Analysis Of A Simple Heart By Gustave Flaubert

856 Words2 Pages

Gustave Flaubert incorporates and composes a realistic piece of literature using realistic literaryature techniques in his short story, “A Simple Heart.” Flaubert accomplishes this through telling a story that mimics the real life of Félicité, and writing fiction that deliberately cuts across different class hierarchies; through this method, Flaubert is able to give the reader a clear understanding of the whole society. Flaubert makes the unvarnished truth about simple hearts clear by exposing a clear replica of a realistic story, therefore, allowing the reader to clearly understand the society and the different classes of characters.
The story, “A Simple Heart” focuses on the life of a naive, simple-minded underclass maid, Félicité and her
Flaubert provides a very believable backstory for Félicité, giving the reader a basis of her past and how it shapes her. Through Flaubert, we learn that Félicité has worked for half a century for Madame Aubain, and she comes from a broken family where she was left alone and worked on a farm. Because she experiences illness similar to real people, she continues to be portrayed as a realistic character, as she is not immune to sickness and disease. Throughout the story, Félicité becomes ill and deaf, and she experiences illness, similar to the characters around her who also got sick. She is not immortal; she must rest and learn to deal with this sickness as it affects her life greatly. Félicité goes to places frequently, and she has many people around her who affect her life; she has things going on in her life such as a person in reality would have happen, and they do affect her. She also expresses emotion as a genuine person would, through anger, kindness, being scared, etc. I do not believe she has any noticeable flaws that render her as unrealistic; I believe Flaubert does accurately portray the character Félicité as a real person. One may think of Félicité as too naive to be realistic, but I do not think nativity is a flaw unless someone takes advantage of

Open Document