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Similes
Part 3, Chapter 11
Explanation and Analysis—The Ending:
The ending of Madame Bovary is when the novel’s cynicism comes to its head, as it follows through on its realism to ensure that Emma’s bad actions have consequences. However, Flaubert takes this cynicism further by having the even more morally corrupt characters, such as Homais and Lheureux, succeed in their greedy ambitions while innocent characters, such as Berthe and Charles, find their downfall with Emma. Ironically, Emma’s attempts to gain status result in her family losing any status they once had.
This irony is compounded by how it is an ongoing joke in the novel that Monsieur Homais wanted more notoriety and respect for his minor achievements and overstepping in local matters, even to the degree of desiring a Legion of Honour (the highest French order of merit) for himself. The novel’s closing line subverts this mockery:
He [Homais] has just received the Legion of Honour.
The least deserving character comes out on top despite causing even more harm than Emma throughout the novel. For example, although Emma pressured her husband into going through with the surgery on Hippolyte, Homais was the one to thoughtlessly introduce the idea of the surgery and equally force Charles’s hand. Homais’s careless whim leads to Hippolyte suffering greatly, nearly dying, and having his leg amputated. Furthermore, this failed surgery was a leading cause of the financial downfall of the Bovarys, which resulted in Berthe’s ending as a poor millworker. This is only one example of how Homais is the only one not suffering from his misdeeds.
The irony of the different endings for these similarly flawed characters revolves around the double standard of ambitious men succeeding where ambitious women fail, due to their privileged gender. The novel’s ironic ending exposes the cynical reality that greedy, bourgeois men will continue to get richer while everyone else will suffer.
Related Themes:
