I’m afraid back to back posting may be frowned upon by our more symmetrically minded friends, but I just had to drop a few words since I just finished the book (I won’t have you scooping me again, twin!)
That is right Madame Bovary is finished. I’ve placed it back on the bookshelf between The Scarlet Letter and Anna Karenina (it’s my “sin shelf”). I’ll have to say that I was more horrified than I anticipated at Flaubert’s description of Emma’s end…and here we’re supposed to be hardened by the graphic violence and butt shots on NYPD Blue (by the way I’m posting from 1993) but Flaubert puts all that to shame. Yechh!
And the sadness doesn’t even stop there! It just gets worse. Contain yourself Gus, contain. The only thing that could have made it sadder would have been if Berthe had a puppy and the puppy got ran over by a horse and Berthe had had to watch as coyotes scavenged for supper from puppy carnage. Only that could have made it sadder.
I was finishing the book as I waited for my bus this afternoon and right before the bus came the wind started gusting and blew some grit into my eye (it was very Brief Encounter…except I was alone). Anyway said grit got itself tangled in my contact lenses and then the tears came and it looked like the tears were coming because of the book (just like when I finished The Bostonians when I had my sinus infection and tears were streaming down my face). So although I was quite affected by the end of the book, my bus mates thought my affectedness was exponentially greater.
So that means that I’m packing The Wind in the Willows for my Spanish holiday. Keep me posted (ha-ha posted) as to when you (finally) finish Bovary and wish to commence our newfound friendship with ones Frog and Toad (and Grover?…this book is about the Muppets right?)
Ciao,
Jon
