Gary Inbinder’s Reviews > Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris: The Story of a Friendship, a Novel, and a Terrible Year > Status Update
Gary Inbinder
is on page 188 of 292
The great French novels of the nineteenth century are all historical novels in some manner, in that they are largely concerned with the struggle to say to whom France belongs in the wake of Revolution, Napoleonic epic, Restoration, and then repeated insurrections.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 188). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 24, 2021 01:37PM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 188). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
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Gary Inbinder
is on page 209 of 292
Amid the stench of corpses and extinguished fires in Paris in June 1871, he could only lay a curse on all his countrymen for having given up on intelligence, on reading in a profound sense. Though Flaubert and the Commune stood at opposite ends of any kind of spectrum, they met in the ruins of Paris.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 209). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 28, 2021 07:48AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 209). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 208 of 292
The notion that the Second Empire needed another novel that would pick up following the coup d’état of December 2, 1851, that stands as climax of Sentimental Education, in what was to be explicitly Sous Napoléon III, demonstrates again that it is only within historical and political time that the individual can make sense of life.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 208). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 28, 2021 07:36AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 208). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 205 of 292
(Flaubert) was disappointed that his contemporaries didn’t understand the historical lessons implicit in Sentimental Education. But that did not mean giving up on the historical enterprise. What was needed, as he said in that letter to Du Camp revisiting the story of the Commune, was a scientific basis for the study of society.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 206). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 27, 2021 09:43AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 206). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 178 of 292
The solution of Bouvard and Pécuchet, after the failure of all their self-educative projects, and their attempts to educate Victor and Victorine and their fellow townspeople, is to return to copying... regurgitating the already said and already written, without visible intention other than keeping language going.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 178). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 23, 2021 06:59AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 178). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 161 of 292
In the aftermath of the Commune, Flaubert—perhaps without quite realizing it—became a republican. For all his belief in rule by intellectual elites—“mandarins,” as he liked to call them—his horror and disgust at what reactionaries and monarchists were up to drove him into alliance with the liberal bourgeoisie.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 161). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 21, 2021 09:50AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 161). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 138 of 292
With Saint Anthony finished (it would be published in 1874), he began taking notes for the book in which, he said, “I will try to vomit my bile on my contemporaries”—Bouvard and Pécuchet.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 138). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 19, 2021 07:44AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 138). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 133 of 292
Henry James’s question, “Why, why him?” (Frederic Moreau in Sentimental Education) may be answered by noting Frédéric’s quasi-anthropological role as someone who exists to witness and annotate history. A more active person with more of his own life might have served less well.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 133). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 18, 2021 08:46AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 133). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 129 of 292
The absolutes of political faith result in such a meeting of the extremes. If you put your faith exclusively in politics, you inevitably end up pursuing strange gods and killing in their name.
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 129). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 17, 2021 11:31AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 129). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Gary Inbinder
is on page 127 of 292
How often had he run errands in the ministries, made calculations, been a fixer, listened to reports! How many sales pitches, smiles, fawnings! ..he had acclaimed Napoleon, then the invading Cossacks, then Louis XVIII, 1830, the workers, all regimes, cherishing Power with such a love that he would have paid...to sell himself.”
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 127). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
— Sep 17, 2021 09:23AM
Brooks, Peter. Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris (p. 127). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
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P.E. wrote: "Keen observation there!Historical in some way or other indeed! Even what is sometimes considered as lesser novels or niche novels, such as
L'Ensorcelée, reminiscent of the Chouan..."
This book looks at the development of the 19th century French historical novel in some detail, including the influence of Sir Walter Scott on Hugo and Dumas père, etc. Also, in Balzac's Illusions perdues, Lucien de Rubempre (Chardon) a provincial poet who follows his aristocratic mistress to Paris and becomes a journalist out of necessity, is working on an historical novel much influenced by Scott. Flaubert transformed the historical novel to focus on the recent past and bring it into the present in an un-romantic, more objective, realistic and, at least in my opinion, more journalistic fashion.
In this regard, Maupassant can be said to have furthered Flaubert's cause, I would observe :)
P.E. wrote: "In this regard, Maupassant can be said to have furthered Flaubert's cause, I would observe :)"Yes, and the book discusses Maupassant and Zola as followers of Flaubert in this regard, and it also discusses Stenhal and Balzac as Flaubert's predecessors. Hugo and Dumas père took a more "old school" Romantic approach to the historical novel, even when they were dealing with recent history, as in "Les Miserables" and "The Count of Monte Cristo."
Historical in some way or other indeed! Even what is sometimes considered as lesser novels or niche novels, such as
L'Ensorcelée, reminiscent of the Chouans & Vendée wars,
Le Désespéré, Là-Bas, more than alluding to the spiritual revivalism in the last 20 years or so of the 19th century,
or even Le Sang noir and other works by Louis Guilloux, dealing with the conflicts issued from the confrontation of old and new elites.
Virtually all short stories by Maupassant, dealing with the tensions and rivalry between city and countryside, with the power of local notables, with the might of the media, with the consequences of the Franco-Prussian war after 1870,...
I feel like you could expand the scope of that observation way into the first half of the 20th century, at the very least: take Céline, Maurras, Mauriac, Drieu la Rochelle, Charles Peguy...