Madame Bovary

5 Pages 1202 Words

A Critical Analysis of the Character
“Madame Bovary”
Of the Novel
Madame Bovary
By
Gustave Flaubert




The character of Madame Bovary consists of many different components. At first Emma Bovary seems content and unassuming. She doesn’t question anything done, and is very easy to please. As the first nine chapters progress, Emma grows uneasy and upset. She stops taking care of her house and home, leaving her husband to wonder what the problem is. After she witnesses the lavish lifestyle that is completely different from her own, in anger, Madame Bovary loses all love and respect for herself, her husband, her home, and slowly descends into a deep depression.
When Monsieur Bovary first met Emma Rouault she was living and taking care of her sick father in Les Bertaux. She loved her father and worked hard to take care of him and their house. Emma Rouault also had a confidence about herself, “ . . . she had an open gaze that met yours with fearless candor” (Flaubert, 858). This openness attracted the then married Monsieur Bovary. He had never encountered a woman like her before, and he spent time with her even after he was done taking care of her father, “ . . . he went back the very next day, then twice a week regularly, not to mention unscheduled calls he made from time to time, as though by chance” (859). After Monsieur Bovary’ wife dies, he takes Emma as his wife and she moves with him to Tostes.
After the couple is married, Madame Bovary finds happiness in her home, but slowly she grows discontent, “But even as they were brought closer by the details of daily life, she was separated from by a growing sense of inward detachment” (874). Madame Bovary felt Charles was very boring and very plain and the married life was nothing like what she expected. Charles didn’t understand his wife’s feelings and that separated them even more “He took it for granted that she was content; and she res...