Madame Bovary: Flashbacks 1 key example

Thus, the flashback breaks away from centralizing Charles’s role in Emma’s life to discuss Emma’s life before Charles, which feels like the true beginning of Madame Bovary. This flashback chapter mirrors the novel’s opening, which describes Charles’s childhood and creates the feeling that the first few chapters were only a false start that now comes to fruition with the reintroduction of the titular character on her own terms. The use of a flashback to restart the novel subverts the expectation of the novel having a male focus (although the title may have tipped off readers) and challenges readers by making them realize that even realist stories are subjective and change based on the focal character. 

Furthermore, the flashback, especially when compared with Charles’s childhood, explains why Emma behaves as she does. Whereas Charles was hardworking but ultimately mediocre in his classes, Emma is remarkably bright but lacks discipline. Furthermore, while he had time to explore vices and develop a sense of self, she did not have that same transitional period in her life, flitting from one contained lifestyle to another and rooting her identity in the literary world, the only place she found freedom. The role of gender shaped their experiences, as Emma’s longing for adventure and something greater grew the longer she was confined by the limitations of women’s role in society. In contrast, Charles has only become more mediocre and settled over time due to the freedom his gender has afforded him. As such, while their personalities are fundamentally different, society’s restriction of women heightens said differences and contributes to Emma’s discontent throughout the novel.

The flashback also explains how and why she turned to literature and other sources of romanticism as a guide:

With a mind that was practical, even in the midst of her enthusiasms, she had loved the Church for the sake of the flowers, music for the words of the ballads, and literature for its power to kindle her passions; this mind rebelled against the mysteries of faith, as she became ever more irritated by the discipline, which was a thing alien to her temperament. 

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Establishing Emma’s romantic ideals in this way foreshadows Emma’s lifelong struggle of trying to find happiness by showing how she has previously sought this goal through various means, such as her previous religious zealousness, with little success. The flashback recounts how she has used her passions as escapism from her previous “cages” of mundanity (the convent and her father’s farm), signaling to the reader that she will tragically attempt the same to escape the small towns she is stuck in throughout her marriage.

Thus, the flashback breaks away from centralizing Charles’s role in Emma’s life to discuss Emma’s life before Charles, which feels like the true beginning of Madame Bovary. This flashback chapter mirrors the novel’s opening, which describes Charles’s childhood and creates the feeling that the first few chapters were only a false start that now comes to fruition with the reintroduction of the titular character on her own terms. The use of a flashback to restart the novel subverts the expectation of the novel having a male focus (although the title may have tipped off readers) and challenges readers by making them realize that even realist stories are subjective and change based on the focal character. 

Furthermore, the flashback, especially when compared with Charles’s childhood, explains why Emma behaves as she does. Whereas Charles was hardworking but ultimately mediocre in his classes, Emma is remarkably bright but lacks discipline. Furthermore, while he had time to explore vices and develop a sense of self, she did not have that same transitional period in her life, flitting from one contained lifestyle to another and rooting her identity in the literary world, the only place she found freedom. The role of gender shaped their experiences, as Emma’s longing for adventure and something greater grew the longer she was confined by the limitations of women’s role in society. In contrast, Charles has only become more mediocre and settled over time due to the freedom his gender has afforded him. As such, while their personalities are fundamentally different, society’s restriction of women heightens said differences and contributes to Emma’s discontent throughout the novel.

The flashback also explains how and why she turned to literature and other sources of romanticism as a guide:

With a mind that was practical, even in the midst of her enthusiasms, she had loved the Church for the sake of the flowers, music for the words of the ballads, and literature for its power to kindle her passions; this mind rebelled against the mysteries of faith, as she became ever more irritated by the discipline, which was a thing alien to her temperament. 

Cite this Quote

Establishing Emma’s romantic ideals in this way foreshadows Emma’s lifelong struggle of trying to find happiness by showing how she has previously sought this goal through various means, such as her previous religious zealousness, with little success. The flashback recounts how she has used her passions as escapism from her previous “cages” of mundanity (the convent and her father’s farm), signaling to the reader that she will tragically attempt the same to escape the small towns she is stuck in throughout her marriage.