Doctor, Doctor

First of all, let me just put your mind at ease. This post has absolutely nothing to do with the short-lived late ’80s sitcom of medical hi-jinkery (and oh, so much more) starring Matt Frewer. If it were I would have titled it Doctor, Doctor rather than just Doctor, Doctor. Oh what the difference italics make.

Secondly, a point of clarification. I think we are comparing apples and oranges when we compare the doctors you mention in your post to Charles Bovary, M.D. You see the doctor’s you mention are evil, which is neither here nor there when measuring their medical acumen. They could be very skilled, albeit evil, practitioners.

My argument is that Charles Bovary is the most inept fictional doctor you are likely to find in literature. (Apologies Dr. Slop.) He’s not even comedically inept. Its not like he hilariously slips on a banana peel when walking into his surgery or partakes in Robin Wiliams as Patch Adams clownishness, oh no my friend, he attributes frightening medical symptoms to obviously unrelated causes.

Therefore, we are comparing apples and oranges. And quite frankly, twinner, your apples are rather mealy and worm-ridden at that.

You do raise an interesting question re: Dr. Moriarity. In my mind he’s a malevolent podiatrist who turns his podiatric genius toward nefarious ends after seeing one bunion too many. (Is it any wonder that Sherlock Holmes always proclaims “the game’s afoot”?)

It’s all about the context clues.

Anyway, I haven’t actually read anymore of Love, Bovary Style. (I like to imagine this as an early working title of Madame Bovary.) But when has that ever stopped me from posting in the past.

Bovar and out,

Justin

Today’s Expectations with Yesterday’s Knowledge

I fear when you so heartlessly castigate Dr. Bovary you are viewing his skills with an anachronistic lens.  Sure by today’s standards and knowledge a fit of blood coughing would never be diagnosed as hyperlogorrhea (my attempt to make reading a lot into a medical term), but that’s because doctors today have a lot more science at their hands than did poor Dr. Bovary.

And I’m also for cutting Chuck some slack…I mean talk about kicking a man when he’s down (you’re not that far yet, but believe me he’s down).

And I’m willing to bet dollars to doughnuts (or doughnuts to dollars–if I win, I want lots of doughnuts…with sprinkles) that there are worse fictional doctors out there…how about that dentist from Marathon Man or Dr. Moriarity (was he a doctor?).  Put that in your pipe and smoke it (but don’t inhale–that can’t be healthy).

Reading your posts I’m taken back to those earlier pages of Bovary and I can now only wish that Emma had found satisfaction with Leon…I hope this isn’t a spoiler but worse “lovers” are in store.

Well I’m hungry and I have coffee stomach–got to go eat!

Jon

Paging Dr. Bovary, Part Deux

It’s official, bar none, Dr. Bovary has got to be the worst literary doctor of all time. I know we had this out in an early part of our conversation about this book, where we jokingly compared the medical inadequacies of Dr. Bovary vs. Dr. Slop our old friend from The Life and Opinions of…well, you know who. But it now appears that there is no contest.

Knowing you as I do, Twin Brother, you will not take this on face value, and demand me to site my sources so let me just stop you right there. I’ve done my homework on this one. So here goes:

How is this little nugget from the efforts of Flaubert’s medical marvel:

Upon learning that his wife is coughing up blood he willing attributes this symptom to too much reading, once the idea is suggested to him by his mother. (I have to admit as I was reading this page, I did feel a slight tickle in my throat and had the brief thought “Sweet Jesus, it’s true.” Luckily my cough ended up being a phlegmer rather than a bleeder.)

What’s next a sore throat caused by too much piano playing? Diarrhea from writing too much?

Magnificent diagnosis doctor. Bravo.

I could litter this post with other examples, but I am anxious to get back to book and see what hi-jinks the man from Huchette might be up to, and this being far from a high quality post, I feel it best to nip it in the bud, right about now…

Until I’ve read more and rediscovered my ability to write,

Justin

Heavy Lifting, or What Wheat Has Wrought

What a pleasant surprise to hear from you. I thought the heavy lifting of blog posts would be left to me as you get settled following your big move. Not unlike how the heavy lifting was left to me in helping you move. (“I have to become acquainted with the space,” can only hold water as an excuse for so long when it comes to me lugging boxes.)

So hearing from you via the blog is a pleasant surprise indeed.

I am quite concerned about the alarming impact that wheat seems to have had on literary characters of the 19th century. Cereal grains have always carried a lot of symbolic weight. I think it was Homer who wrote (or orally passed down for generations in a form eventually to be transcribed):

“Oh muse, I sing the song of the grain,
wheat of forbidden love, barley of pain.
The oat ever constant, the corn calming and nice
hops ever strengthing, to say nothing of rice.”

Or maybe I misremember. (Notice how I imply a familiarity with the epic poet, Homer. That’s right, buddy, I’ll see your Tolstoy and raise you a Homer.)

Leon has entered the story in my reading as well, and things by 19th century French standards are getting out of hand. First, Leon and Emma B. have a conversation and then Emma feigns weariness from the heat when walking to the village in order to walk by Leon’s side.

Feigning heat weariness must be the 19th century equivalent of “running out of gas” when taking a date home. I imagine Emma thinking to herself after Leon offers her his arm “The ol’ feigning weariness in the sun trick…works every time.”

Well, I am off to read more.

A pain in the grain,

Justin

On Wheat and Infidelity

Dear Twin,

Did you truly believe that we would spontaneously break out into a Vaudeville routine?  Things like that happen only rarely and I think we’ve filled our quota what with the time we both coincidentally dressed up like hobos and stumbled across a pianist playing “Brother Can You Spare A Dime”.  But that being said, I’ll try to look at every interaction that we have as a possible 1920s-era dance hall entertainment opportunity in the future.

But on to more things centrally Bovary…I was reading today and the adulterous action is starting to rev up (It’s getting all Desperate Housewives in the French countryside).  As I read what I believe to be the beginning of Emma’s strayings I was struck by the connection that Flaubert makes between this initial amorous interaction and wheat.  And how in that other great novel of infidelity, Anna Karenina, Tolstoy similarly combines wheat with a marriage’s dissolution.  Classic novels have caused me now to give up to things…reading classic novels and wheat.  What will you ruin next Flaubert, Totino’s Pizza Rolls?

Also note how I conversationally dropped the fact that I’ve read, Anna Karenina.  I “subtly” work these references in conversation whenever I can (“Oh, you’re such a Kitty!”  “I love this Argyle sweater as much as Levin loves wheat!”  I’ll say often and repeatedly).

So things are heating up in Book Two…I best get back to reading!

Jon

Adieu, Book One, Adieu

Here’s how I envisioned this conversation going:

Justin: Well, Twin Brother, it’s official Book One is in the books.
Jon: What?
Justin: Book One is in the books.
Jon: I know Book One is in the books. I am already onto Book Two.
Justin: I am onto Book two, too. Book One is in the books.
Jon: I know book one is in the books. They’re identical books, of course, Book One is in the books.
Justin: No, no, it’s “in the books.” It’s over, it’s finished.
Jon: What’s in “in the books?”
Justin: Book One
Jon: I know Book One is in the books. I am already onto Book Two. Didn’t we already cover this?

This conversation would have gone on and on in an Abbot and Costello “Who’s on First”-esque round of hilarity. Although this would be slightly less hilarious and considerably more annoying, and instead of ending with thunderous applause and deep belly laughs it would likely end with you slamming the phone down in frustration.

Instead the conversation went something like this:

Justin: Well, it’s official, Book One is in the books.
Jon: It’s about time.
Justin: Book One it’s in…huh, what?
Jon: It’s about time. I’ve been reading Book Two for like a week
Justin: Oh.

I guess we’ll just have to chalk that up to a missed opportunity. Oh well, maybe me can have a vaudevillian exchange following Book Two.

Until I read more,

Justin

I meant shoehorn

So deal with it… I guess my definition of furniture is broader than yours (I’d define it as anything in a house).  Hence my shoe horn declaration.  But I’ll admit I’m intrigued by your china hutch idea (I didn’t know anyone saw the fragile china inside.)

It’s funny how after two weeks your opinions can change.  Since I wrote that post I came across an alarming picture of you, my twin, in a white fedora and sunglasses getting “jiggy” with it…

And now I think Emma might be on to something.

I’m  just joking, twin…dance if you want to!  “There was a man Bo-Justin and he’d dance for you/The old soft shoe.”

Back to moving stuff,

Jon

Dance, Dance Revolution

First a quibble. You know how I hate to quibble, but in this case, quibble I must.

In your last post, you said that if you were a piece of furniture you would be a shoehorn? A shoehorn??

A shoehorn is not a piece of furniture. If anything it’s a dressing tool or fashion aid, that would be like me saying, “If I were a piece of furniture I would be a lint brush or a corset fastener.” Perhaps you meant the close cousin of the shoehorn, the bootjack, but that too, while more substantial in size, still doesn’t quite fit the bill as furniture. 

Quite honestly, I always had you pegged as the human equivalent of a china hutch. By all outward appearances sturdy and indestructible, but inside full of fragile, ornately patterned dishes. (I know, I know, I just completely blew your mind with the accuracy of my description of “china hutch as Jon.” What can I say? I’ve just always had a knack of pairing people with their furniture equivalent.)

In case you were wondering, I would be a deceptively comfortable looking chair that once sat in you never quite get settled into. (Well, either that or a bookcase.)

Now the question of the day: Why won’t Emma let Charles dance?

I know you mentioned this in your post a few weeks ago, and now that I’ve finally made it to this portion of the novel I have to agree. In my 21st Century reading of the book when Charles and Emma have the following exchange:

“–These ankle straps are going to be awkward for dancing, he said
–Dancing? said Emma
–Yes
–You must be out of your mind! They’d laugh at you. You stay sitting down.”

I couldn’t help but imagine Charles getting ready, tying up his ankle straps, while stiffly bending his arms at the elbow working on his Robot for the big shindig. (I also had a bizarre flashback to a conversation that I remember having before every school dance I ever attended.)

In the end though, I agree with you, Twin Brother, let Charle cha-cha. Is it me or can Emma B. be a bit of a wet blanket sometimes? 

Anyway, I am now nearing the end of Book I. Perhaps I will go sit on my shoehorn and finish-up.

Justin

 

 

Bonjour Belle Bovary!

And I thought I was Christine because I actually own teaware (i.e. coffee mugs) with pictures of the royal family on them.  I may or may not be enjoying a piping hot cup of Lapsang Suchong from my Queen Mum Centary mug as I type this post.  (Spoiler:  I’m not).

Well twin hold on to your horses because I came across a startling discovery last night when I was re-watching a favorite Disney Classic.  I started watching my personal favorite of all of Mr. Disney’s movies, Beauty and the Beast last night and found myself becoming more and more shocked and dismayed as the story line progressed (and not just because of Gaston’s horrible behavior).  For as the movie progressed I recognized many similarities between the Disney princess Belle and Flaubert’s own “princess” Emma.

Similarities between Belle (Beauty) and Emma Bovary that cause me concern for the future happiness of both Belle and Beast:

1. Both of them like to read–if Madame Bovary has taught me anything its that reading is bad news and a source of constant sorrow.
2. Both of them are continually dissatisfied with their current stations (“I want more than this provincial life” sings Belle in the sweeping opening number “Bonjour”)
3. Both meet their future partners during high-stress situations involving the well-being of their fathers.

Belle meet Emma, Emma Belle.  Beast beware!

Oh everything will appear to be going along hunk-dorily until Belle meets an enchanted bookcase…and well we know what happens next (or we don’t…yet.)

Then I thought what piece of household furniture would Emma Bovary be if she had been enchanted by the Curse of the Beast?

Then I thought what piece of household furniture would I be if I had been enchanted (I think a shoehorn).

Then “Be Our Guest” started playing and I had to focus on singing along in my bad French accent (“Try the gray stuff, its delicious/ Don’t believe me, ask the dishes!”)

I’ve been quite Gallic in my reading and movie watching lately.  Dans Paris on Friday night.  Janet Malcolm’s Two Lives (all about Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas in France) on Saturday and Sunday.  And now Beauty and the Beast (which, granted, is barely French).  I sense a theme.

Don’t pull a muscle patting yourself on the back for reading a chapter…you’re still lagging behind.  I look forward to hearing your thoughts on certain characters who have not yet entered into your reading but that I am now quite familiar with and wish to discuss if you ever read more of the book.

Best,

Jon

 

I Did It!!!

That’s right,Twin Brother, I once again picked up my copy of Madame Bovary. Now, I only read one chapter, but I’ve always been a proponent of quality over quantity and I have to say I read that one chapter spectacularly well. 

Thank you for tying your criticism of my reading pace to an all time favorite episode of Night Court, but I think you forgot a plot point or two. Mac was keen to get through his night’s work so that he could get home, get some sleep, and get up for the big two-for-one cardigan sale at the local department store, and Christine had to get her Royal Family commemorative china polished for the big high tea she had planned with her hoity-toity society friends.

In my metaphor, I am Mac. Because I like cardigans and can’t refuse a deal. And you are Christine…because you like tea and I didn’t mention anyone else.

And there is no metaphor.

I completely agree with your assessment of Flaubert’s love poem to excessively filled gutters. You know what really chaps my hide though, is that Flaubert has once again beaten me to the punch. I was just working on a metaphor of love as a over-flowing, backed-up toilet, but it all seems so pointless when I now know that Flaubert has all ready done such wonders with the gutter. Any work I might do in the ill-functioning genre of metaphor would only pale in comparison. I guess that is just a metaphor I will have to abandon. 

Oh well.

Anyway, in my reading it seems that Emma is a bit disillusioned with marriage. I wonder what happens next?? I hope these two crazy kids find a way to work through their differences.

Okay, I am off to read a few more pages of Madame B.

Bovar and out,
Justin