''Three Tales'' (french: Trois contes) is a work by
Gustave 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 Flauber ...
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'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, which she does even when she does not receive it in return. She also carries within her a yearning, a majestic quasi-religious sensibility which finds its apotheosis in the deification, as she dies, of her pet parrot, who floats above her deathbed, masquerading as the
Holy Ghost
For the majority of Christian denominations, the Holy Spirit, or Holy Ghost, is believed to be the third person of the Trinity, a Triune God manifested as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, each entity itself being God.Gru ...
. She lives a simple, unexamined life.
Flaubert's challenge was to create the main protagonist as someone very different from the satirical characters appearing in his previous novels such as ''
Madame Bovary
''Madame Bovary'' (; ), originally published as ''Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners'' ( ), is a novel by French writer Gustave Flaubert, published in 1856. The eponymous character lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emp ...
''.
"The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitalier"
"The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitalier", in French, is a story about
Julian the Hospitaller
Julian the Hospitaller is a Roman Catholic saint, and the patron of the cities of Ghent and Macerata.
History
The earliest known reference to Julian dates to the late twelfth century.Order of Hospitallers, despite the similarity of the names.) He is predicted at birth to do great things. His father is told that he will marry into the family of a great emperor, while his mother is told that he will be a saint. They dote on him. After Julian kills a mouse who interrupted his concentration in church, his cruelty towards animals grows and culminates into his massacre of an entire valley of deer. A stag curses him to kill his own parents. He almost brings the curse to fruition twice: he drops a sword while standing on a ladder near his father, and he pins his mother's white shawl against a wall with a javelin because it looked like bird's wings. He leaves to escape his future (much like Oedipus).
Julian joins a band of vagrants, and they eventually grow into a huge army under his control. He makes a name for himself and marries rich, but never hunts. Finally, his wife convinces him to go hunt, and he is haunted by the spirits of all of the animals he has killed. He returns home to surprise his wife and finds a man and a woman in her bed. Unknown to him, his parents had arrived to see him, and his wife had given them her bed. He thinks that it is another man sleeping with his wife and murders them. He recognizes his misdeed and leaves once again.
Having given all of his possessions to his wife, Julian begs for food but is shunned for his deeds. He comes across a deserted river crossing and decides to live a life of servitude. One day, there is a great storm, and a leper wishes to cross. It is rough, but Julian does not give up. Once across, the leper's requests increase. He wishes for food and wine, Julian's bed, and finally the warmth of Julian's body. When Julian gives the man everything without hesitation, the leper is revealed to be Jesus Christ himself, who takes Julian with him to heaven.
"Hérodias"
"Hérodias" is the retelling of the beheading of
John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
. It starts slightly before the arrival of the Syrian governor,
Vitellius
Aulus Vitellius (; ; 24 September 1520 December 69) was Roman emperor for eight months, from 19 April to 20 December AD 69. Vitellius was proclaimed emperor following the quick succession of the previous emperors Galba and Otho, in a year of ci ...
. Herodias holds a huge birthday celebration for her second husband, Herod Antipas. Unknown to him, she has concocted a plan to behead John. According to Flaubert, this plan entails making her husband fall in love with her daughter, Salomé, leading to him promising her whatever she wants. Salomé, obviously in line with the instructions of her mother, will ask for John's head. Everything goes as planned. John has been repeatedly insulting the royals, so the king does not think long before granting Salomé's wish. The crowd gathered for the party waits anxiously while the executioner, Mannaeus, kills John. The story ends with some of John's disciples awaiting the Messiah.
Sources of inspiration
* "A Simple Heart" was inspired by several events in Flaubert's own life: he also lived in a farmhouse in rural
Normandy
Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...
, he also was adrift in his studies, much like Paul. Most importantly, he had an
epileptic
Epilepsy is a group of non-communicable neurological disorders characterized by recurrent epileptic seizures. Epileptic seizures can vary from brief and nearly undetectable periods to long periods of vigorous shaking due to abnormal electrical ...
seizure in the same way that Félicité does in the story.
* Gustave Flaubert wrote "A Simple Heart" under encouragement from his good friend and author
George Sand
Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil (; 1 July 1804 – 8 June 1876), best known by her pen name George Sand (), was a French novelist, memoirist and journalist. One of the most popular writers in Europe in her lifetime, bein ...
.
* "The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitalier" was inspired by a large
stained-glass window
Stained glass is coloured glass as a material or works created from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant religious buildings. Although tradition ...
at
Rouen Cathedral
Rouen Cathedral (french: Cathédrale primatiale Notre-Dame de l'Assomption de Rouen) is a Roman Catholic church in Rouen, Normandy, France. It is the see of the Archbishop of Rouen, Primate of Normandy. It is famous for its three towers, each i ...
. Flaubert deliberately made his story markedly different from the story told in glass.
* "Hérodias" is based on the biblical figure of the same name. Flaubert based the section on the dance of Salomé from a
bas-relief
Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...
also at
Rouen Cathedral
Rouen Cathedral (french: Cathédrale primatiale Notre-Dame de l'Assomption de Rouen) is a Roman Catholic church in Rouen, Normandy, France. It is the see of the Archbishop of Rouen, Primate of Normandy. It is famous for its three towers, each i ...
and his own experience watching a young female dancer while in Egypt.
* "A Simple Heart" was the inspiration for '' Flaubert's Parrot'', a literary novel by
Julian Barnes
Julian Patrick Barnes (born 19 January 1946) is an English writer. He won the Man Booker Prize in 2011 with '' The Sense of an Ending'', having been shortlisted three times previously with '' Flaubert's Parrot'', ''England, England'', and '' A ...
.
* "Hérodias" is said to have influenced Oscar Wilde's later '' Salome'' (1893) and Jules Massenet's opera '' Hérodiade'' (1881);Gustave Flaubert: ''Three Tales'': New York: Dover Publications: 2004 (back cover). "The Legend of Saint Julian the Hospitalier" was the basis for an opera of the same title by
Camille Erlanger
Camille Erlanger (25 May 186324 April 1919) was a French opera composer. He studied at the Paris Conservatory under Léo Delibes (composition), Georges Mathias (piano), as well as Émile Durand and Antoine Taubon (harmony).Jacobshagen, Arnold: " ...
(1888).
* The story is described at length in
Yann Martel
Yann Martel, (born 25 June 1963) is a Canadian author who wrote the Man Booker Prize–winning novel '' Life of Pi'', an international bestseller published in more than 50 territories. It has sold more than 12 million copies worldwide and spen ...
's novel '' Beatrice and Virgil''.
* The parrot Loulou in "A Simple Heart" makes a cameo appearance in the
Nancy Drew
Nancy Drew is a fictional character appearing in several mystery book series, movies, and a TV show as a teenage amateur sleuth. The books are ghostwritten by a number of authors and published under the collective pseudonym Carolyn Keene. Crea ...
computer game '' Curse of Blackmoor Manor''. In the game, Loulou is known to scream "Felicity! The door, the door!" at the player whenever they walk by. Nancy on occasion will say to herself: "I wonder who Felicity is?"
Google Books
Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical ...