Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary and the Discourse of Hysteria

Abstract

Examines the interface between the hysteric Emma Bovary’s much ado about nothing and Flaubert’s idea that the perfect novel would be a book about nothing, held together by the strength of its style. Claims Flaubert offers a refiguration of medical discourses on hysteria prevalent during his time: the novel presages contemporary conceptualizations of this disturbance. Notes how Flaubert argues that hysteria should not be reduced to the issue of feminine sexual dissatisfaction, but is a form of communication meant to broadcast the fallibility of the symbolic and the self. Traces the way that the characters’ circling around nothing emerges as one of the structuring principles of Madame Bovary; discusses the heroine’s performance of hysteria, inventing new versions of the self as she responds to a desire to lose herself in fantasy.