Word: bouvard
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When Flaubert died in 1880, he left Bouvard and Pecuchet, his "kind of encyclopedia made into a farce," unfinished and unedited. In scope, it was to be Flaubert's masterpiece: a satiric work compounded of his life-long scorn of the bourgeoisie, their morals, their intellectual giddiness, their thoughtless generalizations...
Flaubert's style, however, seems to deny effective translation. Writing in the idiom of the French middle class, using accepted cliches, and punning occasionally, he writes French that is very difficult to render into another language. Especially in the case of Bouvard and Pecuchet, many translations have lacked the spirit, even the satiric subtlety of the original. But this most recent attempt, published by New Directions and jointly translated by T. W. Earp and G. W. Stonier, accurately reveals the artistry of Flaubert to an English-reading audience...
After they renounce their lives as Paris copy clerks and move to the country, Bouvard and Pecuchet hop from one intellectual endeavor to the other. Their failure at preserving vegetables leads them to chemistry, and each successive disappointment leads to a new venture: geology, biology, medicine, verse, politics, literary criticism. Each new "study" leaves them uncertain and confused, but they feel sure that with one more book, one more discovery, a certain subject will become entirely clear to them...
...Flaubert seems always to have his sympathies with his two befuddled heroes. The follies of Bouvard and Pecuchet are pitiable but not hateful. Accepted as men of mediocre capabilities, the limited success that they do have is a glorious triumph. In comparison to the other characters in the book, their enlightenment is a miracle and their learning, shallow as it is, approaches the profound. Bouvard and Pecuchet are loyal friends, and for Flaubert, friendship is a virtue. Therefore, although these two heroes are the vehicle for some of the author's bitterest comments on the bourgeoisie, they...
...many valid complaints are heard against the shoddy intellectualism which is encouraged by pocket-sized philosophies and "Such a Person Made Easy" books. Flaubert, too, despised this surface learning. In a way then, Bouvard and Pecuchet are victims of circumstances. Even if they had the ability to gain real knowledge of any subject, it would be impossible, Flaubert seems to say, because of the superficial culture of the nineteenth century...