Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

Notes

Part 1

Charles Bovary begins at the village school as a new student. He is enrolled in classes he should have
already mastered and the teacher is told to keep an eye on him in hopes of getting him up to his grade-
level by the end of the term. He is teased by the other students about his clothing, his appearance, the
way he speaks and how easily he is confused. He is teased by the teacher for mumbling, being shy, having
an accent and not knowing what to do with his stuff. The teacher gets frustrated with him and ends up
giving penalties (writing assignments) to the whole class with Charles to do extra work on the tenses of
ridiculus sum. When he does not do what the other students do with their caps and coats, he is put in the
dunce seat. He has spit wads thrown at him, but does his work conscientiously, looking up every word in
the dictionary.

His father, Monsieur Charles Denis Bartolome Bovary, was the assistant-surgeon-major, until
1812 when he was forced to leave the service over a conscription scandal (writing fake prescriptions).
With his professional life destroyed, he married well to a woman who loved him and brought a large
dowry to the marriage. She fell out of love with him when he couldn’t be faithful. She maintained a
stoic attitude about her marriage until death. She handled all family business matters after M had
run through her father’s fortune. She called on the lawyers, the president, remembered when bills
fell due, got them renewed, and at home ironed, sewed, washed, looked after the workmen, paid the
accounts.

When Charles was born he was sent to a wet nurse and he returned home spoiled “as a prince”. His
father tried to make a man out of him by teaching him to drink rum, laugh at religion and allowing
him no fire at bedtime and limiting his creature comforts. His mother continued to spoil him and he
was a good natured child who did not respond well to his father’s lessons. At school (the lycee in
Rouen) he did fairly well until he started skipping classes to play dominoes, learned poems and
songs, read pop fiction by Beranger, learned to mix drinks and make love. Thanks to these activities,
he failed his exams. He confessed all to his mother who blamed the school and the teachers and got
him into a medical school after he made up the exams and passed. With his degree, his mother was
able to get him into a practice at Tostes. She also insisted that he marry well, she saw to it that the
woman she wanted for him, Heloise Dubuc was available. He thought the would mean a certain
amount of freedom, but his wife was just as demanding, jealous and sick as his mother had ever
been. “But it was his wife who ruled… (13).”

II

One night at about 11pm a farmer named Rouault sends for the doctor. Charles goes, even though
the farm, Les Bertaux, is at least 15 miles away. The maid, Nastasie helps him get it together by
4am and, as he is on his way he reviews everything he has learned about fractures and hopes this will
be a simple task. It is: “Charles couldn’t have wished for anything easier (17).” Mr. Rouault’s
daughter helps with splints for her father’s leg and this is where we meet Emma Rouault. She flirts
with Charles mostly because she is bored with country life and has no entertainment. He visits her
father very often which makes his wife suspicious. She forces him to swear never to return to Les
Bertaux which makes him think of Emma even more. His mother arrives for a visit: “Charles’s
mother came to see them from time to time; but after a few days she invariably took on her daughter-
in-law’s sharpness against her son, and like a pair of knives they kept scarifying him with their
comments and criticisms (22).”

“Early in the spring it happened that a notary in Ingouville, custodian of the Widow Dubuc’s capital,
sailed away one day, taking with him all his client’s money (23).” So the fortune was gone except for
the house in Dieppe (which was highly mortgaged), some furniture and clothes. Charles’s father is
extremely angry and at first blames his wife. Then both of Charles’s parents turn on Heloise and he
tries to protect his wife. About a week later she died suddenly while hanging out laundry. After the
funeral, Charles decides that she really had loved him, after all.

III

Mr. Rouault finally comes and pays Charles for treating his leg. He has heard about Heloise’s death
and he commiserates with Charles about that loss. Rouault invites Charles back out to Les Bertaux
to cheer him up. He treats him very gently and kindly and Charles does begin to feel better. He finds
out that he likes living alone as he can do things when and how he wants without having to consider
anyone else. One day he visits and Emma offers him a drink. They start talking about their school
days and she displays various moods. That night he starts thinking about marrying her. Rouault
notices they like each other and decides that if asked, he will say yes. Besides he is tired of having his
daughter around all the time and he needs money. They decide to get married as soon as Charles’s
period of mourning is finished, which will make it a spring wedding. They spend the winter getting
ready.

IV

The wedding guests arrive in a variety of different vehicles, some from as far as 30 miles away. They
are all dressed up for the occasion. Carriages, outfits, hats, hairdos are all described in detail. Mr.
Bovary is dressed in his military coat and he despises all these other people for putting on airs. He
also flirts and ignores his wife, who is on the arm of Rouault. The wedding dinner was set up in the
carriage shed and there is a detailed description of the tons of food available. The dinner lasted 15
hours; people frequently had to go for a walk to make room for more food. Finally coffee was served
and the guests not staying over left kind of drunk. Emma had begged her father not to let the usual
wedding night “pleasantries” take place and he did his best even though it did make them 5 or 6
enemies. Charles’s mother sulked because no one had asked her opinion on anything, his father got
drunk.

In the morning, Emma acted no differently than before, but the change in Charles was obvious. “It
was he who gave the impression of having lost his virginity overnight: the bride made not the
slightest sign that could be taken to betray anything at all (35).” Two days after the wedding, Charles
had to return to his patients. As they left, Rouault reminisced about his own wedding and the good
times he had when his wife was alive. Charles and Emma arrive at the house in Tostes, the neighbors
peeking at them and the maid apologizes for not having dinner ready.

The house is described in detail; their apartment, Charles’s office and consulting space, his library of
medical texts still uncut though showing signs of use; the kitchen smells, yard, stable and pantries,
the garden and flowerbeds and statuary. When Emma goes upstairs she finds the 1st Madame
Bovary’s bridal bouquet which Charles takes to the attic right away, but she is still uncomfortable
about it. During the first few days, she amused herself by planning the changes she would make in
the house – furniture, wallpaper, painting, etc. Charles is extremely happy with married life. Emma
is very disappointed and wonders why love seems better in books.

VI

Emma considers her life so far. At first she had thrown herself into convent life passionately and
studied hard to know all the answers and learned her catechism to perfection. She made up sins so
her confessions could last longer and not be boring. She fell in love with history after reading Walter
Scott. She fell in love with Mary Stuart and through her developed an enthusiasm for unhappy
women such as Joan of Arc, Heloise, Agnes Sorrel, Ferroniere, and Clemence Isaure. After her
mother died she became even more passionate about her grief and she thought she was the picture of
melancholy. But she got tired of mourning and tired of convent life. By the time she left, no one was
sorry to see her go. She thought she would be happy to be home, but soon grew bored with farm life.
Finally she met Charles and persuaded herself that she was in love. “And now she could not bring
herself to believe that the uneventful life she was leading was the happiness of which she had
dreamed (47).”

VII

Emma reflects that these honeymoon days are supposed to be the sweetest of her life and wonders
why she does not experience any intensity of emotion. Perhaps she is not in the right place. She
resents Charles for not knowing how unhappy she is. The more he loves her the more she withdraws.
She finds him boring and commonplace, especially since he can’t swim, fence, shoot or answer her
questions about horseback riding. She especially resents that he takes it for granted that she is as
happy as he is, which makes her feel that his happiness must not really be as great as he makes it
seem.

Meanwhile, Emma is a good wife. She keeps up the house, writes bills to the patients without
nagging them for payment, is an excellent hostess and serves him when he gets home late. He
praises himself for having such a good wife. Emma begins to have mother-in-law problems.
Charles’s mother thinks that Emma is spending her son’s money too freely. When he had been
married to Widow Dubuc, she knew her son loved her. Now she can see he thinks his wife is perfect.
When Charles tries to agree with his mother, Emma convinces him that he is wrong.

One of the doctor’s patients, a gamekeeper cured of inflamed lungs, gives Emma a greyhound pup
that she names Djali. She asks herself why she ever got married and daydreams about what a
different husband might be like. It all seems so far removed from her school days when she was
admired for her good grades and her charm.

In September, the Marquis d’Andervilliers invites the Bovarys to Vaubyessard as part of his
attempt to re-enter political life. He had been treated for an abscess by Charles and when his
steward went to Tostes to pay the bill, he noticed the superb cherries (which did not grow at
Vaubyessard) and asked for some cuttings so he could grow his own. When they grew successfully,
he made it a point to thank the doctor personally. This is how he met Emma and decided that this
was a young couple he would like to have attending his party.
VIII

There is a lot of detail about how fancy the chateau at Vaubyessard is; the building, the servants, the
gardens, the interior and the other guests. The Marquise brings Emma into her circle of friends and
makes her feel welcome. She is very impressed by the Marquise’s father, the duc de Laverdiere, who
was once a lover of Marie Antoinette, even though he is kind of repulsive to look at now. She feels
that she fits right in but is ashamed of Charles. When it gets too hot a servant breaks the window and
she can see the peasants peeking in at the party. This reminds her of life on the farm, a life that
seems far away now. The Vicomte asks Emma to waltz with him. This is their 2nd dance together
and the waltz makes her dizzy.

In the morning after a 10 minute breakfast, they visit the greenhouse and the Marquise goes to feed
her swans while the Marquis takes Emma to see the stables. On their way home they find a cigar
case they think belongs to the Vicomte, which Emma keeps. When they get home and dinner is not
ready she loses her temper and fires Nastasie. This upsets Charles but he does not argue with her.
She is obsessed with the ball and it seems to her that her life has been torn apart by this brush with
luxury. “Some of the details departed – but the yearning remained (66).”

IX

Emma is obsessed with the cigar case and the memory of the ball that it represents to her. She
spends a lot of time in her imagination, pretending to be with the vicomte and walking around Paris.
She only knows what she has been told or imagined about Paris, so her ideas of life in the big city are
very compartmentalized. She feels bad that Charles cannot provide her with a higher standard of
living. She hires Nastasie’s replacement and trains her to be a good servant.

Meanwhile, Charles is thriving. He looks and feels better than he ever has and he thinks that Emma
adores him because of all the little things she does to keep herself from being bored out of her mind.
She cannot be happy with the life she has and she cannot change her life to be what she wants. When
Charles tells her about another doctor being rude to him, Emma is so angry with the other doctor
that Charles actually sheds a tear in the mistaken belief that this shows how much she cares for him.
Actually, her outburst is because of the shame and disappointment she feels with Charles and the life
he provides. “So from now on they were going to continue one after the other like this, always the
same, innumerable, bringing nothing! (73)”

Her boredom with life causes her to ignore the things she used to enjoy, like her music and sewing.
This leads to depression and a hopeless feeling that nothing is ever going to get any better for her.
She is also mad at Charles for trapping her in this middle class lifestyle. She gets in the habit of
wandering around her house and garden, waiting for something interesting to happen. When it
doesn’t, she allows herself to become more depressed. She has wild mood swings which worry
Charles. He decides that if she does not get better, they will have to move. When Emma finds this
out, she begins to purposefully lose weight so that she will look ill. Finally, Charles finds a practice
and a house in Yonville and moves his household and a now pregnant Emma to a new location.
Part 2

Opens with a description of Yonville-l’Abbaye and its history, the most important places there are the
church, with its surrounding graveyard (where the caretaker, Lestiboudois, also grows potatoes),
the market, the Lion d’Or hotel and “Homais Pharmacy” which is across the street from the hotel and
next to town hall. “Since the events which we are about to relate, absolutely nothing has changed in
Yonville (87).” Madame Lefrancois, the widow who owns the hotel is also in charge of greeting
the new doctor and his wife, helped by Artemise, the waitress. Hanging around the hotel, waiting
to see the new neighbors are Monsieur Homais, the pharmacist who always seems to be speaking
for an unknown audience, and Monsieur Binet, a punctual, soft-spoken, clever card player, good
hunter and artisan. Hivert, the driver of the Hirondelle, explains their late arrival by saying
Emma’s dog had been lost along the way. Monsieur Lheureux, the dry-goods dealer, tries to
console her with tales of pets who found their way home.

II

Emma steps off the Hirondelle 1st, followed by Felicite, Monsieur Lheureux, the wet nurse and
finally Charles who had to be shaken awake. Homais introduces himself and his boarder, Monsieur
Leon Dupuis, the clerk for Maitre Guillaumin, the notary. Homais talks with Charles about
business travel and medicine. Emma and Leon discuss books, music and ideas; they feel an
immediate kinship and feel that they are very profound and above the things Charles and Homais
talk about. Emma feels that things have got to get better now.

III

Leon thinks about last night’s dinner and how easy it was to open up to Emma. She is the first “lady”
he has ever spent any real time with, though he is considered well-educated, gentlemanly, intelligent
and helpful. Homais is the best neighbor, but with a hidden agenda. He hopes that Charles will not
want to help the legal system prosecute him for practicing medicine without a license. He is very
helpful, introducing the Bovarys to the local tradesmen and shopkeepers and helping them get good
deals in the marketplace. Charles has no patients yet so he appreciates Homais. Charles is most
excited and happy about the pregnancy. Emma is grumpy because she has not been able to spend as
much money as she wanted and had to settle for a pre-made layette. “Thus she had none of the
pleasure she might have had in the preparations that whet the appetite of mother love; and this
perhaps did something to blunt her affections from the beginning (105).” She is disappointed when
the baby is born a girl. They name the girl Berthe and ask Homais to be godfather. Charles’s
mother, Madame Bovary, is godmother. Monsieur Bovary, Charles’s father, gets into an argument
with the priest and makes fun of the christening. Charles’s parents stay for a month.

One day Emma gets a feeling that she has to see her baby. She starts out for the wetnurse’s house
but is still weak and asks Leon to help her there and back, which he does. By nightfall there is a
rumor that they are having an affair.

IV
Cold weather is Emma’s reason for moving her bedroom into the parlor; this also allows her to watch
passersby on the sidewalk. She especially watches for Leon going to & from work. Homais tends to
drop in around dinner time, commenting on the day’s events with Charles, the meal preparation with
Felicite, and the medicinal use of herbs with Emma until his junior clerk Justin came to get him to
close the shop. Justin has a crush on Felicite, the bad habit of eavesdropping, and is good with the
Homais children (Napoleon & Athalie), especially at Sunday afternoon get-togethers at Homais’s
house. The main entertainment at these soirees is card games or dominoes which Emma and Leon
do not enjoy, so they read poetry and stuff together which develops strong emotional feelings
between them.

The people in the above chapter all go out to the site of a new flax mill and on this day Emma decides
that her husband is so common that he actually disgusts her. And the more she thinks about this, the
more attractive Leon seems to her. Lheureux figures this out and hints around to her that he could
lend her money if she should ever need it. Emma becomes aware of Leon’s love for her and this
makes her keep up the appearance of being a good wife, which makes Charles feel very secure. The
more happy and secure Charles is, the more Leon thinks Emma is beyond him and the more he
idolizes her which makes Emma feel she is sacrificing herself and her happiness. It makes her mad
that Charles seems blind to all the emotional turmoil she is going through. “His conviction that he
was making her happy she took as a stupid insult: such self-righteousness could only mean he didn’t
appreciate her (128)?”

VI

Emma goes to see the priest, abbe Bournisien but he is too preoccupied with the catechism class he is
trying to teach to understand that she has come to him for help. She goes home upset that she is
suffering and no one seems to care. She sits down to feel sorry for herself when Berthe comes up to
her trying to play and catch her apron strings. Emma is angry and shouts at the child, which makes
her cry, then pushes her, which makes her cut her cheek on the chest of drawers. Charles walks in
and Emma says the baby got hurt while playing. She seems so upset that Charles ends up soothing
her. She insists that she must look after her baby and will not go down to dinner, but as the child
sleeps Emma decides she is really an ugly child, looking like her father and all. Charles sees her
staring at the child and thinks what a good mother she is.

“Leon was tired of loving without having anything to show for it, and he was beginning to feel the
depression that comes from leading a monotonous life without any guiding interest or buoyant hope
(139).” Leon decides that this is a good time to finish his law degree and gets his mother’s consent to
return to school. Emma is all full of heavy sighs from missing Leon and Charles worries that she is
delicate. Homais and Charles discuss the things that can happen in the city and the particular things
that students (who are well thought of in France) tend to come into contact with.

V II
The next day, Emma falls back into her severe depression. She regrets not pursuing a romantic
relationship with Leon. Once more, she is pleased with her own suffering and begins spending
money on herself. “A woman who had assumed such a burden of sacrifice was certainly entitled to
indulge herself a little (147).” She spends more than she should with Lheureux. On the day that her
mother-in-law leaves Yonville, as Emma is watching out her window, she notices a finely dressed
gentleman. He is bringing his servant to Charles to be bled. He introduces himself as Monsieur
Rodolphe Boulanger, de la Huchette. During the bleeding, Justin and the peasant feel faint
and need help. Emma has to come in to help Charles and this is the first time Rodolphe sees her.
On his way home, he decides that he can most likely seduce her and starts scheming to do this. “And
he immediately began to consider the question of strategy (154).”

VIII

The Agricultural Show is an annual big deal in Yonville. Everybody is dressed their best, showing
their finest product, bands playing, military teams drilling, public shows of religion, and the bars are
full of people who feel superior to attendance at the Agricultural Show. Homais and Madame
Lefrancois have words over this. Homais finds out from Madame Lefrancois that the Café Francais is
going to be locked and closed down. Lheureux holds the note on the place and Tellier’s
embezzlement has allowed him to foreclose on it. Emma is seen on Rodolphe’s arm, but he avoids
having to speak to Homais or Lheureux. The chairman of the jury for the Ag Show, Monsieur
Derozerays de la Panville, jams up Boulanger for deserting the judges’ station but Rodolphe tells
Emma he prefers her company to judging homemade wares. As they walk he makes fun of the
townspeople and country people. Lestiboudois is making money by renting out the chairs from the
church and the funeral establishment. Rodolphe and Emma go to the 2nd floor of the town hall and
he begins his seduction by saying negative things about Emma’s life while comparing his own misery
to hers and letting her know she is the most interesting and beautiful woman he has ever known.
Monsieur Lieuvain is the prefectural councilor sent to address the gathering. He introduces the
idea that Fate has brought them together and describes it as a type of magnetism. Catherine-
Nicaise-Elizabeth Leroux, of Sassetot-la-Guerrier wins a medal for 54 years of service on the same
farm, but she has never seen so many people before and there is a little scene where she cannot
decide what to do as they call her name and urge her forward. When she receives her medal she
decides she will give it to her priest so he will say some Masses for her. This infuriates Homais, who
writes an article for the Fanal de Rouen (a newspaper) mentioning the lack of support the clergy
gave to the Agricultural Show.

IX

Rodolphe waits 6 weeks to contact Emma and when she is distant with him, he tells her that he had
to stay away – and then he had to come back – because he loves her and cannot stop thinking about
her. When Charles walks in, Rodolphe flatters him by standing and addressing him as docteur.
Rodolphe and Charles talk about Emma’s delicate health. Rodolphe offers a horse for Emma to ride,
she says no, Charles says why not, so Rodolphe and Emma go riding together after she has bought an
appropriate outfit. There is a moment on page 188 where his aggressive desire frightens Emma and
he has to work to get his game face back before she has sex with him. Charles sees that she is looking
better and offers to buy her a horse of her own. At first Emma and Rodolphe write each other secret
love letters every day. But, when Emma starts showing up unexpectedly while Rodolphe is in bed, he
tells her that she is foolish to risk ruining her reputation this way.
X

On one of their mornings together, as Emma returns home she is recognized by Captain Binet who
almost shoots her accidentally. He is poaching and she is trespassing. They both lie about their
reasons for being there. That night, Binet shows up at the Homais house and makes Emma very
uncomfortable by hinting that he knows secrets about her. Rodolphe and Emma work out a routine
for their meetings and stay mostly in the arbor. Rodolphe is finding this affair very tiresome but he
is still enchanted by her beauty. He becomes less attentive, she becomes less secure. A letter from
her father makes her remember her life at the farm she was so desperate to escape as a perfectly
happy childhood home. She tries to be a better mother (for a minute) to Berthe. “She even
wondered why she detested Charles, and whether it mightn’t be better to try to love him (203).”

XI

Emma wants to be a supportive wife, so when Homais brings up the idea that Charles should try a
new surgery to correct Hippolyte’s clubfoot she encourages him. “Something more solid than love
to lean on would be only too welcome (204).” Charles studies (Doctor Duval’s treatise) very hard and
Homais (with some help from the townspeople) convinces Hippolyte to allow Charles to operate.
The operation fails and an infection begins which turns into gangrene. Finally, Charles allows
Madame Lefrancois to call a local MD (a real doctor) named Canivet who laughs at the amateur,
botched surgery. No one stands up for Charles who is afraid to show his face and Hippolyte has to
have his leg amputated. As he screams in pain, Emma once more grows to hate everything about
Charles. When he needs a hug & kiss, she is infuriated. That night she is waiting for him by the time
Rodolphe shows up.

XII

Emma jumps back into the affair wholeheartedly. She compares Charles unfavorably with Rodolphe.
Ironically, the more she hates Charles, the easier it is to be nice to him. She pays closer attention to
how she looks, but less attention to how it looks to others. She gets even deeper into debt with
Lheureux when she begins buying gifts for Rodolphe and makes plans to run off with him. She is
completely unaware that Rodolphe finds her gifts humiliating and her talk of love irritating. She
becomes jealous and he decides that she is just like all his other mistresses and will have to be
dumped. The older Madame Bovary gets into it with Emma about her duty to watch over the morals
of her household and Emma tells her to get out. Charles makes her apologize which makes Emma
mad so she is ready to throw herself at Rodolphe when he shows up, even though it looks like he may
have been avoiding her. Even as she makes plans to take Berthe and buys luggage, etc. Rodolphe
keeps telling her to think it over & it’s ok to back out and stay in her meaningless existence. “I can’t
spend the rest of my life abroad! I can’t be saddled with a child! All that trouble! All that expense!
No! No! Absolutely not! It would be too stupid! (234)”

XIII

As soon as he gets home, Rodolphe starts writing the letter to break up with Emma. He reads some
of her old letters for inspiration, and along the way comes across love letters from a lot of women.
They all sound pretty much alike and he thinks maybe Emma’s love is common. He writes a letter
designed to look as if he is breaking up because he is such a thoughtful guy, not wanting to cause her
any pain, etc… “Have you given really serious thought to your decision? Do you realize into what
abyss I was about to hurl you, poor darling? You don’t, I’m sure. You were going ahead blind and
confident, full of faith in happiness, in the future….Ah! Poor wretched, insane creatures that we are!
(236)” He kind of jokes about his wording and keeping it sort of true, “Maybe she’ll think I’m giving
her up out of stinginess….What’s it to me if she does! Let her….And let’s get it over with! (237)” In
the morning he has his plough-boy, Girard; deliver the letter in a basket of fruit (apricots) with the
message that Rodolphe has “gone on a trip.” She reads the letter in the attic, considers jumping,
hears Charles calling, tries to act the dutiful wife, snaps at him, freaks out and finally faints. She is
sick again, with a high fever for 43 days. Charles is so worried that he even calls in other doctors, Dr.
Canivet for consultation and Dr. Lariviere, his old teacher.

XIV

Because Emma has been so ill and Charles has stayed with her to care for her, he can’t afford to pay
Homais for the medications he has been using for her; bills are piling up and creditors are calling for
their payment, especially Lheureux who delivers all the stuff Emma asked him to keep secret from
Charles and then demands payment (see XII). Lheureux refuses to let Charles return the items and
says he better watch what he says or it will make his wife even more ill; he threatens to sue and then
gets Charles to sign another promissory note. Remembering all his other bills, Charles decides to
borrow one thousand francs at 6% interest. Lheureux is counting on Charles not being able to pay
and this works out very well for him. “His had been the winning bid for the cider-supply contract at
the Neufchatel public hospital; Maitre Guillaumin was promising him some shares in the peatery at
Grumesnil, and he was thinking of setting up a new coach service between Argueil and Rouen…
(Page 248)” Emma gets rid of everything that she loved when Rodolphe was in her life. One day she
thinks she is dying and gets M. Bournisien (the priest) to give her last rites, which sends her into an
ecstatic state. The priest thinks religion has cured her and arranges for some books to be sent to her,
but these annoy her and she is upset because she can’t get that feeling of ecstasy back again. As she
gets better, she goes to church less often and discourages people from visiting her. In this chapter
Bournisien and Homais begin their debate about religion. Charles decides Emma needs a night at
the opera.

XV

Emma gets into the story of Lucie de Lammermoor (opera mentioned above) but Charles gets
confused and can’t understand the plot. At intermission, Emma wants to go outside but feels faint.
While Charles is getting her some water, he runs into Leon and has him come to their box to say
hello. Seeing Leon, she is no longer interested in the opera (at this point the main character is going
mad because of a messed up love affair) and they all decide to go out for an ice. They talk about all of
Leon’s old friends and Emma’s illness. When Leon praises the opera, Charles decides that Emma
should stay over one more night so she can see it.

Part 3

Leon has spent the last 3 years trying to forget Emma, his nice clothes, manners and good looks
made him a favorite at the cabaret (bar or dance-hall); but seeing her again he falls right back in love
with her. They kind of pick up where they left off, talking about how difficult their lives are and
hoping to console each other. At first, Emma says they have to be just friends (again). Leon thinks
this is unfair. They agree to meet at the cathedral the next day. Emma keeps him waiting and has a
letter for him explaining what a bad idea an affair is for them. Leon does not read the letter and it
irritates him when Emma prays for too long. Then Emma agrees to a tour of the building. Finally,
Leon drags her away from church and they get into a carriage. They stay in the carriage, riding
around town for hours with the curtains closed – only opening enough to throw out the torn up
pieces of her letter.

II

Emma & Leon have stayed out too late and Emma misses the Hirondelle. She takes a private cab to
catch up with it. Back in Yonville, Felicite sends her to the Homais’ and she walks in on Mr. Homais
yelling at Justin because he had the keys to the capharnaum where deadly substances are stored.
Eventually Emma mentions to Mrs. Homais that she was told to come over and she learns that
Charles’s father has died. Homais was supposed to break it to her gently, but in his anger forgets to
be gentle. Emma soon tires of Charles being sad and thinks he is pitiful. Lheureux shows up to offer
his help and Emma says she’s had enough of his help. Lheureux brings up the idea of Emma getting
Charles’s power of attorney.

III

Leon and Emma spend 3 days in the Hotel de Boulogne where he is supposed to be helping her set
up the power of attorney paperwork. The next evening they go for a boat ride and Emma learns that
Rodolphe has been there with some other women. When she hears this she starts shivering and
Leon is afraid she is getting sick again. He cannot understand why the power of attorney is so
important to her.

IV

Leon starts letting his work go and decides to go to Yonville to see Emma. Meanwhile, Lheureux
continues to supply Emma with many items that she does not need and cannot afford. He tells her
she deserves them and that it is not too much to ask for her to have such things – and all on credit.
Also, the wet-nurse & her family & her boarder eat breakfast every morning with the Bovarys. Emma
begins to show an interest in music and gets Charles to pay for her to go to Rouen once a week for
piano lessons. Really, she is going into town to meet Leon.

Thursday is the day of Emma’s fake piano lessons. She meets Leon instead. He adores her. He
makes her feel emotionally alive. About this time, Emma becomes aware of a blind beggar who sings
& begs near the Hirondelle’s route home. He is horribly deformed and diseased and he frightens her.
One day Charles tells her that he met her piano teacher and the teacher does not know her. She
convinces him that he is mistaken & there is another piano teacher named Felice Lempureur. She
starts being more considerate of Charles again. One day she makes the mistake of accusing Leon of
being “like all the others” which starts him thinking he is not her first extra-marital affair. One
Thursday, Lheureux catches her on Leon’s arm coming out of the Hotel de Boulogne which frightens
her and which Lheureux uses as an excuse to get her to sell the property left to Charles by his father.
When she does sell, it is to a buyer found by Lheureux. Instead of paying off her debts she continues
to let Lheureux cheat and ruin her. Charles’s mother finds out about & destroys the power of
attorney but Emma convinces Charles to sign another. One day she fails to return home & Charles
goes looking for her, finding her walking along the sidewalk alone. She tells him that if he is going to
get all upset she will not feel free to go to her lessons in case she does not feel well enough to return
home. He backs down and she starts just dropping in on Leon which makes him uncomfortable.
VI

Leon has invited Homais to come see him sometime and one day he does. Leon can’t get away and
Emma is forced to wait for him, getting hysterically upset and accusing him of preferring Homais’s
company to her own. Leon begins to resent her proprietary attitude. After a debt collector has the
sheriff serve a legal notice against her she borrows even more money from Lheureux, pawns a bunch
of Charles’s stuff and tries to borrow money from other friends. During this time, Leon starts to feel
uncomfortable with the amount of money she is spending and the amount she expects to be spent. It
seems they are starting to tire of each other. She attends a masquerade party dressed as a man &
ends up with people & in a place that is unsafe. She gets home to find a man from Mr. Vincart who
now has possession of one of her IOUs to Lheureux. Soon after that there is a court order demanding
that she pay her debt of 8,000 francs or have all her property sold by “Maitre Hareng, hussier at
Buchy” to meet the bill. Lheureux refuses to lend her any more money and looks forward to the day
he can foreclose on Charles’s estate. Emma starts billing Charles’s patients and selling some of her
personal items. She pays of 1500 francs but then borrows more.

VII

Emma’s belongings are catalogued for sale & she hides the guard left behind from Charles. She tries
to get a loan, asks Leon to steal for her & goes to Guillaumin (the lawyer). He will pay Emma for sex;
she gets mad & walks out. She goes to Binet (the tax collector) to try to get more time to pay her
taxes. When that doesn’t work she tries to seduce him. Unfortunately some of her female neighbors
watch this going on through a window. Finally Emma decides that she will offer herself to Rodolphe
in exchange for the money. “So she set out for La Huchette, unaware that now she was eager to yield
to the very thing that had made her so indignant only a short while ago, and totally unconscious that
she was prostituting herself (363).”

VIII

Rodolphe is surprised to see Emma. He still finds her very charming and tries to apologize,
justifying his conduct by telling her that he had to abandon her because of some other, third party’s
matter involving honor and even their life. Emma tells him that she can’t live without him. She is
surprised he stayed away for 3 years, “It was true; for the past 3 years he had carefully avoided her,
out of the natural cowardice that characterizes the stronger sex; and now Emma went on, twisting
and turning her head in coaxing little movements that were loving and catlike (366).” He pulls her
into his lap before he notices she has been crying. When he asks why, she asks him for 3,000 francs.
As soon as Rodolphe finds out she needs money he cools down a little and says he doesn’t have it.
She looks around the room and sees several things she thinks are valuable, she counts his blessings
for him (house, farm, trips, hunting woods and fancy jewelry) but Rodolphe refuses to be of any use
to her. When she leaves she is dazed, confused, frightened and has forgotten the question of money.
She runs home but when she reaches the pharmacy she decides to go in. She gets Justin’s attention
through the window and convinces him to get the key for the Capharnaum without asking
permission. As soon as she is in the room she heads straight for the shelf where the arsenic is kept
and grabs a handful and eats it. Justin protests but she tells him that if anyone finds out they will
blame his master. She goes home feeling “almost as serene as though she had done her duty (371).”
Meanwhile, Charles has been looking for her. By the time he gets home she is already there. She
won’t talk to him, just writes a letter and asks him not to read it until tomorrow. She lies on the bed
thinking that she will just fall asleep and die. She first gets a bad taste in her mouth, becomes
unbearably thirsty, starts choking, vomits and her jaws convulse. It is not until her whole body is
convulsing that she realizes that Charles really does love her. Charles is stunned when she says she is
poisoned; Felicite runs for Mr. Homais, who is so loud he wakes up the neighborhood and soon the
whole village is awake. Charles writes Dr. Canivet and Dr. Lariviere, sending Hippolyte after one and
Justin after the other. Emma asks to see her daughter but the child is confused, thinking she is
getting a present from her mother, then frightened by the look she has and how big her eyes are.
Charles has Felicite take Berthe away because she is struggling to get away. Canivet is first to arrive
and Charles thinks Emma is doing better but “Soon she was vomiting blood. Her lips pressed
together more tightly. Her limbs were contorted, her body was covered with brown blotches, her
pulse quivered under the doctor’s fingers … like a harpstring about to snap (376).” She starts
screaming in pain, Charles is crying, Homais is sighing, Dr. Canivet is surprised that his purging
hasn’t helped when Dr. Lariviere arrives. Lariviere looks at her, checks her breathing, sheds a tear
for poor Charles’s grief, then asks Canivet to step out of the room with him. Neither one of them
wanted to watch Emma die. Homais catches up with them in the square and invites them to his
home for a meal. While they are eating the question of where she got the poison comes up and Justin
starts shaking and drops the dishes he’s carrying. “Homais blossomed in his role of proud host, and
the thought of Bovary’s distress added something to his pleasure as he selfishly contrasted their lots
(380).” After Homais serves coffee, the doctor is asked for and gives advice to/about several people
and their medical complaints. People stop asking advice when they see the priest (Bournisien)
coming to give Emma last rites. Emma actually seems better after the prayers but just as the priest is
saying there is room for hope after all, Emma goes through a final, extended bout of tremors,
convulsions and pain; her death rattle sounds. Suddenly they hear wooden shoes on the street
outside and the blind beggar singing. “Emma began to laugh – a horrible, frantic, desperate laugh –
fancying that she saw the beggar’s hideous face, a figure of terror looming up in the darkness of
eternity (384).” And she falls back on the bed, dead.

IX

“Anyone’s death always releases something like an aura of stupefaction, so difficult is it to grasp this
irruption of nothingness and to believe that it has actually taken place (384).” Charles is grief-
stricken and breaks uncontrollably into tears. When Homais goes home, he is accosted by the blind
beggar who has come looking for the pharmacist to get the “antiphlogistic” salve, aka anti-
inflammatory promised by him. Homais tells him to come back later. He writes 2 letters, prepares a
sedative for Charles and decides to spin the story of Emma’s suicide: “When all the Yonvillians had
heard his story about the arsenic that Emma had mistaken for sugar while making a custard, Homais
returned once more to Bovary (385).” It takes Homais and the priest to convince Charles that he had
to plan a funeral for Emma; when he does, it is very extravagant with 3 coffins, her wedding dress
and velvet dressings. As they watch over the body, Homais and the priest get into a volatile
discussion about religion/science. Charles can’t stay away from the body. At daybreak his mother
arrives and that evening the townspeople come to pay their respects. Charles’s mother and Madame
Lefrancois clean and dress the body. Later, Charles lifts her veil to see her face and gives a scream of
horror that wakes Homais & Bournisien. When Felicite tells Homais that Charles wants a lock of her
hair, Homais is shaking so hard he slashes at it blindly. Emma’s father arrives and sees the black
cloth on the door (a sign that someone inside is dead) and faints.

X
Homais had tried to spare M. Rouault’s feelings and worded his letter in such a way that “it was
impossible for his to know what to think (394).” He asks Charles what happened to his baby and
they cry in each other’s arms. “The apothecary drew them apart. ‘There’s no use going into the
horrible details. I’ll tell Monsieur all about it later. People are coming. Have some dignity, for
heaven’s sake! Take it like a philosopher!’ (395)” Almost everyone attends the funeral. Hippolyte
wears his best false leg. It seems to Charles to last forever. Rouault is now alone in the world.
Charles and his mother talk and decide they will never again be separated. At midnight Lestiboudois
goes to the grave to retrieve his shovel and almost catches Justin who has come to mourn at Emma’s
graveside.

XI

The day after the funeral, Charles has Berthe sent home, but he tells her that her mother is on a trip,
and then he gets depressed because she is a cheerful child. Lheureux tells Vincart he better collect on
the debt Emma owed. After that “everyone began to snatch what he could. (401)” Charles refuses to
sell any of Emma’s possessions which angers his mother; they argue and she leaves. More and more
debts come to light and he finds out that Emma has already collected what was due to the doctor and
he is forced to borrow more. Felicite and Theodore elope. Charles finds the letter from Rodolphe
that Emma left in the attic. “In any case, Charles wasn’t one to go to the root of things: he closed his
eyes to the evidence, and his hesitant jealousy was drowned in the immensity of his grief (402).”
Charles starts dressing and acting as Emma had wanted him to and he haunts her bedroom,
completely neglecting his daughter. Homais stops letting his children play with Berthe now that she
is poor. The blind beggar has gone back to the hill near the city where he tells everyone who will
listen about Homais’s failure to help him. In return, Homais starts a letter to the editor campaign
complaining about homeless, diseased, problem people. Eventually, Homais is successful in getting
the beggar consigned to an asylum. Homais becomes increasingly well-respected as he continues to
write articles about the latest medical & scientific developments (& religious & political) & he
introduces chocolate as a health food, what he really wants is the cross of the Legion of Honor.
Charles has been avoiding going through Emma’s things, but finally he unlocks her desk and all the
love letters from Leon & Rodolphe spill out. “Everyone was amazed at the depth of his depression.
He no longer went out, had no visitors, refused even to call on his patients (409).” He takes Berthe
to the cemetery with him. Lheureux is successful in his transportation service which means financial
hardship for Madame Lefrancois. One day he decides to sell his horse and he meets Rodolphe who
invites him to have a beer. Charles looks at this guy his wife had loved and is tempted to get mad but
he forgives Rodolphe and blames fate for Emma’s death. The next day Berthe finds her father dead
in his garden. An autopsy showed no cause of death. All that was left was enough money to get
Berthe to her grandmother’s house. Madame Bovary dies that year and Berthe is sent to an aunt on
Emma’s side. The aunt sends her to the cotton mill to work for her living. The next 3 doctors in
Yonville do not amount to much. Homais did finally get the cross of the Legion of Honor.