The Theme in the Work
The novel opens with marriages arranged by others. In Chapter 1 of Part I, the mother of Charles Bovary chooses for him the widow Dubuc, older and with an income; in Chapter 2 that woman makes him swear on the prayer book that he will not return to Bertaux, and she dies after the fortune proves false. In Chapter 3 the engagement to Emma Bovary is arranged between Charles and farmer Rouault, by the signal of the shutter, and Emma, who would have preferred to marry at midnight by torchlight, is not understood. Chapter 4 is the country wedding feast, and the next morning it is Charles who seems the maiden of the day before.
At Tostes, in Chapter 5, the bouquet of the dead bride is still in the bedroom, and Emma wonders what would be done with hers if she died; the happiness that marriage was supposed to bring does not come, and she concludes she was wrong to think herself in love. In Chapter 7 Charles's conversation is as banal as a sidewalk, and she asks herself why she married; in Chapter 9 her own wedding bouquet goes into the fire. In Part II, Chapter 5, Emma becomes an exemplary wife while her husband's tenderness pushes her toward adultery; in Chapter 11, after the failed operation on Hippolyte, she despises Charles; in Chapter 15, before Lucie de Lammermoor, she laments not having given her life, before the defilement of marriage, to a great and solid heart.
In Part III marriage becomes cover. Emma invents piano lessons in Chapter 4, sustains them with a false receipt in Chapter 5, and has Charles redraw the power of attorney that her mother-in-law burned. In Chapter 6 she finds in adultery the insipidity of marriage. Dead, she is buried by Charles, in Chapter 9, in her wedding dress; in Chapter 11, still knowing nothing, he sends congratulations on the wedding of Léon, then finds the letters and the portrait, and dies holding a lock of her hair.
No one in the book marries by clear choice: Charles marries twice, led first by his mother and then by a desire he does not name, and Emma marries a vocabulary. Two bouquets and a dress outline the theme: the bouquet of the dead woman found in the bedroom, Emma's own burned during the move, and the wedding dress in the coffin. The marriage in which Charles believed to the end existed only for him. And adultery, which should have been the way out, ends as a copy of what she was fleeing.
Where It Appears
- Part I, Chapter 1: Charles's mother installs him as a doctor in Tostes and chooses for him his first wife, the widow Dubuc, older and with a declared income.
- Part I, Chapter 2: Héloïse makes Charles swear on the prayer book that he will no longer go to Bertaux, and afterward her fortune is discovered to have been a lie.
- Part I, Chapter 3: Charles and farmer Rouault arrange the engagement, and Emma, who would have preferred to marry at midnight by torchlight, sees her father fail to understand the idea.
- Part I, Chapter 4: After the wedding feast, the one who seems the maiden of the day before is Charles, while Emma, the bride, lets nothing show.
- Part I, Chapter 5: At Tostes, Charles takes the bouquet of his dead first wife to the attic, and Emma, watching him, imagines what would be done with hers if she died.
- Part I, Chapter 7: Disappointed by Charles's banal conversation, Emma asks herself why she married during her walks to the abandoned pavilion at Banneville.
- Part I, Chapter 9: While packing for the move to Yonville, Emma watches her own wedding bouquet burn in the fire without comment.
- Part II, Chapter 5: Emma is admired in Yonville as an exemplary wife and mother, but behind her virtue she lives on desire and on anger at Charles.
- Part II, Chapter 11: After Hippolyte's leg gangrenes and is amputated, Emma looks at the humiliated Charles and feels ashamed at having imagined that such a man could have any worth.
- Part II, Chapter 15: Watching Lucie de Lammermoor, Emma laments not having given her life, before the defilement of marriage, to a great and solid heart.
- Part III, Chapter 2: At Charles's kiss, Emma thinks of Léon, and Lheureux, in full mourning, hints that the husband should give her a power of attorney.
- Part III, Chapter 4: Emma feigns a sudden passion for the piano and, using the lessons as a pretext, obtains from Charles permission to go to Rouen once a week.
- Part III, Chapter 5: When Charles says the piano teacher does not know her, Emma sustains the lie with a receipt that turns up inside Charles's boot.
- Part III, Chapter 6: Emma finds in adultery with Léon all the insipidity of marriage, because the two know each other too well for the surprises of possession.
- Part III, Chapter 9: Charles writes that he wants Emma buried in her wedding dress, white shoes, and wreath, in three coffins, of oak, mahogany, and lead.
- Part III, Chapter 11: Charles replies with congratulations on Léon's wedding, finds in Emma's writing desk Léon's letters and Rodolphe's portrait, and dies with a lock of her hair.
Passages
Before the marriage, Emma already wants another marriage.
The engagement is arranged between the two men, and Emma's desire already appears beyond the measure of her world.Emma eût, au contraire, désiré se marier à minuit, aux flambeaux; mais le père Rouault ne comprit rien à cette idée, Emma would, on the contrary, have wished to marry at midnight, by torchlight; but Father Rouault understood nothing of that idea.
Marriage is measured against the words of books, and loses.
Marriage does not deliver what love promised, and Emma concludes she was wrong to think herself in love.Avant qu’elle se mariât, elle avait cru avoir de l’amour; mais le bonheur qui aurait dû résulter de cet amour n’étant pas venu, il fallait qu’elle se fût trompée, songeait-elle. Et Emma cherchait à savoir ce que l’on entendait au juste dans la vie par les mots de félicité, de passion et d’ivresse, qui lui avaient paru si beaux dans les livres, before she married she had believed she had love; but since the happiness that should have resulted from that love had not come, she must have been mistaken, she thought. And Emma tried to learn what was really meant in life by the words felicity, passion, and intoxication, which had seemed so beautiful to her in books.
The bridal bouquet burns without a comment from Emma.
Les petites baies de carton éclataient, les fils d’archal se tordaient, le galon se fondait; et les corolles de papier, racornies, se balançant le long de la plaque comme des papillons noirs, enfin s’envolèrent par la cheminée, the little cardboard berries burst, the wire twisted, the braid melted; and the paper corollas, shriveled, swaying along the plate like black butterflies, at last flew up the chimney.
Her contempt for her husband turns back against her own hope.
Emma, in front of him, stared at him; she did not share his humiliation, but felt another: that of having imagined such a man could have any worth, as if she had not already verified dozens of times his mediocrity.
Adultery repeats what was meant to replace it.
They knew each other far too well for those surprises of possession that multiply pleasure a hundredfold. Emma was as bored with Léon as he was weary of her. Emma now found in adultery all the insipidity of marriage