'A Simple Heart': Gustave Flaubert's Story of an Arrested Life

She started off as a rich privileged kid who, at the age of 14, had been struck by the worst thing that can happen to a girl at the very edge of her puberty – having a spoiled mother who cared more about the money than for her own daughetr, Faunia had to face an abusing stepfather who found her chilish innocence and beauty too powerful sexual bate to endure. Running away at such early and immature years of her life and staying completely alone and protected only by clear sky and an empty wallet, she had been forced to put up with the worst kind of jobs and worst kind of men that could possibly be found. In

The life of a lady in the 19th century is painted in a romantic light. Pictured in her parlor, the lady sips tea from delicate china while writing letters with a white feathered quill. Her maid stands silently off in the background, waiting for orders to serve her mistress. What is not typically pictured, is the sadness or boredom echoed on the lady’s face. Perhaps the letter is to a dear friend, not seen in ages, pleading with the friend to visit, in hopes that the friend will fill the void in the lady’s life made from years spent in a loveless marriage; or possiblyk20 the lady isn’t writing a letter at all, but a novel or a poem, never to be read by anyone but her. Edith Warton and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, are 19th Century ladies who dare to share their writing with the world. Through their works, the darker side of a woman’s life in the late 1800’s is exposed. Gender politics in the 19th dictates that a lady is dependent on her husband for her financial security and social standing; that is if she is fortunate enough to marry at all. In Edith Warton’s The House of Mirth, Lily Bart is a beautiful woman in her late 20’s, who fails to marry a wealthy man. The narrator in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper slowly goes insane under her physician husbands misguided attempts to cure her of depression. The downfall of Lily Bart and the narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper is

Gustave Flaubert’s short story, A Simple Heart, is the narrative account of one woman’s painfully unrewarding life as a humble and blindly dedicated servant, Felicite. Throughout the story chronicling her life, she suffers a series of heartbreaking losses, but continues to love unconditionally nonetheless. A Simple Heart brings up themes of death and loss, and unquestioning duty and responsibility. It also calls into question conventional religious belief, through, among other things, Felicite’s warship of the parrot, Lou Lou. Felicite represents each of these themes partly in her own ignorance and simplicity and, as a result, it is seemingly difficult to validate the authenticity of her

Taking care of the household is known typically as a “woman’s job” and with the combination of an overbearing husband who has complete control over her, she can feel like she can never leave. After hearing the news of her husband’s death, Mrs. Mallard in Kate Chopin’s The Story of An Hour “[had] no one to live for during those coming years; she would live for herself.” Her taste of freedom after becoming widowed, showed how she was only living to serve her husband and not for herself. She was overjoyed at the fact that she had another reason to live for someone other than Mr. Mallard, and only after hearing the news of her husband’s death was she so happy.

Her lack of self-value can often result in her behaving in a noble manner. That case occurs when she is walking through a meadow with Madame Aubain and her children. From across the plain a raging bull comes charging towards the quartet. Félicité steps aside from the family, attracting the bull’s attention. She takes off running, the bull in hot pursuit, and narrowly escapes through a fence just before the bull gores her. She did not stop to think about what might happen to herself at any point in this intense sequence. She instead made the play that was best for Madame Aubain and her children, even if it meant endangering herself. Félicité’s humble attitude and willingness to sacrifice are truly admirable. She thinks simply, deciding that others are more valuable than

In his short story “A Simple Heart”, the main character Felicite is a low-class maid, and as a result of this has very little outside knowledge. Throughout her story, Felicite is manipulated, whether it’s by Theodore, the man she loves, or her Madame, who treats her unfairly. Felicite begins learning some outside knowledge when she and the Madame’s daughter go to church, where ”Felicite worshiped devoutly” (Flaubert). She applies this to her life and lives a humble, pious life, treating everyone around her with nothing but kindness and charity. Felicite’s kindness is taken advantage of time and time again because of the absence of self-knowledge.

In “The Story of an Hour,” Kate Chopin describes the series of emotions a married woman with a heart condition, Mrs. Mallard, endures after hearing about the death of her husband, Mr. Mallard. She assumes that she will be a mournful widow, but she ends up silently rejoicing. It turns out that she was not happily married and the thought of freedom from her attachments of marriage gave her

Through symbolically and ironically suggesting that gender definitions delimit the feminine self, the opening of “The Story of an Hour” hints of the tragedy that pervades the tale.  Because of Mrs. Mallard’s “heart trouble,” her sister and her husband’s friend rush to her side to break the news of her husband’s death in a gentle manner (644).  On a literal level, Louise Mallard’s condition suggests that she has a congenital

In Gustave Flaubert’s short story “A Simple Heart” Flaubert tells of the life of Felicite, a poor woman who does not seem to have any luck at all. Felicite is the kind of character that makes the reader pity her while at the same time finding her to be incredibly strange. Flaubert uses human emotions in a story that is incredibly simple in both word and tale to tell the reader of a woman who does not live a particularly exciting or happy life. Through this short story, Flaubert has given the reader a character that is simple but loving, strange yet human, and easily attached to things. Through his use of realism and a firm grasp on human emotions Flaubert has crafted a tale that is unlike any other.

In Fatima Merinissi’s Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood is based on the tales of a young girl that lives in a traditional Moroccan harem that follows the lines of enchanting as well as disparaging. The accounts of the book follower her on a day to day and experience all of the trivialities that accost her in life. At a young age, Merinissi was contently

Written by Gustave Flaubert and published in 1856, Madame Bovary tells a story about the life and death of Emma Bovary, a middle class woman living in mid-nineteenth century France. This novel is known as one of the best examples of literary realism ever written, and for good reason. Through his writing and attention to detail, Flaubert does an excellent job of giving the reader an idea of just how mundane everyday life was like in France during the mid-nineteenth century. Through the various characters in the novel, Flaubert is also able to portray many positive and negative characteristics he saw in the people living during this time. Of the many different characteristics and ideas that Flaubert uses to describe characters throughout the novel, I think that the many aspects he saw in the bourgeoisie class and materialism are uniquely important. I believe that the ways Flaubert uses the ideas and issues of materialism and similar principles he saw in the bourgeoisie to tell the story of Madame Bovary, to criticize the bourgeoisie, as well as show how harmful and destructive he believed these issues could be to a society.

At the beginning, it is seen that a 19-year-old girl, who works as a waitress at the Five and Ten restaurant named Florentine is the main focus, but the novel revolves around Florentine’s mother, Rose-Anna. Rose-Anna represents many themes throughout the story such as, personal loss, struggle and solitude, which presents her as a round character. Firstly, Rose-Anna experiences loss when she loses three of her eleven children at a young age, she lost her son Daniel who died from Leukemia, her son Eugène and her husband Azarius to the war and Florentine to marriage. Her loss is only a part of her struggles, Rose-Anna and her family struggle through life because they live in poverty. Rose-Anna represents struggle because she must take care of eleven children as well as another one coming on the way. While, Florentine and Eugène are forced to work for a living to earn money for rent and food, instead of going to school. This demonstrates Rose-Anna as a round character because she always blamed Azarius for their poverty, but by the end, she realized that “she always held [Azarius] responsible for their poverty, but now it seemed to her he had done his part” (Roy 372). The last theme that

Flaubert use of “they” and “them,” further separates Emma from the festivities of the upper class. Additionally, as Emma is preparing for the ball, she is striving to appear as “extravagant” as possible. She “did her hair according to the directions of the hairdresser, and put on the barege dress” (Flaubert, 42-44) Thus, Flaubert emphasizes that Emma’s is unable to prepare for the ball without “directions” implying that she is not able to be a part of the upper-class events without guidance. Therefore, her only connection to the upper class at the ball are her clothes. Also, Flaubert further separates Emma and Charles from the rest of the guest, by having them arrive in a “dog-cart” (Flaubert, 41). Hence, Flaubert advocates that no matter how much the middle class aspires to be a part of the upper-class—through material items—they will never have the means to do so. Flaubert further emphasizes the separation between Emma and the rest of the guests when he writes: “Emma was listening to a conversation full of words she did not understand” (Flaubert, 45). Flaubert is highlighting how out of place Emma is, yet how aloof Emma remains. She is still “listening” even though she doesn’t understand what they are saying. Overall, Flaubert utilizes perspective in order to highlight Emma’s aspirations to be a part of the upper class, through her appearance and material items. Ultimately, Flaubert is critiquing the French middle-class in that

Next, Mrs. Mallard was a woman who suffered from the times where women were treated with less value and importance. She lost her own life because rejoice at her husband’s tragedy. Her uncontrollable desire to be free made her become a frivolous woman, who let his personal longing’s end with his own life. When she realized that her husband was alive all his plans vanished. Her happiness was a temporary happiness which lasted less than an hour.

In the story of Alice in Wonderland we follow Alice down a rabbit hole into a land of pure wonder, where the logic of a little girl holds no sway. In Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, we witness exactly the opposite as Emma Bovary, a most romantic creature, is purposely cast into a harshly realistic world. In either case, a creature is put into an environment unnatural to her disposition, yet in Flaubert’s example, Emma shares the world we inhabit, and thus the message her story brings is much more pertinent. To convey this message, Flaubert replicates not a world of fantasy, but rather the real world, with all its joy, sadness, and occasional monotony intact. Then he proceeds to dump an