Bouvard and Pecuchet

by Gustave Flaubert

  It was necessary to give her something good.

  Bouvard was in favour of the Tour de Nesle. But Pécuchet was afraid of parts which called for too much action.

  "She would prefer some classical piece! Phèdre, for instance."

  "Be it so."

  Bouvard set forth the theme: "It is about a queen whose husband has a son by another wife. She has fallen madly in love with the young man. Are we there? Start!172

  "'Yes, prince! for Theseus I grow faint, I burn—

  I love him!'"[9]

  And, addressing Pécuchet's side-face, he gushed out admiration of his port, his visage, "that charming head"; grieved at not having met him with the Greek fleet; would have gladly been lost with him in the labyrinth.

  The border of the red cap bent forward amorously, and his trembling voice and his appealing face begged of the cruel one to take pity on a hopeless flame.

  Pécuchet, turning aside, breathed hard to emphasise his emotion.

  Madame Bordin, without moving, kept her eyes wide open, as if gazing at people whirling round; Mélie was listening behind the door; Gorju, in his shirt-sleeves, was staring at them through the window. Bouvard made a dash into the second part. His acting gave expression to the delirium of the senses, remorse, despair; and he flung himself on the imaginary sword of Pécuchet with such violence that, slipping over some of the stone specimens, he was near tumbling on the ground.

  "Pay no attention! Then Theseus arrives, and she poisons herself."

  "Poor woman!" said Madame Bordin.

  After this they begged of her to choose a piece for them.

  She felt perplexed about making a selection. She had seen only three pieces: Robert le Diable in the capital, Le Jeune Mari at Rouen, and another at Falaise 173which was very funny, and which was called La Brouette du Vinaigrier.[10]

  Finally, Bouvard suggested to her the great scene of Tartuffe in the second act.

  Pécuchet thought an explanation was desirable:

  "You must know that Tartuffe——"

  Madame Bordin interrupted him: "We know what a Tartuffe is."

  Bouvard had wished for a robe for a certain passage.

  "I see only the monk's habit," said Pécuchet.

  "No matter; bring it here."

  He reappeared with it and a copy of Molière.

  The opening was tame, but at the place where Tartuffe caresses Elmire's knees, Pécuchet assumed the tone of a gendarme:

  "What is your hand doing there?"

  Bouvard instantly replied in a sugary voice:

  "I am feeling your dress; the stuff of it is marrowy."

  And he shot forth glances from his eyes, bent forward his mouth, sniffed with an exceedingly lecherous air, and ended by even addressing himself to Madame Bordin.

  His impassioned gaze embarrassed her, and when he stopped, humble and palpitating, she almost sought for something to say in reply.

  Pécuchet took refuge in the book: "The declaration is quite gallant."

  "Ha! yes," cried she; "he is a bold wheedler."

  "Is it not so?" returned Bouvard confidently. "But here's another with a more modern touch about174 it." And, having opened his coat, he squatted over a piece of ashlar, and, with his head thrown back, burst forth:

  "Your eyes' bright flame my vision floods with joy.

  Sing me some song like those, in bygone years, You sang at eve, your dark eye filled with tears."[11]

  "That is like me," she thought.

  "Drink and be merry! let the wine-cup flow:

  Give me this hour, and all the rest may go!"[12]

  "How droll you are!" And she laughed with a little laugh, which made her throat rise up, and exposed her teeth.

  "Ah! say, is it not sweet To love and see your lover at your feet?"[13]

  He knelt down.

  "Finish, then."

  "'Oh! let me sleep and dream upon thy breast,

  My beauty, Doña Sol, my love!'[14]

  "Here the bells are heard, and they are disturbed by a mountaineer."175

  "Fortunately; for, but for that——" And Madame Bordin smiled, in place of finishing the sentence.

  It was getting dark. She arose.

  It had been raining a short time before, and the path through the beech grove not being dry enough, it was more convenient to return across the fields. Bouvard accompanied her into the garden, in order to open the gate for her.

  At first they walked past the trees cut like distaffs, without a word being spoken on either side. He was still moved by his declamation, and she, at the bottom of her heart, felt a certain kind of fascination, a charm which was generated by the influence of literature. There are occasions when art excites commonplace natures; and worlds may be unveiled by the clumsiest interpreters.

  The sun had reappeared, making the leaves glisten, and casting luminous spots here and there amongst the brakes. Three sparrows with little chirpings hopped on the trunk of an old linden tree which had fallen to the ground. A hawthorn in blossom exhibited its pink sheath; lilacs drooped, borne down by their foliage.

  "Ah! that does one good!" said Bouvard, inhaling the air till it filled his lungs.

  "You are so painstaking."

  "It is not that I have talent; but as for fire, I possess some of that."

  "One can see," she returned, pausing between the words, "that you—were in love—in your early days."

  "Only in my early days, you believe?"

  She stopped. "I know nothing about it."

  "What does she mean?" And Bouvard felt his heart beating.176

  A little pool in the middle of the gravel obliging them to step aside, they got up on the hedgerow.

  Then they chatted about the recital.

  "What is the name of your last piece?"

  "It is taken from Hernani, a drama."

  "Ha!" then slowly and as if in soliloquy, "it must be nice to have a gentleman say such things to you—in downright earnest."

  "I am at your service," replied Bouvard.

  "You?"

  "Yes, I."

  "What a joke!"

  "Not the least in the world!"

  And, having cast a look about him, he caught her from behind round the waist and kissed the nape of her neck vigorously.

  She became very pale as if she were going to faint, and leaned one hand against a tree, then opened her eyes and shook her head.

  "It is past."

  He looked at her in amazement.

  The grating being open, she got up on the threshold of the little gateway.

  There was a water-channel at the opposite side. She gathered up all the folds of her petticoat and stood on the brink hesitatingly.

  "Do you want my assistance?"

  "Unnecessary."

  "Why not?"

  "Ha! you are too dangerous!" And as she jumped down, he could see her white stocking.

  Bouvard blamed himself for having wasted an opportunity. Bah! he should have one again—and then not all women are alike. With some of them you177 must be blunt, while audacity destroys you with others. In short, he was satisfied with himself—and he did not confide his hope to Pécuchet; this was through fear of the remarks that would be passed, and not at all through delicacy.

  From that time forth they used to recite in the presence of Mélie and Gorju, all the time regretting that they had not a private theatre.

  The little servant-girl was amused without understanding a bit of it, wondering at the language, charmed at the roll of the verses. Gorju applauded the philosophic passages in the tragedies, and everything in the people's favour in the melodramas, so that, delighted at his good taste, they thought of giving him lessons, with a view to making an actor of him subsequently. This prospect dazzled the workman.

  Their performances by this time became the subject of general gossip. Vaucorbeil spoke to them about the matter in a sly fashion. Most people regarded their acting with contempt.

  They only prided themselves the more upon it. They crowned thems
elves artists. Pécuchet wore moustaches, and Bouvard thought he could not do anything better, with his round face and his bald patch, than to give himself a head à la Béranger. Finally, they determined to write a play.

  The subject was the difficulty. They searched for it while they were at breakfast, and drank coffee, a stimulant indispensable for the brain, then two or three little glasses. They would next take a nap on their beds, after which they would make their way down to the fruit garden and take a turn there; and at length they would leave the house to find inspiration 178outside, and, after walking side by side, they would come back quite worn out.

  Or else they would shut themselves up together. Bouvard would sweep the table, lay down paper in front of him, dip his pen, and remain with his eyes on the ceiling; whilst Pécuchet, in the armchair, would be plunged in meditation, with his legs stretched out and his head down.

  Sometimes they felt a shivering sensation, and, as it were, the passing breath of an idea, but at the very moment when they were seizing it, it had vanished.

  But methods exist for discovering subjects. You take a title at random, and a fact trickles out of it. You develop a proverb; you combine a number of adventures so as to form only one. None of these devices came to anything. In vain they ran through collections of anecdotes, several volumes of celebrated trials, and a heap of historical works.

  And they dreamed of being acted at the Odéon, had their thoughts fixed on theatrical performances, and sighed for Paris.

  "I was born to be an author instead of being buried in the country!" said Bouvard.

  "And I likewise," chimed in Pécuchet.

  Then came an illumination to their minds. If they had so much trouble about it, the reason was their ignorance of the rules.

  They studied them in the Pratique du Théâtre, by D'Aubignac, and in some works not quite so old-fashioned.

  Important questions are discussed in them: Whether comedy can be written in verse; whether tragedy does not go outside its limits by taking its179 subject from modern history; whether the heroes ought to be virtuous; what kinds of villains it allows; up to what point horrors are permissible in it; that the details should verge towards a single end; that the interest should increase; that the conclusion should harmonise with the opening—these were unquestionable propositions.

  "Invent resorts that can take hold of me,"

  says Boileau. By what means were they to "invent resorts?"

  "So that in all your speeches passion's dart

  May penetrate, and warm, and move the heart."[15]

  How were they to "warm the heart?"

  Rules, therefore, were not sufficient; there was need, in addition, for genius. And genius is not sufficient either. Corneille, according to the French Academy, understands nothing about the stage; Geoffroy disparaged Voltaire; Souligny scoffed at Racine; La Harpe blushed at Shakespeare's name.

  Becoming disgusted with the old criticism, they wished to make acquaintance with the new, and sent for the notices of plays in the newspapers.

  What assurance! What obstinacy! What dishonesty! Outrages on masterpieces; respect shown for platitudes; the gross ignorance of those who pass for scholars, and the stupidity of others whom they describe as witty.

  Perhaps it is to the public that one must appeal.180

  But works that have been applauded sometimes displeased them, and amongst plays that were hissed there were some that they admired.

  Thus the opinions of persons of taste are unreliable, while the judgment of the multitude is incomprehensible.

  Bouvard submitted the problem to Barberou. Pécuchet, on his side, wrote to Dumouchel.

  The ex-commercial traveller was astonished at the effeminacy engendered by provincial life. His old Bouvard was turning into a blockhead; in short, "he was no longer in it at all."

  "The theatre is an article of consumption like any other. It is advertised in the newspapers. We go to the theatre to be amused. The good thing is the thing that amuses."

  "But, idiot," exclaimed Pécuchet, "what amuses you is not what amuses me; and the others, as well as yourself, will be weary of it by and by. If plays are written expressly to be acted, how is it that the best of them can be always read?"

  And he awaited Dumouchel's reply. According to the professor, the immediate fate of a play proved nothing. The Misanthrope and Athalie are dying out. Zaïre is no longer understood. Who speaks to-day of Ducange or of Picard? And he recalled all the great contemporary successes from Fanchon la Vielleuse to Gaspardo le Pêcheur, and deplored the decline of our stage. The cause of it is the contempt for literature, or rather for style; and, with the aid of certain authors mentioned by Dumouchel, they learned the secret of the various styles; how we get the majestic, the temperate, the ingenuous, the touches that are noble and the expressions that are181 low. "Dogs" may be heightened by "devouring"; "to vomit" is to be used only figuratively; "fever" is applied to the passions; "valiance" is beautiful in verse.

  "Suppose we made verses?" said Pécuchet.

  "Yes, later. Let us occupy ourselves with prose first."

  A strict recommendation is given to choose a classic in order to mould yourself upon it; but all of them have their dangers, and not only have they sinned in point of style, but still more in point of phraseology.

  This assertion disconcerted Bouvard and Pécuchet, and they set about studying grammar.

  Has the French language, in its idiomatic structure definite articles and indefinite, as in Latin? Some think that it has, others that it has not. They did not venture to decide.

  The subject is always in agreement with the verb, save on the occasions when the subject is not in agreement with it.

  There was formerly no distinction between the verbal adjective and the present participle; but the Academy lays down one not very easy to grasp.

  They were much pleased to learn that the pronoun leur is used for persons, but also for things, while où and en are used for things and sometimes for persons.

  Ought we to say Cette femme a l'air bon or l'air bonne?—une bûche de bois sec, or de bois sèche?—ne pas laisser de, or que de?—une troupe de voleurs survint, or survinrent?

  Other difficulties: Autour and à l'entour of which Racine and Boileau did not see the difference; imposer, 182or en imposer, synonyms with Massillon and Voltaire; croasser and coasser, confounded by La Fontaine, who knew, however, how to distinguish a crow from a frog.

  The grammarians, it is true, are at variance. Some see a beauty where others discover a fault. They admit principles of which they reject the consequences, announce consequences of which they repudiate the principles, lean on tradition, throw over the masters, and adopt whimsical refinements.

  Ménage, instead of lentilles and cassonade, approves of nentilles and castonade; Bonhours, jérarchie and not hiérarchie and M. Chapsal speaks of les œils de la soupe.

  Pécuchet was amazed above all at Jénin. What! z'annetons would be better than hannetons, z'aricots than haricots! and, under Louis XIV., the pronunciation was Roume and Monsieur de Lioune, instead of Rome and Monsieur de Lionne!

  Littré gave them the finishing stroke by declaring that there never had been, and never could be positive orthography. They concluded that syntax is a whim and grammar an illusion.

  At this period, moreover, a new school of rhetoric declared that we should write as we speak, and that all would be well so long as we felt and observed.

  As they had felt and believed that they had observed, they considered themselves qualified to write. A play is troublesome on account of the narrowness of its framework, but the novel has more freedom. In order to write one they searched among their personal recollections.

  Pécuchet recalled to mind one of the head-clerks in his own office, a very nasty customer, and he felt183 a longing to take revenge on him by means of a book.

  Bouvard had, at the smoking saloon, made the acquaintance of an old writing-master, who was a miserable drunkard. Nothing could be so ludicrous as this c
haracter.

  At the end of the week, they imagined that they could fuse these two subjects into one. They left off there, and passed on to the following: a woman who causes the unhappiness of a family; a wife, her husband, and her lover; a woman who would be virtuous through a defect in her conformation; an ambitious man; a bad priest. They tried to bind together with these vague conceptions things supplied by their memory, and then made abridgments or additions.

  Pécuchet was for sentiment and ideality, Bouvard for imagery and colouring; and they began to understand each other no longer, each wondering that the other should be so shallow.

  The science which is known as æsthetics would perhaps settle their differences. A friend of Dumouchel, a professor of philosophy, sent them a list of works on the subject. They worked separately and communicated their ideas to one another.

  In the first place, what is the Beautiful?

  For Schelling, it is the infinite expressing itself through the finite; for Reid, an occult quality; for Jouffroy, an indecomposable fact; for De Maistre, that which is pleasing to virtue; for P. André, that which agrees with reason.

  And there are many kinds of beauty: a beauty in the sciences—geometry is beautiful; a beauty in morals—it cannot be denied that the death of Socrates was beautiful; a beauty in the animal kingdom—the184 beauty of the dog consists in his sense of smell. A pig could not be beautiful, having regard to his dirty habits; no more could a serpent, for it awakens in us ideas of vileness. The flowers, the butterflies, the birds may be beautiful. Finally, the first condition of beauty is unity in variety: there is the principle.

  "Yet," said Bouvard, "two squint eyes are more varied than two straight eyes, and produce an effect which is not so good—as a rule."

  They entered upon the question of the Sublime.

  Certain objects are sublime in themselves: the noise of a torrent, profound darkness, a tree flung down by the storm. A character is beautiful when it triumphs, and sublime when it struggles.

  "I understand," said Bouvard; "the Beautiful is the beautiful, and the Sublime the very beautiful."