/lit/ - Literature

>>17624201
>What was her fucking problem?
she was a woman

>>17624205
Beat me to it.

>>17624201
>Madame Bovary c'est moi
In conclusion: Flaubert by the problem.

Jesting aside, it's a great book. I urge everyone on this board to read it.

>>17624205
well, that explains a lot
>>17624214
> it's a great book. I urge everyone on this board to read it.
Absolutely anon. I really like Flaubert's prose

>>17624219
gimme an example sentence

>>17624283
I didn't read it in english anon.

>>17624201
what was the meaning of the book?

>>17624313
Don't be a cuck and women are evil when they don't love you.

>>17624374
two eternal truths

>>17624214

It's a great book, but it's no Sentimental Education.

Unironically the greatest novel ever written.

>>17624201
Good book for incels who naively thinks that slut behavior started recently.
Those sluts always existed, and will always exist. Stupid, and empty. Totally solipsistic. Specialists at changing their minds quickly.
They are a manifesto against marriage.

>>17624379
anon...but it's not even top 3 French novel...
>>17624374
>>17624424
>>17624205
t. prime example why lower classes shouldn't be allowed to become literate
What's even funnier, you are literally Emma - just instead of reading romantic novels you read memes and r9k/pol "wisdom" about life and women. Moreover, you're completely detached from reality in the exact same manner as she is and not unlike her you somehow managed to feel superior over it despite the dazzling baselessness of such claims to everyone else. Pure comedy.

>>17624313
Don't take books too seriously, go outside and do something of your life.

>>17624379
I agree Sentimental Education is even better. Not sure I would call it the greatest novel ever with 100% certainty but it's one of the best contenders.

>>17624608
What is your top 3? Does in include In Search of Lost Time?
In fairness there are so many great French novels, the competition is pretty brutal. Almost impossible for a French writer to compare after 1960.

>>17624283
"How much are they?"

"A mere nothing," he replied, "a mere nothing. But there's no hurry; whenever it's convenient. We are not Jews."

>>17624631
I was just trolling cuz I haven't read Sentimental Education but my top 3 is
1.In search of lost time
2.Les Miserables
3.The Red and the Black
(probably 4 would be Bovary for now)
What is yours?

>>17624623

I was lucky enough to be able to read it in french and the prose is simply perfect. One issue I had with the prose in Mme. Bovary is that at times you can see that Flaubert is just trying to dazzle you and getting in the way of what he is trying to say. No such issue in Sentimental Education. It is Flaubert's perfect prose, but now completely transparent.

The ending is pure genius. I finished it and I could feel Flaubert laughing his ass off at me beyond the grave.

>>17624686

1. Sentimental Education
2. The Red and the Black
3. Crime and Punishment.

I'd also put Bovary in 4th. Ulysses is hors cathegorie, like those extra-hard mountain passes in the Tour de France.

>>17624205
/thread

>>17624608
t. woman

>>17624686
Hard question. My top 3 would probably be very similar to yours but with Sentimental Education at the top (haven't read In Search of Lost Time yet). Charterhouse of Parma and Madame Bovary deserve a mention of course, so does Tentation of Saint Anthony.
Giono's trilogy A King without Entertainment is also up there imo.
Balzac and Zola are words into themselves, their work are so big they basically count as modern prose epic.
Finally Diary of a Country Priest and The Future Eve are both very dear to me and quite unique novels. A bit too small and single minded to qualify as greatest, but certainly among the most fascinating and unforgettable books I've read.

If we're talking novels from all countries I'd have to fit a couple Dosto works (mostly Karamazov and The Idiot, but the Adolescent is great as well) and Anna Karenina, but also Zeno's Conscience and Moby Dick. Elio Vittorini's Conversations in Sicilia and Lampdusa's The Cheetah would be like Italian equivalent of Country Priest and Eve, smaller works but very special and memorable. Kobo Abe's The box man would be a Japanese equivalent.

In the end that's much longer than a top 3, but I feel the answer would be incomplete without all those. When I think about the novels I've read I realized the great massive novelistic cathedrals can't really replace the smaller intringuing works.

>>17624767
I agree with you on the prose, although I don't think Flaubert's writing is so noticeable in Bovary either (certainly much less so than most writers, except in a few memorable and generally deliberate occasions).

But yeah, in Sentimental Education he's perfected the art of self-restraint. When you look closely it's completely on a different level than most writers of prose. Even a great one like Zola, you can see how he's telegraphing his intentions with his writing. Nothing of the sort with Flaubert, you don't get to see the ropes.

The ending is indeed great (and very comforting in a way), and the chapter before the (the first ending so to speak), which is so unforgettable, is actually taken straight from Flaubert's own life.

>>17625004
*worlds into themselves
Btw Flaubert was such an admirer of Balzac he had to warn himself against unconsciously imitating him. Balzac is sometimes criticized for his prose, but he's really a giant and the godfather of the modern novel.

>>17624214
>Madame Bovary c'est moi
he never said that

>>17625135
He whispered it to my ear anon. Tenderly.

>>17625022

Yes, the best part about that ending is that after 300 pages of unrelenting cynicism, in a first read it seems like more of the same, but there is something sweet and wholesome about it. Like Fréderic and his friend have finally come to terms with how their adult life did not turn out the way they hoped but they still had a grand time. One cannot help but feel that now that they have a clearer view of their lives they could do a better job with them. It is unlikely, but I like think Flaubert leaves that window open.

The first ending is brutal. Imagine summarizing a couple decades in a couple paragraphs after all the loving detail that has come before. It hits you hard.

>>17625152

Imagine the smell.

>>17625202
Cheese and Baguette

>>17624608
>t. prime example why lower classes shouldn't be allowed to become literate
>What's even funnier, you are literally Emma - just instead of reading romantic novels you read memes and r9k/pol "wisdom" about life and women. Moreover, you're completely detached from reality in the exact same manner as she is and not unlike her you somehow managed to feel superior over it despite the dazzling baselessness of such claims to everyone else. Pure comedy.

Lmao, you're a pseud.

>>17625278

Imagine picking and eating the crumbs left in that moustache.

>>17625183
It really resonated with me as a man nearing 30. I'm really starting to come to terms with the fact that I didn't make the best of my 20s (to put it mildly) and that most ambitions are a fool's errand. I really consider that book to be the most essential read for a young man interested in literature. It's really the "literally me" of enthousiastic men under 30.

>>17624608
triggered wahmen

>>17625285
>lmao
t.
>>17624955
t. irrevokably fried brain

>>17624608
ah bloo bloo bloo post tits

>>17624686
LMFAO imagine putting rouge et le noir over madame Bovary, how fucking embarrassing.

>>17625952
>>17625942
the incel/poltard revolution has been disaster for /lit/man race
>>17625979
Wow you know the title in french! No way! Not surprised madame appeals to jaded decadent faggots of today. Take your beloved Flauberts advice - don't procreate, and stop samefagging as well.

>>17626079
>don't procreate, and stop samefagging as well.
I'm not name fagging(you're schizo) and you haven't adressed the fact that you have shit taste

>>17624201
>What was her fucking problem?
Her husband was a cuck.
>And why Charles was such a cuck?
He was a man.

>>17626774
>>And why Charles was such a cuck?
>He was a man.
More like he was married to her. You cannot be full cuck if you are not married. If a women disrespect you, leave her. Oh shit, you can't, since you are married (cuck). The more married you are, the more cuck you potentially are, and vice versa.

>>17625135
How do you know?

>>17625572

That's exactly how it made me feel.

Fréderic is a youthful romantic hero stuck in a realist novel: he tries everything a romantic hero should try and as such he squanders his youth.

>>17624201
>And why Charles was such a cuck?

The beginning of the novel describes Charles as a naïve, somewhat stupid do-gooder. That bizarre episode where Flaubert spends a page describing his hat in disturbing detail? That's his way of telegraphing Charles is a massive dork, because only a dork would wear such a hat in 19th century France. A dork and a cuck by nature is who Charles he is as a character. Everyone agrees that he has married way out of his league.