"But you never loved her!" Who is Emma?
Very early in the novel, Emma Bovary laments her fate of being a woman. She even longs for a boy so she can get her "revenge" through him. Is just her fate of being a woman in an oppressive patriarchal society enough to justify her actions? I didn't sense much sympathy for her in our class discussions, but she is always fighting the limitations of her culture. Are we less sympathetic toward her because while Charles is a boorish, dim, and unsophisticated man, he is basically good, and kind and true to her (and worships her)?
Does she ever suggest, in thought, word or action, that she would live differently if she were free from the constraints and double standards of her sex?
Does she ever suggest, in thought, word or action, that she would live differently if she were free from the constraints and double standards of her sex?
posted by Dr. Battles at 12:58 PM
4 Comments:
I think that she was fighting her limitations only because of her romantic viewpoint on life, based on the books she read while in the convent. She never once tried to face reality as far as what every day life actually entailed. As she approached the relationships she had, she always looked for change, never excepting complacency. Although Charles seemed boring and dull to her, he was loyal and willing to give emma anything she wanted, within reason. Why didn't she look toward her hisband for excitment and change instead of looking outside the marriage.
I don't remember her stating that she would trade sexes if possible, just mates.
I think Emma would act the same way even if she lived in a freer and more equal society because of her personality. She strives for more and more because she is never satisfied with what she has.
I don’t really think anything can justify her actions because she acts selfishly. She doesn’t commit adultery because of anything Charles did, but because she romanticized the idea, just like she tried to romanticize everything else in her life. She read these books of wonderful tales of love that were filled with noble heroes and damsels in distress and she wanted to live that imaginary life. When Charles, ordinary human that he is, failed to live up to her lofty expectations, she turned to other men, always hoping to find the hero from her novels.
At one point in the novel, Emma mentions the exciting, romantic ideas in some the things she’s read where the heroines were adulterers, seven the idea of committing adultery came from her books. She didn’t have an original thought, but hoped that by acting like the women in the novels she read she would find that “happily ever after” they all talk about.
As for her dream of a son, I wonder if she wanted the boy for “revenge” against society or if she had more sinister motives. A child listens to its parents. By having a little boy, she could influence and even control him whereas she can’t control adult men. Look at Charles: his mother still has a large say in everything he does and he’s a grown man.
This idea gains more support when you look at how she treats her lovers: she tries to get them to do what she says. She wants Rodolphe to fight Charles (and he doesn’t see why he should since he doesn’t really care for her). With Leon, she starts by convincing him to leave work when he knows he shouldn’t and things come to a head when she tells him to steal for her (which he refuses). In both dalliances, Emma takes the aggressive stance; she’s the one who goes running to her lover and she constantly buys gifts to please him. She’s trying to take control of the situation, but we all know she doesn’t really have any control.
Cicely,
I agree with you that Emma is very immature because she fails to realize that the fantasy world of books does not occur in real life. I think I would even take it a step further and say she is still very childlike because I think she is playing dress-up: she starts by living beyond her means so that she can look and act like the heroines in her novels and then she begins an affair, again mimicking the characters in the books she has read. Her whole life is spent trying to become one of those characters and she even dies in a dramatic way, a proper ending for a romantic novel.
I also don’t think Emma would change if her environment changed because I don’t think she really knows who she is. She spends her whole life trying to be someone else and that is ingrained in her character so she would continue to live in her fantasy world no matter where she really lived.
I don’t think she needed to create a male companion because Charles was willing to take on the role; she just never asked him to. Though very much a mama’s boy, Charles goes against his mother, first by marrying Emma, and then later by taking Emma’s side in an argument so I think he would have done anything Emma wanted. The problem was with Emma: once she had Charles, she no longer wanted him.
Brithabeth and Cicely,
I agree with most of what you both stated except the point of Emma acting the same in a freer society.
If Emma was raised differently, I believe that her actions and outlook would be different, just like anybody elses. Because of her attractions to books and her inexperience, she believed that married life should have been different than what she was experiencing. Life as a whole was far different in her books than in reality, making her unappreciative and thus unsettled , always looking for the better, which according to her books , was the correct way of life.
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