46:I[185,["/_next/static/chunks/08z4tkzvltetr.js","/_next/static/chunks/121~yigv24_j6.js","/_next/static/chunks/0a~e7k..h6jfc.js","/_next/static/chunks/0za7dr7c2y81~.js","/_next/static/chunks/03klviw01y.ih.js","/_next/static/chunks/0gx_3vy1-syt4.js","/_next/static/chunks/0i6hzvr84kc1r.js"],"SendEmailButton"] 4c:I[45269,["/_next/static/chunks/08z4tkzvltetr.js","/_next/static/chunks/121~yigv24_j6.js","/_next/static/chunks/0a~e7k..h6jfc.js","/_next/static/chunks/0za7dr7c2y81~.js","/_next/static/chunks/03klviw01y.ih.js","/_next/static/chunks/0gx_3vy1-syt4.js","/_next/static/chunks/0i6hzvr84kc1r.js"],"SignupCTA"] 3f:["$","h1",null,{"className":"max-w-[22ch] font-display text-[clamp(32px,4.5vw,48px)] font-medium leading-[1.05] tracking-[-0.02em] text-[color:var(--fg-1)] text-balance","children":"Who’s afraid of realism? ‘Madame Bovary’ by Gustave Flaubert (part two)"}] 40:["$","div",null,{"className":"flex flex-wrap items-center gap-x-4 gap-y-1 font-mono text-[12px] uppercase tracking-[0.1em] text-[color:var(--fg-3)]","children":[["$","time",null,{"dateTime":"2026-02-02T11:05:00.000Z","children":"February 2, 2026"}],["$","span",null,{"aria-hidden":true,"children":"·"}],["$","span",null,{"children":"00:10:27"}],false]}] 47:T55d,

‘He opened him up and found nothing.’ These are the doctor’s findings at Charles Bovary’s autopsy near the end of 'Madame Bovary'. Taken on its own, it’s a simple medical observation. In the context of Emma Bovary’s tragic story, it serves as a condemnation not just of Charles’s emptiness but the whole provincial world Flaubert has been describing.

In the second part of his analysis of 'Madame Bovary', James Wood considers the major episodes leading to Emma’s death and argues that what made Flaubert’s realism dangerous was not its depictions of infidelity, but its use of cliché to expose French bourgeois lives constructed entirely of received ideas and second-hand emotions.

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