Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert was a nineteenth-century French novelist whose meticulous prose style made him a model for literary realism.
His masterwork *Madame Bovary* (1857) scandalized readers and faced obscenity charges for its unsentimental portrait of adultery and provincial life.
Flaubertian describes writing marked by precise word choice and detached observation: a Flaubertian attention to detail.
Male French name
Appearance of being factual
- objectivityFreedom from personal bias
- impersonalityLack of personal connection
- detachmentSeparation or emotional uninvolvement
- observationAttentive watching or remark
documentation · bourgeois · provincial · social critique · psychological depth · naturalism · Zola
Weary, listless dissatisfaction
- disillusionmentBitter loss of faith
- bourgeoisieCapitalist ownership class
- romanticismEmotional, imaginative worldview
- escapismHabitual mental retreat
adultery · mediocrity · provincialism · aspiration · despair · irony · satire · pessimism
- NovemberEleventh month
- correspondenceExchanged written communication
- manuscriptsHandwritten or typed originals
- draftsPreliminary written versions
Years 1801-1900
- Second EmpireNapoleon III's French regime
- FranceWestern European republic
- ParisFrance's chief city
- BaudelaireFrench decadent poet
Skill in making objects
- perfectionismCompulsive pursuit of flawlessness
- revisionAltering to improve
- laborStrenuous effort; also childbirth
- polishingSmoothing by friction
sentences · precision · aesthetic · beauty · musicality · formalism · painstaking
Favoring contemporary approaches
- aestheticismValuing beauty above ethics
- precursorSomething that comes first
- ProustFrench novelist of memory
- JoyceIrish personal name
Maupassant · Nabokov · Turgenev · Henry James · structuralism · literary criticism · semiotics · Sartre
Gustave
Male French name
- RouenNorman capital on Seine
- NormandyNorthern French coastal region
- hermitPerson choosing total seclusion
recluse · epilepsy · syphilis · bachelor · travels · Egypt · Tunisia
verisimilitude
Appearance of being factual
- objectivityFreedom from personal bias
- impersonalityLack of personal connection
- detachmentSeparation or emotional uninvolvement
observation · documentation · bourgeois · provincial · social critique · psychological depth · naturalism · Zola
ennui
Weary, listless dissatisfaction
- disillusionmentBitter loss of faith
- bourgeoisieCapitalist ownership class
- romanticismEmotional, imaginative worldview
escapism · adultery · mediocrity · provincialism · aspiration · despair · irony · satire · pessimism · futility
Madame Bovary
- NovemberEleventh month
- correspondenceExchanged written communication
- manuscriptsHandwritten or typed originals
drafts · notes · unfinished · posthumous
nineteenth century
Years 1801-1900
- Second EmpireNapoleon III's French regime
- FranceWestern European republic
- ParisFrance's chief city
Baudelaire · Balzac · Hugo · Turgenev · Sand · salon · literary circles
craftsmanship
Skill in making objects
- perfectionismCompulsive pursuit of flawlessness
- revisionAltering to improve
- laborStrenuous effort; also childbirth
polishing · sentences · precision · aesthetic · beauty · musicality · formalism · painstaking
modernism
Favoring contemporary approaches
- aestheticismValuing beauty above ethics
- precursorSomething that comes first
- ProustFrench novelist of memory
Maupassant · Joyce · Nabokov · Turgenev · Henry James · structuralism · literary criticism · semiotics · Sartre
- literaturebooks, book, fiction, poetry, stories
- AuthorsShakespeare, William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Twain, F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Famous AuthorsShakespeare, Dickens, Austen, Hemingway, Twain
- French Culturebaguette, baguettes, beret, berets, brie
- NovelistsStephen King, Agatha Christie, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen
- Classic AuthorsShakespeare, Dante, Homer, Chaucer, Milton
FlaubertAlexandre Dumas
Victor Hugo · Walter Scott · George Sand · Charles Dickens · Dostoevsky
Flaubertauthorial intrusion
Writer commenting within narrative
Dickens · Thackeray · Victor Hugo · Harriet Beecher Stowe · didacticism