Bouvard et Pécuchet
Bouvard and Pécuchet (Original Title: Bouvard et Pécuchet ) is an unfinished, satirical picaresque novel by Gustave Flaubert, published posthumously in 1881, a year after Flaubert's death in 1880.
Already designed in 1863 as Les Deux Cloportes ( " The two isopods " ), Flaubert has only started in August 1874 with the work on the book. Over time, he became obsessed with the work on the book so that he claimed to have read more than 1,500 books to prepare the transcript. He described the book itself as his masterpiece, which surpasses all his other works.
- 5.1 Texts
- 5.2 secondary literature
Content
Action
Bouvard and Pécuchet describes the adventures of two Parisian office workers ( copyist ) François Denys Bartholomée Bouvard and Juste Romain Cyrille Pécuchet. They are the same age and have an almost identical nature. Bouvard and Pécuchet meet each other on a hot summer day in 1838 and immediately close a symbiotic friendship. As Bouvard inherits a considerable fortune, decide which friends to settle in the country. You will find a piece of land near the village Chavignolles, between Caen and Falaise in Calvados in Normandy. The search for intellectual stimulation leads over the years by almost all branches of knowledge.
Flaubert sets the two title characters from the treacherous traps and adversities of Sciences and Arts. Any project that Bouvard and Pécuchet start, comes to failure. As Bouvard and Pécuchet after their failures and disappointments never remain on a subject, instead rest always new issues, they constantly stay on the stage of an amateur beginners. Their efforts lead to the deterioration of its relations with the villagers.
According to Flaubert's posthumous notes try the villagers - furious over Bouvard and Pecuchet antics - chasing the pair of friends from the area. Disgusted with the world in general, return Bouvard and Pécuchet ultimately to "copy, as once " ( comme autrefois copier ) return; they cease their intellectual efforts. The work ends with the intense preparation for making a double desk at which they want to write together.
Form
In each chapter, the activities of the title characters are assigned to specific subject areas. The work thus receives an episodic plot structure. The lack of a real success and the constant progression of time, the political and social conditions, integrating the rapid political changes in France after the February Revolution of 1848 and the founding of the Second French Republic, creates a strong tension effect of the novel.
Filming
- " Bouvard et Pécuchet " directed by Jean -Daniel Verhaeghe, 1989.