….Whereas you’ll forget me : I will vanish like a shadow”" (Flaubert, 175).But towards the end of the novel, when Emma is in need of money, she tracks him down. But for him the relation has already broken, but the beginning of a realization of his faults can be sensed. He slowly starts thinking of accepting her relationship. Thus the character is presented as romantic at the same time a realistic character. More than the usual conversations and actions the real life picture is drawn through character description. Catherine Leroux, who is awarded a prize “for fifty-four years of service on the same farm is invited to the stage to receive the prize. The writer says “Her thin face, framed in a simple coif, was more wrinkled than a withered russet, and out of the sleeves of her red louse hung her large gnarled hands. Years of barn dust, washing soda and wool grease had left them so crusted and rough and hard that they looked dirty….”( Flaubert 176). Catherine is highly realistic when compared with Emma. Her fancy was for the good of the farm. She fully switched from an emotional life to that of robotic mind, “pale stare softened by no hint of sadness or human kindness” (Flaubert 17). When she receives the medal se reacts to it differently, “I will give it to our priest and he will say some Masses for me “. She finds it totally meaningless to be awarded for what she was doing for living and eating. The portrayal of Leroux is perfect example of realistic approach to life. Leon Dupis is another example of romanticism portrayed by Flaubert. He first appears in second chapter of part 2. When they meet at the dinner with Homais , Leon and Emma strike a conversation. Emma is able to converse freely with him and she discovers similarity of books and music. They speak of lofty subjects, Paris Theatre, high society, mountain scenery and sunsets. Leon seeks the romantic life, full of adventure. They quickly establish a powerful relationship that could easily become more passionate, but Emma pushes him away and finally leaves for Paris to pursue his career. But later in the novel Emma pay a visit to him and starts a firm affair, but Leons superiors at work never approve this. This relation was also based on simple romantic visions, but later they both realize their stands and try to withdraw from this. Here Leon seems to be more realistic in nature. He knows that he has a bright future in his career. When Emma asks him to pawn some of her silverware, he began to question her actions. Leon , recognizing his stand more firm than Emma, and also tired of constant sadness and suffering slowly moves away from her. Even the sexual relation is also boring for him. When Emma seek his help to for money and even ask him to steal money from is office, he tell a lie and escape from her forever. Leon’s romantic way of thinking originally came from the boredom with Yonville where he lived. But he escaped from the tangles of the mind dreaming about a new realistic life with a nice wife, good job etc. Thus Leon also is different from Emma, who always plunged herself into the romantic way of thinking. The final greatness of Flaubert’s realism lies in the manner in which he is able to capture the dullness of the middle-class people. Flaubert’s observation was so keen that he depicted the average life very close to the reality and also in an artistic sense. His intension was so clear that the contrasts between the characters were so obvious that the common readers were also able to recognize the conflicts and the real nature of the characters. In this way the handling of Homais is a masterful stroke of realistic description. Homais was the owner of the pharmacy in Yonville . He loves his own sound and goes on talking about various subjects he knows. Before the arrival of Charles, he acts as the town doctor. The prescriptions were given according to what he has there as the collection. He always prefers recognition and glory. He pushes Charles for an experimental surgery for club-foot, but ends up in failure that the boy loses his leg. A speaker in clichés and the processor of ‘scientific outlook’ on society he regards himself as a modern man and thinker. He is a quack who seeks to rise by bringing qualified persons to grief. His pomposity and superficial ideals become one of the remarkable facets of the novel- his hypocrisy and mediocrity are well brought out. Homaise is the realistic creation of Flaubert. His arrogant attitude and ideas create a menacing appearance, but actually is actions and words are evidences that he is a harmless person. But he usually argued with persons even the subjects which he has very less knowledge. Once he argued with a priest over the issues of science and God. At the end we see Homaise awarded the cross of Legion honor, a prestigious award. Another character portrayed by Flaubert is Charles Bovary, a villain in the romantic life of Emma. Charles is portrayed as Flaubert himself. Flaubert being born in a family of doctors, had access to different medical books and he had knowledge about several medicines which helped him to use this in his own works. The life in Rouen also depicted very realistically because of his knowledge about that area. Charles was a simple minded man. It is true that he loved Emma heartily, but not the type of romantic love that is expected by Emma. Emma often spurned for his expressions of love. But that was outstanding and pure. But this simple mindedness placed him as the villain of the novel, since e fails to provide what Emma wants or who Emma wishes to be. The satisfaction of married life which she expects is unrealistic that she long for a love she lulls in her mind. This intense feeling creates the Emma whom we see throughout the novel. Her affections with people like Rodolphe who was rich and Leon who has rich language was enough to please a lady like Emma. The description of Emma’s death is a masterpiece of Flaubert’s realism. Flaubert himself said that when he wrote about Madame Bovary’s poisoning e could fell the taste of arsenic in is mouth and experienced the same nausea. What makes the climax in this tragedy so dramatic is the earlier spectacle of Emma going round and round in an ever narrowing circle as Leureux and his bankers and bailiffs close in on her. There is something implausibly morbid in the timely appearance of the blind man, to whose infernal wretchedness Emma had once given all her money. There are touches of upsetting sentimentality as Emma weeps over her reflection in the mirror. Charles is a great failure in his life. He fails to recognize luxurious life his wife her ties and relations, her debts etc until her death. He identifies the passion in her mind only after her death. As to compensate for the loses he starts buying luxury items and also spend money extravagantly which throw him again to plunge into debts. This continues till is death, and only death save him from the liabilities. Thus Flaubert portrayed a simple ordinary life very close to the realistic approach. He was a good man fit for all woman of the time except for Emma. The two characters represent realism and romanticism in the true sense. The extreme ends of both meet in these characters. Emma is a victim of her own naiveté and inexperience. Fleming says She is “seduced by time” ( Fleming). There for she plays into the hands of others. She is tricked by her enemies and let down by her friends. He husband fails her because he cannot understand her romantic ‘élans’; the priest also, because her emotional religion is beyond his comprehension. Her lovers take fight and walk out on her. Her extravagance makes her a toy in the hands of the men and her signature too the bills bring ruin to her husband and herself. Though Emma is an adulterous se is not really promiscuous. It is her romantic nature which leads her to affairs. ; She recoils from the solicitor’s advance, though giving in would have saved her from disaster. She has periodic pangs of consciousness, when she seeks recourse in religion and visions of sainthood. At times she feels guilty about having neglected her child Berth and goes all out to be a perfect mother for her. By the end of the novel both Emma and Charles are dead, their lives spoiled, but the other two characters experienced more success and happiness in their lives. Leon got married to a decent woman and began a life of maturity, while Homais, through his strategies. Both these characters are proof that romanticism can end and facts and truth can be realized. The romantic thoughts and actions are limitations of youth. When we attain maturity through harsh realities of life, we will become more realistic and significant. Thus they became mature and responsible in their way of thinking and action. Homais vision was very realistic and found ways to guide them properly. Thus he becomes what he wishes or dream. Flaubert portrayed the characters as representatives of romanticism and realism. He made some of his characters excessive with emotions and some highly realistic with the harsh difficulties of life. Flaubert’s realism follows the method of rigorous observation of human behavior against the physical background of contemporary life and its form is artistic. It is perfection of style that has enabled to effect the aesthetic transformation of mundane and vulgar reality. Saint- Beauve remarks of him “One precious quality which distinguishes Flaubert from other realists …he has style”. Thus Flaubert is not only commenting on the themes of an individual’s inability to accept reality and society’s stratification of people into groups or hierarchies based on ideologies or social status, he is delineating the emphasis of reading too much romantic literature. Flaubert’s words action and even thought pattern reflects Flaubert’s attack on unrealistic behavior. Thus he is aggressive towards the excessive idealism and individualism of Romanticism which will affect the ordinary mind of a common reader. He successfully presented the emotional approach to life against the realistic approach by analyzing the situations. The novel is a satire in the sense that it mocks at the one sided views of life, because to Flaubert life is a complex phenomenon. In Flaubert’s character existed two opposing tendencies. Being excessively emotional, his natural inclination was towards wild lyrics imaginings or- Romanticism. But he also processed a profound pessimistic scorn of humanity which made him mock all human folly especially his own impulses. According to him the world was God’s joke which was one of amused contempt. However, the inward conflict between poetic fancy and mockery produced one of the world’s masterpieces. Work cited Flaubert, Gustave. Madame Bovary. Translated by Lydia Davis. New York: Penguin Classics Deluxe edition. 2011 print [ISBN: 978-0143106494 Haynes, Christine. “The politics of publishing during the second Empire: The trial of Madame Bovary Revisited.” French politics, Culture and Society 23.2 (2005) Perkins, Wendy. “Critical Essay on Madame Bovary.” Novels for Students. Ed. Jennifer Smith. Vol. 14. Detroit: Gale, 2002. Literature Resource Center. Web. 27 Nov. 2012. Fleming , Bruce E. “ An Essay in Seduction ; or The trouble with Bovary” Emma Bovary , Ed Harold Bloom New York 1994. Fleming also claims that Bovary is “seduced by time” and, like all Romantics, she “is taken by the Age of Chivalry; she dreams of her own childhood, or she dreams of the future with Rodolphe, of a second ball, of something, anything, that is to happen” (Fleming). . Read More