If you only ever read one letter writer, make it Flaubert. But along with the art-theory torrent, be prepared for lush obscenity. I'd always bought into the myth of Flaubert as shutaway, but he was just as much a man of the world.
It really thrills me to imagine that someone, a hundred years from now, will have a collection of their WhatsApp messages distributed as evidence that they were “one of the early 21st century’s wittiest minds.”
I have this habit (a bad one) of doing long joke sessions with women contacts who are in some spectrum of interest in dating or friends. Alcohol and phones don't mix, but some of these contacts really enjoy these sessions. It's basically just straight improv which sometimes might go on for an hour or more. I mostly drink alone or with people who don't speak English, and are just there mostly silently hanging out. This would not otherwise be productive time for me, and I mostly don't chat when sober. I feel guilty for the women, because I'm taking up their time. But they would drop out if they didn't enjoy them. Some of them are really good improv partners, they send prompts and I keep the jokes flowing. I would talk to dudes, but there's something about the contrast of culture and gender which seems to make these work well. If the person on the other end is too much like me, then they don't flow. Often I'll wake up the next morning and crack myself over a long chat session that was hazy. Like, some of this stuff, I don't know how I come up with it. It's not necessarily the alcohol, but rather the setting puts me in a place where I'm 100% not thinking about work or anything else serious. My brain is totally free. Modern life inhibits this flow. So, now I download the chats in whatever form available, parse them, and stick them in a database app so that I can tag some of the highlights. ;)
I mean, people still read Sam Pepys’ diaries, which are basically tweet-format (you can even follow along in realtime: https://mastodon.social/@samuelpepys )
I'm tired that everybody is pretending that many of the great classic are any good today. It's like people eating dried days old cake, but because it comes from a great chef, they can't honestly form an opinion about it and will just praise it.
At the time, given the lack of offer and the standards they had, sure, the books were great.
But I had to read a Flaubert's as part of my French education. From today's perspective, it's boring, it's not insightful and the style is excruciatingly dated.
Same with Victor Hugo, Jules Verne, Jule Vales, Rousseau...
Sure, you have jewels that still hold very well after so many years, like Dumas or Rostand.
But otherwise, we are stuck in the past, advising young readers to dive into things because of the inertia of their reputation rather than their real qualities.
There are better things in the ancien Greek literature to read if you want more profound wisdom, better social critics in 60-80' sci-fy, and more deep and developed characters in many new york times best sellers.
Or if you really want to read French, there are Lanzmann, Pennac, Nothomb...
Not to mention we have way more than books today. Hell, there are TV shows that give you more in a few scenes than entire books of this guy.
And video games that will create more lasting impact in a few minutes of gameplay than old Gustave.
Plus if we stay in French, the field of bandes dessinées will cover a vast range of emotional and philosophical fields by the time Flaubert takes to tell you something died of pneumonia. Again.
> From today's perspective, it's boring, it's not insightful and the style is excruciatingly dated
From your perspective. From my perspective, Madame Bovary and Sentimental Education are exceptional. Fresh, engaging and psychologically insightful. I would recommend anyone who enjoys reading to try Flaubert.
There is this effect, as with Shakespeare or the Bible, where you read a classic and it seems tacky and common because you read the same references a thousand times without realizing that originally it was the source of those references.
Maybe that has some influence in your opinion, or maybe you don't like Flaubert, and that is fine, just adding to the conversation. There are other tropes, like the tortured French intellectual (old professor usually) and womanizer character in a novel (cough Houellebecq) that I find tiring, but "para gustos colores" (different strokes for different folks).
IMO Long descriptions of rooms do not feel as modern as Hemingway, but who is to say that fashion won't change in the future.
Agreed "It's a classic so it's good, don't argue" doesn't wash. It's just conformity impressed on one by conformists. Some things need to be allowed to die on their own dis-merits, not forced to remain alive like tithonus (Vanity Fair, OMG)
(A bit more precisely, people should be allowed to make up their own mind. If I don't think Shakespeare is as good as I'm supposed to think he is, it's all subjective so my opinion carries as much weight as anyone else's. Nobody, especially at school, should be forced into reading what doesn't work for them. I'd much rather have read Greek legends myself).
Although your critique is reminiscent of some of the worst quotes from Sam Bankman Fried, I was intrigued, until you praised Pennac and Nothomb. Nothomb is a big bag of nothing. Pennac is nice and funny and is part of the readings I have been recommending to my kids, but he's not in the same league as Flaubert. In fact it's not even the same sport.
It's possible you disliked Flaubert because it was compulsory. Same thing happened to me with Stendhal. If so, may I suggest you try again.
I created an account just to refute this ridiculous comment.
Flaubert genius was he was incredibly economical in his writing. Salambo, Temptation of St Anthony, Madame Bovary and Sentimental Education are all so wildly different. Event translated into English the fragrant, elegance comes through. Nabokov, James Joyce, William James and Cormac McCarthy all tooks lessons from him and recognized the power of his writing.
The papers of Cormac McCarthy have some self inspired French poetry inspired from 'The Temptation of St. Anthony'. Scenes from Blood Meridian are inspired by the violence of certain scenes in the Temptation.
He was a massively talented genius writer. I think you were forced to learn and appreciate literature and any work that is administered in an academic setting loses its charm.
Denigrating Greek literature is incredibly dismissive. Some of the passages of the Illiad (the description of the shield of Achilles or the scenes of Hectors fear of impending death). Or the Odyssey (the dog recognizing Odysseus) remain the some of the most evocative, tragic scenes of all liteature.
Literature reflects the age in which it is written. Simply declaring all social critique is useful between the 60s and 80s robs you of any undestanding of the past.
Madame Bovary is a savage social critique of insipid provincial life. You can feel the scorn and disdain dripping off the pages. Flaubert had opinions on his own characters and was without any empathy for them.
This entire comment is indicative of a tech bro who had a bad experience in public schooling.
Many of the classics are classics for a reason because time is the greatest sieve of quality or they are essential to understanding the Western cannon and by extension the entirety of Western thought.
Since I don't denigrate greeks but say the opposite, that you can find in it profound things than what flaubert has to say, I will assume you just answered in anger and not as a person intérested in the debate.
Maybe you're just the wrong reader, or reading at the wrong time? I've noticed books get a lot worse or better depending on the age I read them, the conditions I'm in.
That said, I read (and liked) Flaubert in translation, so maybe it's worse in French.
I like Daniel Pennac and Nothomb but come on, they didn't move forward the beauty of the french language.
I used to be relativistic in arts just like your comment, then I read Dumas (Monte Cristo) and Hugo (1793, The Workers of the Sea) and my jaw dropped. Must read ! (French here too)
That said, I'd love if music video clips, video games, TV shows took more inspiration from literature and merge more the different mediums
But otherwise, we are stuck in the past, advising young readers to dive into things because of the inertia of their reputation rather than their real qualities
Agreed about inertia and conservatism, but still in France I notice we read lots of recent books too.
Lanzmann did, espacially with the white whale. I specifically chose those authors because they each bring something different.
Pennac brings a fresh point of view on morality, hapiness, character motivations, etc. Flaubert characters are monodimensional while pretending they are complex.
And nothomb has a different take on madness, absurd and finding life in it. Flaubert states what now we know is obvious, because we have read it ten times.
Flaubert tries to sell you something in the disguise of a story. I find it unsatisfying now that we have all those new flavors and textures in abundance.
We are drowning in talent and creativity, beauty and emotion. Our generation is blessed with so much good fresh cake I don't see the point of the dry one.
But to be honest, the only argument I need is that if you take a 100 kids and make them read all of them, 98 will not finish Flaubert if they have a choice, but they might finish one if the other books. That's not because Flaubert is too hard to get into.
There's a superb collection of his letters here:
https://flaubert.univ-rouen.fr/correspondance/correspondance...
As for translations, I found Geoffrey Wall's more even and nearer Flaubert's style than Steegmuller's.