|
Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert ( , , ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. Highly influential, he has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flaubert, realism strives for formal perfection, so the presentation of reality tends to be neutral, emphasizing the values and importance of style as an objective method of presenting reality". He is known especially for his debut novel ''Madame Bovary'' (1857), his ''Correspondence'', and his scrupulous devotion to his style and aesthetics. The celebrated short story writer Guy de Maupassant was a protégé of Flaubert. Life Early life and education Flaubert was born in Rouen, in the Seine-Maritime department of Upper Normandy, in northern France. He was the second son of Anne Justine Caroline (née Fleuriot; 1793–1872) and Achille-Cléophas Flaubert (1784–1846), director and senior surgeon of the major hospital in Rouen. He began writi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flaubert's Letters
The letters of Gustave Flaubert (French: ''la correspondance de Flaubert''), the 19th-century French novelist, range in date from 1829, when he was 7 or 8 years old, to a day or two before his death in 1880. They are considered one of the finest bodies of letters in French literature, admired even by many who are critical of Flaubert's novels. His main correspondents include family members, business associates and fellow-writers such as Théophile Gautier, the Goncourt brothers, Guy de Maupassant, Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve, George Sand, Ivan Turgenev and Émile Zola. They provide a valuable glimpse of his methods of work and his literary philosophy, as well as documenting his social life, political opinions, and increasing disgust with bourgeois society. Correspondents 4481 letters by Flaubert survive, a number which would have been considerably higher but for a series of burnings of his letters to his friends. Many of those addressed to Maxime Du Camp, Guy de Maupassant ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Madame Bovary
''Madame Bovary'' (; ), originally published as ''Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners'' ( ), is a novel by France, French writer Gustave Flaubert, published in 1856. The eponymous character lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life. When the novel was first serialized in ''Revue de Paris'' between 1 October 1856 and 15 December 1856, public prosecutors attacked the novel for obscenity. The resulting trial in January 1857 made the story notorious. After Flaubert's acquittal on 7 February 1857, ''Madame Bovary'' became a bestseller in April 1857 when it was published in two volumes. A seminal work of literary realism, the novel is now considered Flaubert's masterpiece, and one of the most influential literary works in history. Plot synopsis ''Madame Bovary'' takes place in provincial Northern France, near the town of Rouen in Normandy. Charles Bovary is a shy, oddly dressed teenager arriving at a new school where his new classmates ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Salammbô
''Salammbô'' (1862) is a historical novel by Gustave Flaubert. It is set in Carthage immediately before and during the Mercenary Revolt (241–237 BCE). Flaubert's principal source was Book I of the '' Histories'', written by the Greek historian Polybius. The novel was enormously popular when first published and jumpstarted a renewed interest in the history of the Roman Republic's conflict with the North African Phoenician outpost of Carthage. Genesis After the legal troubles that followed the publication of ''Madame Bovary'', when he was tried and acquitted on charges of "immorality", Flaubert sought a less controversial subject for his next novel. In 1857, Flaubert decided to conduct research in Carthage, writing in March to Félicien de Saulcy, a French archeologist about his plans. In a letter to Madame de Chantepie dated 23 January 1858, he described his anticipation: "I absolutely have to go to Africa. This is why, around the end of March, I will go back to the co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sentimental Education
''Sentimental Education'' (French: ''L'Éducation sentimentale'', 1869) is a novel by Gustave Flaubert. Considered one of the most influential novels of the 19th century, it was praised by contemporaries such as George Sand and Émile Zola, but criticised by Henry James. The story focuses on the romantic life of a young man at the time of the French Revolution of 1848. The novel describes the life of a young man (Frédéric Moreau) living through the revolution of 1848 and the founding of the Second French Empire, and his love for an older woman (based on the wife of the music publisher Maurice Schlesinger, who is portrayed in the book as Jacques Arnoux). The novel's tone is by turns ironic and pessimistic; it occasionally lampoons French society. The main character, Frédéric, often gives himself over to romantic flights of fancy. Background Flaubert based many of the protagonist's experiences (including the romantic passion) on his own life. He wrote of the work in 1864: "I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bouvard Et Pécuchet
''Bouvard et Pécuchet'' is an unfinished satirical novel by Gustave Flaubert, published in 1881 after his death in 1880. Background Although it was conceived in 1863 as ''Les Deux Cloportes'' ("The Two Woodlice"), and partially inspired by a short story of Barthélemy Maurice (''Les Deux Greffiers'', "The Two Court Clerks", which appeared in ''La Revue des Tribunaux'' in 1841 and which he may have read in 1858), Flaubert did not begin the work in earnest until 1872, at a time when financial ruin threatened. Over time, the book obsessed him to the degree that he claimed to have read over 1500 books in preparation for writing it—he intended it to be his masterpiece, surpassing all of his other works. He only took a minor break, in order to compose '' Three Tales'' in 1875–76. It received lukewarm reviews: critics failed to appreciate both its message and its structural devices. Plot summary ''Bouvard et Pécuchet'' details the adventures of two Parisian copy-clerks, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Three Tales (Flaubert)
''Three Tales'' (french: Trois contes) is a work by Gustave Flaubert that was originally published in French in 1877. It consists of the short stories: "A Simple Heart", "Saint Julian the Hospitalier", and "Hérodias". "A Simple Heart" "A Simple Heart", or in French, is a story about a servant girl named Felicité. After her one and only love Théodore purportedly marries a well-to-do woman to avoid conscription, Felicité quits the farm where she works and heads for Pont-l'Évêque, Calvados, Pont-l'Évèque, where she picks up work in a widow's house as a servant. She is very loyal and easily lends her affections to the two children of her mistress, Mme Aubain. She gives entirely to others; although many take advantage of her, she is unaffected. She has no husband, no children, and no property, and is reliant on her mistress to keep her; she is uneducated; her death is virtually unnoticed. Despite her life being seemingly pointless, she has within her the power to love, whic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Temptation Of Saint Anthony (novel)
''The Temptation of Saint Anthony'' (French ''La Tentation de Saint Antoine'') is a dramatic poem in prose (often referred as a novel) by the French author Gustave Flaubert published in 1874. Flaubert spent his whole adult life working fitfully on the book. Origin In 1845, at age 24, Flaubert visited the Balbi Palace in Genoa, and was inspired by a painting of the same title, then attributed to Bruegel the Elder (now thought to be by one of his followers). Flaubert worked at the subject in three versions, completed in 1849, 1856 (with extracts published at that time) and 1872, before publishing the final version in 1874. It takes as its subject the famous temptation faced by Saint Anthony the Great, in the Egyptian desert, a theme often repeated in medieval and modern art. It is written in the form of a play script, detailing one night in the life of Anthony the Great, during which he is faced with great temptations. The work was illustrated by the French painter Odilon Re ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guy De Maupassant
Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant (, ; ; 5 August 1850 – 6 July 1893) was a 19th-century French author, remembered as a master of the short story form, as well as a representative of the Naturalist school, who depicted human lives, destinies and social forces in disillusioned and often pessimistic terms. Maupassant was a protégé of Gustave Flaubert and his stories are characterized by economy of style and efficient, seemingly effortless ''dénouements''. Many are set during the Franco-Prussian War of the 1870s, describing the futility of war and the innocent civilians who, caught up in events beyond their control, are permanently changed by their experiences. He wrote 300 short stories, six novels, three travel books, and one volume of verse. His first published story, " Boule de Suif" ("The Dumpling", 1880), is often considered his most famous work. Biography Henri-René-Albert-Guy de Maupassant, born on 5 August 1850 at the late 16th-century Château de Miromes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Louise Colet
Louise Colet (15 August 1810 – 9 March 1876), born Louise Revoil de Servannes, was a French poet and writer. Life and works She was born at the hôtel d'Antoine ( fr) in Aix-en-Provence in France. In her twenties she married Hippolyte Colet, an academic musician, partly in order to escape provincial life and live in Paris. Upon arrival in Paris, Colet began to submit her work for approval and publication and soon won a two-thousand-franc prize from the Académie française, the first of four prizes won from the Académie. At her salon participated many of her contemporaries in the Parisian literary community, such as Victor Hugo. In 1840, she gave birth to her daughter Henriette, but neither her husband nor her lover, Victor Cousin, would acknowledge paternity. Later she became thparamourof Gustave Flaubert, Alfred de Musset, and Abel Villemain. After her husband died, Colet supported herself and her daughter with her writing. Her brother was the painter Pierre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rouen
Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine in northern France. It is the prefecture of the Regions of France, region of Normandy (administrative region), Normandy and the Departments of France, department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one of the largest and most prosperous cities of Middle Ages, medieval Europe, the population of the metropolitan area (french: functional area (France), aire d'attraction) is 702,945 (2018). People from Rouen are known as ''Rouennais''. Rouen was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy during the Middle Ages. It was one of the capitals of the Anglo-Normans, Anglo-Norman dynasties, which ruled both England and large parts of modern France from the 11th to the 15th centuries. From the 13th century onwards, the city experienced a remarkable economic boom, thanks in particular to the development of textile factories and river trade. Claimed by both the French and the English during the Hundred Years' War, it was on its soil that Joan of Arc was tried ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the greatest French writers of all time. His most famous works are the novels ''The Hunchback of Notre-Dame'' (1831) and ''Les Misérables'' (1862). In France, Hugo is renowned for his poetry collections, such as (''The Contemplations'') and (''The Legend of the Ages''). Hugo was at the forefront of the Romanticism, Romantic literary movement with his play ''Cromwell (play), Cromwell'' and drama ''Hernani (drama), Hernani''. Many of his works have inspired music, both during his lifetime and after his death, including the opera ''Rigoletto'' and the musicals ''Les Misérables (musical), Les Misérables'' and ''Notre-Dame de Paris (musical), Notre-Dame de Paris''. He produced more than 4,000 drawings in his lifetime, and campaigned for social cau ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Literary Realism
Literary realism is a literary genre, part of the broader realism in arts, that attempts to represent subject-matter truthfully, avoiding speculative fiction and supernatural elements. It originated with the realist art movement that began with mid- nineteenth-century French literature (Stendhal) and Russian literature (Alexander Pushkin). Literary realism attempts to represent familiar things as they are. Realist authors chose to depict everyday and banal activities and experiences. Background Broadly defined as "the representation of reality", realism in the arts is the attempt to represent subject matter truthfully, without artificiality and avoiding artistic conventions, as well as implausible, exotic and supernatural elements. Realism has been prevalent in the arts at many periods, and is in large part a matter of technique and training, and the avoidance of stylization. In the visual arts, illusionistic realism is the accurate depiction of lifeforms, perspective, and the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
