Customer Reviews

Madame Bovary: Backgrounds and Sources Essays in Criticism (Norton Critical Edition)

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This is the best edition I know of for writing college papers. Besides having the text of the novel it is full of critical essays and useful material for analyzing the classic.

This review is specific to the Norton Critical Edition titled "Madame Bovary: Backgrounds and Sources Essays in Criticism."

This edition combines an excellent English translation of the original French text with some of the best literary criticism of the work over the 125-odd years since its publication. (Note: just in case anyone doesn't know, literary criticism isn't where someone complains about the book - it's where he/she analyses it.)

Madame Bovary belongs on anyone's list of the most influential novels of the 19th Century - as anyone reading through the influential novels of the 20th century soon learns from the many references to it - but anyone wanting to understand what that influence has been and why it has had so much influence needs to read some of the critical analysis of the work.

In this volume, you can read the book for yourself and then learn what other authors have thought about the work over time, plus see Flaubert's notes and get an insight into what alternatives he considered when constructing his book. This not only enhances your own appreciation of the work, it gives insights into how the book influenced those other authors and suggests other books to read.

Madame Bovary is a great book, but she isn't an island; the Norton Critical Edition is a great way to understand her position in literature.