This is the first book-length study of Flaubert's use of dialogue, an important but neglected component of his fictional texts. Professor Haig's starting point is Sartre's observation that 'Flaubert does not believe that we speak: we are spoken'. Dialogue in Flaubert does not attempt to represent an individual style but to circumscribe a larger phenomenon of language. Speech defines man both in the sense that it describes him as a set of human characteristics, and inscribes him within a system of social values. The author explores the development of Flaubert's use of dialogue in Madame Bovary, L'Education Sentimentale (both versions), and Bouvard et Pécuchet.
| ISBN: | 9780521111522 |
| Publication date: | 7th May 2009 |
| Author: | Stirling Haig |
| Publisher: | Cambridge University Press |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Pagination: | 212 pages |
| Series: | Cambridge Studies in French |
| Genres: |
Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers Literary studies: c 1800 to c 1900 |