French literature

Sentimental Education

 

 

 (Extract from chapter 5)

 

Flaubert should not be read like we eat a sandwich, but rather like being a guest at Alain Ducasse’s table. Every detail matter. Let’s savour the very substance of the language, the alchemy between sound and meaning!

In this extract, Flaubert tells the story of his hero, Frédéric, a student in Paris. But students don’t party all the time, they are also very bored. It is a Sunday atmosphere that the writer is trying to create here.

 

“He spent whole hours gazing from the top of his balcony at the river as it flowed between the quays, with their bulwarks of grey stone, blackened here and there by the seams of the sewers, with a pontoon of washerwomen moored close to the bank, where some brats were amusing themselves by making a water-spaniel swim in the slime. His eyes, turning aside from the stone bridge of Nôtre Dame and the three suspension bridges, continually directed their glance towards the Quai-aux-Ormes, resting on a group of old trees, resembling the linden-trees of the Montereau wharf. The Saint-Jacques tower, the Hôtel de Ville, Saint-Gervais, Saint-Louis, and Saint-Paul, rose up in front of him amid a confused mass of roofs; and the genius of the July Column glittered at the eastern side like a large gold star, whilst at the other end the dome of the Tuileries showed its outlines against the sky in one great round mass of blue. Madame Arnoux’s house must be on this side in the rear!

He went back to his bedchamber; then, throwing himself on the sofa, he abandoned himself to a confused succession of thoughts—plans of work, schemes for the guidance of his conduct, attempts to divine the future. At last, in order to shake off broodings all about himself, he went out into the open air.

He plunged at random into the Latin Quarter, usually so noisy, but deserted at this particular time, for the students had gone back to join their families. The huge walls of the colleges, which the silence seemed to lengthen, wore a still more melancholy aspect. All sorts of peaceful sounds could be heard—the flapping of wings in cages, the noise made by the turning of a lathe, or the strokes of a cobbler’s hammer; and the old-clothes men, standing in the middle of the street, looked up at each house fruitlessly. In the interior of a solitary café the barmaid was yawning between her two full decanters. The newspapers were left undisturbed on the tables of reading-rooms. In the ironing establishments linen quivered under the puffs of tepid wind. From time to time he stopped to look at the window of a second-hand book-shop; an omnibus which grazed the footpath as it came rumbling along made him turn round; and, when he found himself before the Luxembourg, he went no further.”

 

 

***

 

Simon P. Magee, Chicago, 1904.

 

« Il passait des heures à regarder, du haut de son balcon, la rivière qui coulait entre les quais grisâtres, noircis, de place en place, par la bavure des égouts, avec un ponton de blanchisseuses amarré contre le bord, où des gamins quelquefois s’amusaient, dans la vase, à faire baigner un caniche. Ses yeux délaissant à gauche le pont de pierre de Notre-Dame et trois ponts suspendus, se dirigeaient toujours vers le pont aux ormes, sur un massif de vieux arbres, pareils aux tilleuls du port de Montereau. La tour Saint-Jacques, l’Hotel-de-Ville, Saint-Gervais, Saint-Louis, Saint-Paul se levaient en face, parmi les toits confondus, – et le génie de la colonne de Juillet resplendissait à l’orient comme une large étoile d’or, tandis qu’à l’autre extrémité le dôme des Tuileries arrondissait, sur le ciel, sa lourde masse bleue. C’était par derrière, de ce côté-là, que devait être la maison de Madame Arnoux.

Il rentrait dans sa chambre ; puis, couché sur son divan, s’abandonnait à une méditation désordonnée ; plans d’ouvrages, projets de conduite, élancements vers l’avenir. Enfin, pour se débarrasser de lui-même, il sortait.

Il remontait, au hasard, le Quartier Latin, si tumultueux d’habitude, mais désert à cette époque, car les étudiants étaient partis dans leurs familles. Les grands murs des collèges, comme allongés par le silence, avaient un aspect plus morne encore ; on entendait toutes sortes de bruits paisibles, des battements d’ailes dans des cages, le ronflement d’un tour, le marteau d’un savetier ; et les marchands d’habits, au milieu des rues, interrogeaient chaque fenêtre, inutilement. Au fond des cafés solitaires, la dame du comptoir baillait entre ses carafons remplis, les journaux demeuraient en ordre sur la table des cabinets de lecture ; dans l’atelier des repasseuses, des linges frissonnaient sous les bouffées du vent tiède. De temps à autre, il s’arrêtait à l’étalage d’un bouquiniste ; un omnibus, qui descendait en frôlant le trottoir, le faisait se retourner ; et, parvenu devant le Luxembourg, il n’allait pas plus loin. »

 

 

***