Sentimental Education
Encyclopedia
Sentimental Education (French
: L'Éducation sentimentale, 1869
) was Gustave Flaubert
's last novel
published during his lifetime, and is considered one of the most influential novels of the 19th century, being praised by contemporaries George Sand
, Emile Zola
, and Henry James
.
, and his love for an older woman (based on the wife of the music publisher Maurice Schlesinger
, who is portrayed in the book as Jacques Arnoux). Flaubert based many of the protagonist's experiences (including the romantic passion) on his own life. He wrote of the work in 1864:
The novel's tone is by turns ironic and pessimistic; it occasionally lampoons French society. The main character, Frédéric, often gives himself to romantic flights of fancy.
"Here the form and method are the same as in "Madame Bovary"; the studied skill, the science, the accumulation of material,
are even more striking; but the book is in a single word a dead one. "Madame Bovary" was spontaneous and sincere; but to read its successor is, to the finer sense, like masticating ashes and sawdust. L'Education Sentimentale is elaborately and massively dreary. That a novel should have a certain charm seems to us the most rudimentary of principles, and there is no more charm in this laborious monument to a treacherous ideal than there is interest in a heap of gravel."
(1782) by Goethe, René (1802) by Chateaubriand, Lara (1824) by Byron, Lélia (1833/1839) by George Sand and Frank of La Coupe et les Lèvres (1832) by Alfred de Musset, popular romantic protagonists of the late 18th
and early 19th centuries
. His friend Deslauriers also asks Frédéric to "remember" Rastignac from Balzac's Comédie humaine and in the second part Frédéric asks Mlle Louise Roque if she still has the Don Quixote, a novel of the early 17th century.
in the years following the revolution of 1830
in France.
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
: L'Éducation sentimentale, 1869
1869 in literature
The year 1869 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Macmillan Publishing opens first American office in New York City headed by George Edward Brett-New books:*Louisa May Alcott - Good Wives...
) was Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert
Gustave Flaubert was a French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists. He is known especially for his first published novel, Madame Bovary , and for his scrupulous devotion to his art and style.-Early life and education:Flaubert was born on December 12, 1821, in Rouen,...
's last novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
published during his lifetime, and is considered one of the most influential novels of the 19th century, being praised by contemporaries George Sand
George Sand
Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, later Baroness Dudevant , best known by her pseudonym George Sand , was a French novelist and memoirist.-Life:...
, Emile Zola
Émile Zola
Émile François Zola was a French writer, the most important exemplar of the literary school of naturalism and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism...
, and Henry James
Henry James
Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
.
Plot introduction
The novel describes the life of a young man (Frederic Moreau) living through the revolution of 1848 and the founding of the Second French EmpireSecond French Empire
The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...
, and his love for an older woman (based on the wife of the music publisher Maurice Schlesinger
Maurice Schlesinger
Moritz Adolf Schlesinger , generally known during his French career as Maurice Schlesinger, was a German music editor. He is perhaps best remembered for inspiring the character of M...
, who is portrayed in the book as Jacques Arnoux). Flaubert based many of the protagonist's experiences (including the romantic passion) on his own life. He wrote of the work in 1864:
- "I want to write the moral history of the men of my generation-- or, more accurately, the history of their feelings. It's a book about love, about passion; but passion such as can exist nowadays--that is to say, inactive."
The novel's tone is by turns ironic and pessimistic; it occasionally lampoons French society. The main character, Frédéric, often gives himself to romantic flights of fancy.
Characters in Sentimental Education
The characters of Sentimental Education are marked by capriciousness and self-interest. Frederic, the main character, is originally infatuated with Madame Arnoux, but throughout the novel falls in and out of love with her. Furthermore, he is unable to decide on a profession and instead lives on his uncle's inheritance. Other characters, such as Mr. Arnoux, are as capricious with business as Frederic is with love. Without their materialism and "instinctive worship of power", almost the entire cast would be completely rootless. Such was Flaubert's judgment of his times, and the continuing applicability of that cynicism goes a long way in explaining the novel's enduring appeal.Sequence of appearances
- Frédéric Moreau, the "hero", a young man from provincial France, who ends up a member of the middle class.
- Jacques Arnoux, publisher, porcelain manufacturer; also a speculator and a womanizer, "ill nearly all the time and [looks] like an old man" towards the end of the novel, and eventually dies a year before the novel's end.
- Mme Marie (Angèle) Arnoux, his wife, mother of two children, platonic affair with Frédéric, moves to Rome by the end of the novel.
- Marthe Arnoux, their daughter
- M. Roque, land-owner and M. Dambreuse's unsavoury agent; father of Louise Roque.
- Louise (Elisabeth-Olympe-Louise) Roque, his red-headed daughter, a country-girl; is passionately in love with Frederic for a time, marries Deslauriers, leaves him for a singer.
- Charles Deslauriers, law student, close friend of Frederic, a lawyer by the end of the novel.
- M. Dambreuse, banker, aristocratic politician, timeserver, financier. Dead in the third part of the novel.
- Mme Dambreuse, his much-younger, very determined, exquisite wife, with whom Frederic has an affair; she marries an Englishman by the end of the novel.
- Baptiste Martinon, law student, a rich farmer's son, a reasonably hard-working careerist ends up a senator by the end of the novel.
- Marquis de Cisy, nobleman and law student, a dapper youth, father of eight by the end of the novel.
- Sénécal, math teacher and uncompromising, puritanical, dogmatic Republican; supposedly dead by the end of the novel.
- Dussardier, shop worker, an idealistic Republican; dies at the end of the novel by Sénécal's hand.
- Hussonet, journalist, drama critic, clown, ends up controlling all the theatres and the whole press.
- Regimbart, "The Citizen", a boozy revolutionary chauvinist; becomes a ghost of a man.
- Pellerin, painter with more theories than talent; becomes a photographer.
- Mlle Vatnaz, actress, courtesan, frustrated feminist with literary pretensions; vanishes by the end of the novel.
- Dittmer, frequent guest of Arnoux
- Delmas or Delmar, actor, singer, showman (may also be the singer introduced in Chapter 1)
- M. and Mme Oudry, guests of the Arnoux
- Catherine, housekeeper for M. Roque
- Eléonore, mother of Louise Roque
- Uncle Barthélemy, wealthy uncle of Frédéric
- Eugène Arnoux, son of the Arnoux
- Rosanette (Rose-Annette) Bron, "The Marshal", courtesan with many lovers, e.g. M. Oudry; has a little son with Frédéric later
- Clémence, Deslauriers' mistress
- Marquis Aulnays, Cisy's godfather; M. de Forchambeaux, his friend, Baron de Comaing, another friend; M. Vezou, his tutor
- Cécile, M. Dambreuse's "niece", actually illegitimate daughter
- Another "character": Mme Arnoux's Renaissance silver casket, first noted at her house, then at Rosanette's, finally bought at auction by Mme Dambreuse
Literary significance and reception
Henry James, an early and passionate admirer of Flaubert, considered the book a large step down from its famous predecessor."Here the form and method are the same as in "Madame Bovary"; the studied skill, the science, the accumulation of material,
are even more striking; but the book is in a single word a dead one. "Madame Bovary" was spontaneous and sincere; but to read its successor is, to the finer sense, like masticating ashes and sawdust. L'Education Sentimentale is elaborately and massively dreary. That a novel should have a certain charm seems to us the most rudimentary of principles, and there is no more charm in this laborious monument to a treacherous ideal than there is interest in a heap of gravel."
Allusions to other works
Early in the novel, Frédéric compares himself to Young WertherThe Sorrows of Young Werther
The Sorrows of Young Werther is an epistolary and loosely autobiographical novel by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, first published in 1774; a revised edition of the novel was published in 1787...
(1782) by Goethe, René (1802) by Chateaubriand, Lara (1824) by Byron, Lélia (1833/1839) by George Sand and Frank of La Coupe et les Lèvres (1832) by Alfred de Musset, popular romantic protagonists of the late 18th
18th century in literature
See also: 18th century in poetry, 17th century in literature, other events of the 18th century, 19th century in literature, list of years in literature.Literature of the 18th century refers to world literature produced during the 18th century....
and early 19th centuries
19th century in literature
See also: 19th century in poetry, 18th century in literature, other events of the 19th century, 20th century in literature, list of years in literature....
. His friend Deslauriers also asks Frédéric to "remember" Rastignac from Balzac's Comédie humaine and in the second part Frédéric asks Mlle Louise Roque if she still has the Don Quixote, a novel of the early 17th century.
Allusions to actual history, geography, and current science
The novel takes place between 1840 and 1867 and references many political and artistic events during that time. Primarily, the main characters discuss the conflict between the monarchists, imperialists, and republicansRepublicanism
Republicanism is the ideology of governing a nation as a republic, where the head of state is appointed by means other than heredity, often elections. The exact meaning of republicanism varies depending on the cultural and historical context...
in the years following the revolution of 1830
July Revolution
The French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution or in French, saw the overthrow of King Charles X of France, the French Bourbon monarch, and the ascent of his cousin Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans, who himself, after 18 precarious years on the throne, would in turn be overthrown...
in France.
Allusions in other works
- In the film ManhattanManhattan (film)Manhattan is a 1979 American romantic comedy-drama film directed by Woody Allen about a twice-divorced 42-year-old comedy writer who dates a 17-year-old girl before eventually falling in love with his best friend's mistress...
, Woody AllenWoody AllenWoody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...
's character names this novel as one of his answers to the question "Why is life worth living?". - In the television series The SopranosThe SopranosThe Sopranos is an American television drama series created by David Chase that revolves around the New Jersey-based Italian-American mobster Tony Soprano and the difficulties he faces as he tries to balance the often conflicting requirements of his home life and the criminal organization he heads...
, an episode in season 5 was entitled "Sentimental EducationSentimental Education (The Sopranos episode)"Sentimental Education" is the fifty-eighth episode of the HBO original series The Sopranos and the sixth of the show's fifth season. It was written by Matthew Weiner, directed by Peter Bogdanovich and originally aired on April 12, 2004....
." - Mario Vargas LlosaMario Vargas LlosaJorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa, 1st Marquis of Vargas Llosa is a Peruvian-Spanish writer, politician, journalist, essayist, and Nobel Prize laureate. Vargas Llosa is one of Latin America's most significant novelists and essayists, and one of the leading authors of his generation...
's 20072007 in literatureThe year 2007 in literature involves some significant new books.-Events:*November 19 - First Kindle e-book reader released.*December 11 - Terry Pratchett informs fans on-line that he has been diagnosed with a rare form of Alzheimer's disease.-Literature:...
novel "The Bad Girl" makes several allusions to Sentimental Education. One of the characters takes the name "Madame Arnoux", and the narrator admits to reading Flaubert's works. - In a season 5 episode of Dawson's Creek, Joey Potter's literature professor references Sentimental Education and the theme of the book.
- "Sentimental Education" is the title of a poem by the American poet Lawrence JosephLawrence JosephLawrence Joseph is an American poet, writer, essayist, critic, lawyer, and professor of law.-Life:Joseph's grandparents, Lebanese Maronite and Syrian Melkite Eastern Catholics, were among the first Arab Americans to emigrate to Detroit, where both Joseph's parents were born...
. - Joyce Carol Oates has a story collection with the same title.
- The band Free KittenFree KittenFree Kitten is a musical collaboration between Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon and Pussy Galore's Julie Cafritz. Originally performing under the name Kitten, they changed their name, after receiving threats of legal action by a heavy metal singer performing under that name...
have an album called Sentimental Education. - Maxime Le ForestierMaxime Le ForestierMaxime Le Forestier is a French singer.He was born in Paris to an English father and a French mother who had lived in England. He had two older sisters, Anne and Catherine....
(French Singer) wrote and composed a song called "L'Éducation Sentimentale" which described a not-so platonic night escapade of a man and his love.
Film, TV, or theatrical adaptations
- L'Education sentimentale - 1962 West GermanWest GermanyWest Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
production, only loosely based on the novel - Sentimental Education - 1970 British mini-series
- L'Education sentimentale - 1973 French mini-series
- in Mr. Jealousy a 1997 film by director Noah Baumbach, the main character Lester Grimm, quotes from the last pages of the novel.
Further Reading
- Sentiment in Flaubert's Education sentimentale, Peter Cortland, 1966.
External links
- 1922 English Translation Complete French text, by chapter Complete French text, in HTML - WARNING: large file. Complete French text, in PDF Various resources, French
- Manuscript photographs
- Proust on Flaubert
- Internal timeline of the novel
- Sentimental Education Map Sentimental Education, audio version
