Emotional State and Class Systems in Madame Bovary

Gustave Flaubert, an accomplished French writer of the mid-1800s, innovated realist ideals in his well-known piece Madame Bovary in 1856. Steeped in deep character development, his novel incorporates symbolism within several major individuals. Throughout the novel, Flaubert relates diverse character traits within Emma Bovary, clothing her in multiple personalities. In times of transition, Flaubert reflects Emma’s emotional state by relating multiple social classes to her situation. Her emotional state, socially or emotionally, hinges on the different class stages of her life.

Before the interference of other classes and characters, Emma embraces her naïve self, defining the whole-hearted middle class. The novel begins with her enjoying her life on a farm, with the convent in her past, relying quaintly on herself and her father. In Emma’s background, she does not compare her life to other factions of society, nor does he allow for any sort of riches to impact her way of thinking. In fact, she has no desire to leave her life, to the extent that “when she went to confession, she invented little sins in order that she might stay longer [in the convent]” (Flaubert 24). Her fond memories of her life in the convent prove that she enjoyed her life of practice. While members of church society did not lead lavish lives, this does not seem to hinder Emma’s thoughts on her lifestyle. She reflects the middle class, though she indulges her past, she never obtains the thought process that more money would lead to a better life for her. The way that she idolizes her former life reflects this time as a growth point and positive period of her life. When Charles first visited her “she laughed at getting none of it [milk]” (Flaubert 15). Flaubert p...

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...ly describe Emma in the past, as when they began their affair she doted on him constantly. However, as her character alters, she loses many of her previous traits. Also, the setting that surrounds Emma during this time starts to illuminate the poverty to which she transitions into. Her affair used to resemble elegance and true love between Leon and Emma, but as she continues to reflect these impoverished traits, the places in which she has her affair become less lavish. Near the ending of her affair, Leon and she “sat in a low ceilinged room of a tavern, at whose door hung a black net” (Flaubert 151). Not only does the dark tavern express the decline in her status, but the fact that a “black net” hangs from the door expresses a darkness entering her life.

Works Cited

Flaubert, Gustave, and Francis Steegmuller. Madame Bovary. New York: Random House, 1957. Print.