Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert BOOK REVIEW 

Man you have one of the best book channels on the platform, thanks for all the great content :-)

I just want to add something. ***SPOILER*** Emma Bovary romanticised everything in her life, only to get bored and disappointed by reality. Her marriage was boring, her affairs ridiculous, she never developed a motherly instinct towards her little daughter. Still, till the end, she end the dream of experiencing something pure and romantic and grandiose. Tragically, her final deception was indeed suicide. In fact, she didn't choose suicide just as a way out of her problems, but also as a last idealistic attempt for experiencing a little sense of romanticism in her life. She DREAMT of dying like the heroines of her books: with dignity, almost elegance, surrounded by people in shock for her sad destiny. Instead, she died horribly. The poison took ages to kill her, meanwhile eating up her internal organs. Her tongue became totally black. She became really ugly because of the pain, and smelly. She died amidst her own piss and vomit. Not only she lived a life chasing dreams and delusions, but she also died in the same way!

Madame Bovary, Ana Karenina and La Regenta, the adultresses trilogy of 19th century.

If you loved Madame Bovary , i would recommend Anna Karenina by Leo tolstoy

1.3 views....197 likes... 0 dislikes This shows the quality of your work.. Superb review...as always Keep up the good work

Thanks for acknowledging that translations differ and for giving credit to the translator. I'm a translator myself, and this type of recognition is very rare and very appreciated. If you're going for the dark French classics, do try The Dangerous Liasons. It's brilliant.

Madam Bovery is a perfect book . I am Turkish , Turks love this author very much . I love Russian and Frech literature but also I recommend Turkish literature .

You should really learn french, if only just for reading

Man I need to reread this book I really love how he writes human emotion. It also really made me like it even more when I read it caused an uproar. I think of Emma as a rebellious impulsive character born in the wrong time

: What struck me the most about this book was the development of M. Homais. The final line of the whole book is: "He has just been awarded the Legion of Honour." This guy expressed everything you just said about the limits of people's compassion, but whereas everyone secretly holds onto those limits, he puts those limits out there in the open on a consistent basis - and the French government rewards him for it. I found myself much more interested in the secondary characters than our tragic heroine or her immediate relationships.

I just finished this book and I feel somewhat stupefied or stunned. The book is so powerful. Your review is spot on.

I studied this book in university and I remember watching this review so many times when you first put it out. It's so familiar and comforting to me at this point, and I just love how you expressed your opinions and ideas here. Thank you so much.

Finished two weeks ago and daaammnnnn beautiful beautiful writing! The influence of Flaubert is clearly seen in Knausgaard. Love it

So good to watch your love for the book... I love Flaubert... Madame Bovary changed my life... I was 14 when I read this book... I am 38 now... Still no children and pay all my bills in cash :)

In the end I really enjoyed Madame Bovary, but it's so much description and so little actually story that it was really hard for me to get into it at first. It all moves so fast at the beginning and yet at the same time there is no dialogue at all for the first 60 pages. Only description. Also, it actually felt really unrealistic how quickly she regretted her marriage. Wasn't it the same day as the wedding? My favorite part is definitely the end, the downward spiral.

Madam Bovary struggled not because she was cruel greedy and selfish. She was a bright young person who could have taken in the world but was not able To because of her gender. Her dissociation, distractions and depressions were symptoms of disempowerment.

I ended up reading Madame Bovary and In Search of Lost Time this year, would not recommend reading the latter unless you're in for the long haul. It's interesting reading the two, with Madame Bovary being this small but perfectly tweaked serving, while In Search of Lost Time is a once-in-a-lifetime experience that's greater than the sum of its parts.

You've influenced my book purchase for a while now, in my bag I carry around Machado’s Epitaph of a small winner and the spanish version of Borge's The Aleph, thank you for keeping me reading.

I've known about Madame Bovary since 10th grade. I'm now in 1st year college. And Christ, i actually want to read this now. Thanks for reviving my 4 year old interest!

yyou have to read stendhal, red and black. amazing as madame bovary.

That is a beautiful cover, my wife loves this book. Keep up the great work Cliff.

Ur a fucking G Clifford. Keep doing your thing.

Great video, man, I would recommend you Salammbô, also by Flaubert. It's a complete oposite style from Mme Bovary. Salammbo has some great battle scenes, withering dialogues and brutal violence that you would be amazed with Flaubert's ability to deal with various topics and stories.

In the top right it looks like you have a copy of Dhalgren, and the 3-volume 1q84. I hope I'm right.

I recently found your channel, and, indeed, it's better than food. You make me remind and rethink when i read Madame Bovary. It's such a great novel because of the way it looks to our complexities, motivations and contradictions. In any case, i want to confirm that, indeed, it makes you more empathetic and compassionate about the others. It was really hard for me though, because, in 2019 i had a break up. She cheated on me and we were in terrible terms. But what i did with all that anger and confusion, was read: Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary. It was such a moment of revelations for me, to my flaws and hers, or, what i'd like to introduce as a concept in this book, our "Sentimental education", because, in both novels, the protagonist wish more, mostly motivated by an inner romanticism and lack of, we could say, joy, excitement, and escape of boredroom. But, in fact, it doesn't change, but gets worse, and, eves so, tend to bring out the worst of us. It makes comprehend more about that, about what art we consume and how we consume (i mean, with ourselves, our social relationships, our human experience), can make tremendous flying castles, then, fall. At the end of the day, i end up with a bit less of resentment, a bit less of confusion, and, the great vital experience of reading, in words of Flaubert "But do not read, as the children read, to amuse yourself, nor as ambitious people read, to get instruction. No! read to live!" And that's beauty.

I regret skipping this one in highschool.

I can relate to his reaction of the book. I was blown away when she committed suicide, the book just took me away from reality and before I knew it, it smacked me in the face.

I just finished reading it. I’m astonished!

I just finished reading it and then found myself here. Splendid review, I agree with everything you say. In my life thus far best book I've ever read, made me really feel, only other book which has had a similar effect was Heart of Darkness by Conrad. Amazing stuff.

Great review. I read Madame Bovary for the first time after living in France for a few years and I really just couldn't get along with it. Maybe I should give it another try.

This book was great if you think about it for its place in the feminist cannon. It was the first to completely illustrate that women too desire like men do. And also that women too are selfish and foolish.

My point is that Do you think about immoral intimacy? It is one of them. The painted veil, Anna Karenina, The Scarlet letter, and Madam Bovary. Whatever story is developing? The fundamental question of woman's love? What the fucking woman's love?

I get so excited when Cliff releases a new video and suggests books better than food!

Passionate review, Cliff. The foot surgery section is chilling. And the final sentence, brutal. Social climbing, provincialism, false accomplishments in search of recognition-mid 19th C France or 21st C US? Sex in the midst of a country fair will never be the same...

Great review! Have you ever read anything by Benjamin Myers? If not, I would recommend reading Beastings or The Gallows Pole. Very bleak, but beautiful historical fiction set in the northern parts of England.

Very well. I'm sure you've read, "A Simple Heart". Damn, Madame Bovary is fing intense.

What's your Instagram so we can thirst follow???

"Our duty is to feel what is great and love what is beautiful - not to accept all the social conventions and the infamies they impose on us."

Recently read Against Nature and Huymans rated Flaubert. Also one of Bowie's favourite books. Gotta read this one.

After reading Bovary, I downloaded the complete works in translation and probably not the best translation, a bundle thing, but the variety of his chosen themes matches the richness and fecundity of his style; although style too changes (every so appropriately, toujours!), so that the variety of styles justify the themes and the richness and fecundity, etc., balance achieved, yes le mot juste and also le style juste pour le juste milieu so to speak, if such may be said without being too ridiculous; my French is too poor to know how poor is my French

I hate to be that guy, but this is a literary channel, so ... "she gets bored WITH her marriage", not "OF her marriage" ... !

Thank you for recommending this. I am reading it now. It is really better than food for me. Thank you.

I recently downloaded a free kindle version of Madame Bovary but the format was awful so I couldn't get past the first chapter. Your review really makes me want to read it now. I will have to find a better kindle version. BTW I highly recommend The Magus by John Fowles. I live on an island in Thailand and found it randomly in a used book shop here. It was intriguing since it's about a teacher who moves who a beautiful Greek island and slowly goes insane after meeting a mysterious man who totally mind fucks the shit out of him. Seems right up your alley. Edited to add, there are two versions of the book. The endings are a little different. I read the revised version.

Man I love adapations

Gosh I wanted to watch this review, but when you talked about spoilers... I'll have to wait and read it. :) I just want to say the lines you read at the beginning are so beautiful and, as a translator (from English to French), it makes my heart full to know we have amazing translators all over the world for us to enjoy literature at its purest (or close enough). I'd love for you to review one of Emile Zola's books. I fell in love with the first one (The Fortune of the Rougons) which no one talks about and I don't get why! (I've read The Kill as well, but as good as it was, the first one just got me in so many ways). Love your work! ❤ So few people in my life care about literature, it's sometimes depressing. Your videos are like fresh air.

Will reread Flaubert. Thank you for yet another great review. Greetings from the Netherlands.

Man, I admire your work, the only channel about true literature. I studied spanish philology and I can tell you that if you loved Madame Bovary, you need to read La regenta by Leopoldo Alas "Clarín", writen after Flaubert's work and surpassing him in many points. Surely the greatest spanish novel after the Quijote. Thanks for your content, Cliff

You should record some audiobooks mate! I love your reading :)

J'ai lu récemment sur France cultrue que Flaubert écrivait ses romans pour rendre une couleur. Madame Bovary représentait pour lui le "gris de moisissure d'existence de cloportes".

I love the way you express the contents of this book. I feel the same. It's incredibly intense, and yes lots to do with Machado de Assis and also Tolstoy.

Cliff--great review! A quick recommendation: The Star Diaries by Stanislaw Lem. This book cracked me up, and I think you'd enjoy it. Looking forward to your next entry.

Anyone interested in Flaubert read Steegmuller's translation of his letters ... totally awesome...

Oh por favor, gracias! Voy 🏃🏽‍♀️ a leerlo.

I have watched this video three times! This review blows me away. Now, I need to re-read Bovary.

Difference between Bovary and Anna Karenina?

In high school my french teacher kept recommending it to me, but I've always put it off in favor of proust ... perhaps it's time.

Great review as always. I'm currently reading Ford Maddox Ford's THE GOOD SOLDIER, and I think it is becoming one of my new favorites.

I agree with you, it's a masterpiece. Every enthusiastic lover of literature has a small clutch of classics they would be happy to re-read and Madame Bovary is one of mine. One irritation I have with so many reviews of this novel is that they all seem to reduce the titular character by declaring that she is 'very much like a footballer's wife of today, some aspirational social climbing fabulous nobody'. I think to say that is missing layer upon layer of what this character study is really all about. I winced when I first heard Emma Bovary equated with an aspirational 'footballer's wife'. To me, her psychology and motivations throughout are given such a nuanced look, one that goes further than just showing us a superficial yokel who wants to have an unearned 'high position' in every social scene, to be admired and rise and be the Queen Bee in the dynamic of every one of her life's chapters. I think there's so much gold to mine in this complex, deeply sensitive yet honest portrait. And if indeed Emma Bovary was a sort of cipher for the author, a device which was employed in order for the author to explore certain powerful emotions as his first and most critical intention, then I say again, a masterpiece. A bit of Emma Bovary lives inside everybody I daresay.

I could hear you talk about book all day :)

"The losses inherent in suicide are real, but unlike the losses inherent in a murder, they may be inflicted in the exercise of a moral right. At the very least, we are generally permitted to inflict those losses in other contexts. If suicide is prohibited because of the harm to our mothers, should we also be legally forbidden to move away from our mothers?" - "Every Cradle Is A Grave," Sarah Perry, p. 86.

It sure was a riveting read.

My literary theory professor asked us to read this book for class and before I could buy the book RU-vid recommended me this video. Guess it really does know me well

I came to this video because I gave up on reading the book and just wanted the analysis - you’ve convinced me to finish it, thank you

and of the blood circling through her flesh like a river of milk ..how unfortunate you pick the silliest metaphor in his writing...but then he does a good job of taking the piss out of romantic love..this woman caused misery to her blameless husband and ignored her child..all for love..ha ha..no wonder Flaubert didn't want to pass on this corrupt life to a child of his own..he was a great writer I unfortunately ..conclude you are not somebody who has understood it..

Flaubert would submit his texts to the "gueuloir" (roughly translated to the screamer). He would just read his prose out loud, almost screaming, to make sure that it sounded right. I was too young when I first read it for school and did not take the time to appreciate the style, wanting the story to progress (the book has a very slow pace). I'm rereading it right now.

man, i hated madame bovary.

One of my favorite books, I'm so glad to see this :)

This is what happens if you are ungrateful... I loved the video and I support you

I remember studying this in 10th grade and the class had such a scandalous and depressing atmosphere when we got to the end. We were all very shocked 16 year olds hahaha!

Can i still win the book and coffee if I live in Brazil?

Such a wonderful review of my favorite novel. I've read Madame Bovary many times throughout my life and, like great music, it never grows old - I experience something new each time. The fact that you perceived so much from just one reading is admirable. I'm certain that, like myself, you'll discover much more each time you return to this masterpiece. I was also pleased to see you with Adam Thorpe's translation. I own a number of translations and Thorpe's is probably my favorite. As a fine poet he's extremely sensitive to the musicality and nuance of Flaubert's prose - it truly is a poetic novel, so this is no small point. I also have read all of the Madame Bovary parasitic works. I use that term affectionately because these books explore Flaubert's story and style in loving and often enlightening ways. Once again, great review. I love to see someone so passionately involved in literature. If I had never read Madame Bovary you would have inspired me to rectify that oversight immediately.

We are no different than Madame Bovary..we are no better...speak for yourself mate.if I had a loving partner and a lovely daughter I wouldn't dream of having a destructive affair with some more attractive player...

Maybe Bookdepository.com has it. It’s also owned by Amazon I believe.

Excellent review. Thank you so much 🌷

Cliff these reviews get me so hyped to read the book that you are reviewing! I thank you so much for your enthusiasm and intelligence! Are you still working on your project for the Story of The Eye?

Only watched some of the review (stopped at the spoiler warning) BUTT would you still recommend the book so highly if you knew what happens to Madame Bovary going in? Would this take a lot of pleasure away from the experience?

Thomas hardy the return of the native is an excellent book on similar lines

8:09 Develop your capacity for compassion and empathy

Tellement vrai ce que tu dis à la fin. J'ai rencontrer des gens grâce aux livres qu'ils lisaient quand j'attendais l'autobus et j'ai été inspirée par certains. Merci pour ton compte rendu.

How do you read in a train station or wherever you were? Your powers of focus must be bonkers. I struggle with focus while reading if, say, a distant cat farts in a neighbourhood 100 blocks east. I drop the book and can't concentrate. Any tips?

Have just bought tis book - the penguin classics Wall translation - and your review is most impassioned I’ve seen or read . Great work

I love this channel already and I’ve only been on it for two hours thank you I’ll give you your roses now

Read this during my classic.lit course last year, really enjoyed it. Flaubert is a fascinating author.

Can't watch more cus I don't want spoilers!

I read twenty pages of Madame Bovary in high school and scoffed at it like the child I was -- I was knee deep in modernism and post-modernism at the time, incapable of respecting anything that didn't experiment with its structure like William S. Burroughs. Luckily I read Moby Dick and realized how beautiful literature can be without all the avant-gardery, but I haven't gone back to Flaubert yet. Time to check this out then.

What do you think of Anna Karenina which has a similar storyline?

Penguin Books call Emma Bovary a heroine on the book jacket...she is not..she is a spoilt egocentric schemer

Lydia Davis or Adam Thorpe?

I just found this channel and I love it! I love the books you review and you've given me some inspiration for new reads, and i love the passion you show. I feel that kind kf passion after a truly great book, like kafkas the trial which i just finished reading for the tenth time. Flaubert is someone I've been aware of especially referenced a lot in my philosophy course but tbis review is what has made me feel I should definitly give him a read. Thanks!

Shame you didn't read it in its original language

Which translation of this is best?

Is that Dhalgren up on the top right of your shelf?

gosh, thanks for remembering me of all the feelings i had reading this book, amazing review!!

The passage he reads at 3:14 is in part two chapter 9

Read it last year. It's the only Flaubert that I ever read.

It's been some years since I read this one, very good one. Good work!

♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️♥️

10:57 Houellebecq did it for me

Great channel❤

What really blew my mind about this book is that it has the plot of a soap opera but because of the way it's described, and when you go over it in your mind, you realize it's one of the most profound works of art ever created.