Other editions of book Madame Bovary A Tale of Provincial Life

In a provincial village far from Paris, a doctor named Charles Bovary marries a beautiful farm girl: Emma. She rapidly grows bored with him and takes a rich landowner as a lover. When her lover rejects her, she takes up with a law clerk. Her husband knows nothing of her romances, nor does he know that Emma has ruined him with her waste, poor management, and self-indulgence...

"‘Madame Bovary’ has a perfection that not only stamps it, but that makes it stand almost alone: it holds itself with such a supreme unapproachable assurance as both excites and defies judgment." —Henry James"Ever since ‘Madame Bovary’, the art of the novel has been considered equal to the art of poetry." —Milan Kundera"From the narrative point of view, the most perfect book is ‘Madame Bovary’ by Flaubert." —Giorgio de Chirico"Stylistically it is prose doing what poetry is supposed to do." —Vladimir Nabokov"‘Madame Bovary’ show Flaubert as the pioneer of our age, the portraitist and philosopher of the modern world." —Émile Zola"Possibly the most beautifully written book ever composed; undoubtedly the most beautifully written novel… a book that invites superlatives… the most important novel of the century." —Frank O’ConnorThis exquisite novel tells the story of one of the most compelling heroines in modern literature — Emma Bovary. Unhappily married to a devoted, clumsy provincial doctor, Emma revolts against the ordinariness of her life by pursuing voluptuous dreams of ecstasy and love. But her sensuous and sentimental desires lead her only to suffering corruption and downfall. A brilliant psychological portrait, Madame Bovary searingly depicts the human mind in search of transcendence. Who is Madame Bovary? Flaubert's answer to this question was superb: "Madame Bovary, c'est moi." Acclaimed as a masterpiece upon its publication in 1857, the work catapulted Flaubert to the ranks of the world's greatest novelists.

In a provincial village far from Paris, a doctor named Charles Bovary marries a beautiful farm girl: Emma. She rapidly grows bored with him and takes a rich landowner as a lover. When her lover rejects her, she takes up with a law clerk. Her husband knows nothing of her romances, nor does he know that Emma has ruined him with her waste, poor management, and self-indulgence...

In a provincial village far from Paris, a doctor named Charles Bovary marries a beautiful farm girl: Emma. She rapidly grows bored with him and takes a rich landowner as a lover. When her lover rejects her, she takes up with a law clerk. Her husband knows nothing of her romances, nor does he know that Emma has ruined him with her waste, poor management, and self-indulgence...

Emma Bovary, daughter of an uneducated farmer and wife of a dull doctor in northern France, harbors a passion for everything beyond her grasp - sophistication, romance, love, and deliverance from her banal provincial life. Motivated by the primal, idealized, and vain, she seeks adventure. And with each new endeavor, Emma sets for herself an inevitable and inescapable trap. Condemned as an affront to public morals, Madame Bovary’s obscenity trial made it notorious. Today, Emma stands as one of fiction’s most famous figures, and the novel itself, among the most pioneering and influential in world literature. AmazonClassics brings you timeless works from the masters of storytelling. Ideal for anyone who wants to hear a great work for the first time or rediscover an old favorite, these new editions open the door to literature’s most unforgettable characters and beloved worlds. Revised edition: Previously published as Madame Bovary, this edition of Madame Bovary (AmazonClassics Edition) includes editorial revisions.

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.'...for her, life was as cold as an attic with a window looking to the north, and ennui, like a spider, was silently spinning its shadowy web in every cranny of her heart.'Married to Charles, a provincial doctor, Emma Bovary yearns for a more glamorous life. Disenchanted with her husband and seeking an escape from their dull marriage she is soon tempted into a brief romantic liaison with another man. Although short-lived, she remains desirous of passion and the finer things in life and embarks on another affair, destroying her reputation.Considered scandalous at the time, Emma Bovary's superficial and immoral behaviour shocked readers and caused moral outcry. Flaubert holds up to ridicule not only Madame Bovary herself, but the society that dares to judge her.

Emma, a passionate dreamer raised in the French countryside, is ready for her life to take off when she marries the decent, dull Dr. Charles Bovary. Marriage, however, fails to live up to her expectations, which are fueled by sentimental novels, and she turns disastrously to love affairs. The story of Emma’s adultery scandalized France when Madame Bovary was first published. Today, the heartbreaking story of Emma’s financial ruin remains just as compelling.In Madame Bovary, his story of a shallow, deluded, unfaithful, but consistently compelling woman living in the provinces of nineteenth-century France, Gustave Flaubert invented not only the modern novel but also a modern attitude toward human character and human experience that remains with us to this day. One of the rare works of art that it would be fair to call perfect, Madame Bovary has had an incalculable influence on the literary culture that followed it. This translation, by Francis Steegmuller, is acknowledged by common consensus as the definitive English rendition of Flaubert’s text.