A Sentimental Education: The Story of a Young Man (Oxford World's Classics) (Paperback)

~ (Author), (Translator) "On the morning of 15 September 1840 the Ville de Montereau was lying alongside the quai Saint-Bernard* belching clouds of smoke, all ready to sail..." (more)
Key Phrases: china clay company, fifteen thousand francs, Madame Arnoux, Madame Dambreuse, Monsieur Dambreuse (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Great edition--much superior than old Penguin edition."--K. Arens, University of Texas
"Introduction and notes are . . . thorough. . . . translation . . . is consistent in tone."--Rafael Newman, University of Washington

Product Description

First published in 1869, this novel offers a meticulously accurate, ironic depiction of uneventful lives in a crucial period of European history. Flaubert combines intricate political and social upheaval with a close scrutiny of individual motives to produce one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 528 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; Later Printing edition (May 18, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0192836226
• ISBN-13: 978-0192836229
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #799,964 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A superb translation of a perfect novel, May 25, 2001

By	"cued" (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews

This is simply one of the most satisfying novels I have ever read. And the Parmee translation is excellent - there is not an awkward word or phrase anywhere in the text. Flaubert loved to write fiction which captured the pettiness, baseness, and stupidity of human relations. Misanthrope might be too harsh a word for Flaubert, but he certainly didn't have much patience for the sort of crass greed and shallow, unquestioning conformity he witnessed as a young man in Paris in the Revolution of 1848. I understand that Flaubert started working on this novel very early in his career, but abandoned it several times before finally bringing it to pres in 1869. The care and time Flaubert took in writing this novel shows, especially when you compare it to Madame Bovary, Flaubert's famous book. Bovary is an easier book to "understand". Flaubert may have felt misunderstood. Bovary can be read as an attack on the bourgeoisie, their dull, conformist lives, and the stupid and ultimately self-defeating passions they indulge in an effort to escape from the suffocating monotony of their existence. Or it can be read, as most readers tend to read, as a morality tale about the tragic consequences of adultery. The Sentimental Education sets the record straight, however. Flaubert was not a moralist preaching on the sins of adultery in Bovary. This novel makes that obvious. Here Flaubert again takes up an attack on the bourgeoisie, this time leaving no room for misunderstanding.

I once met someone (a literature student specializing in 19th century fiction, no less!) who complained to me how boring she thought the Sentimental Education was. So boring that she never bothered to finish it. To this day I believe she approached the book in the wrong frame of mind. She may have been expecting some Balzac-ish bildungsroman, about the provincial who comes to Paris and grows into a society man. Instead, she discovered a novel about a dull provincial who comes to Paris thinking he is going to grow into a society man, but is such a poor judge of human character and relations that he meets defeat at every corner. But it is one thing to say the book is dull. It is another to point out that Frederic Moreau is a very dull human being. But then, we remember... we know people like Moreau. At some point or another, we all may have even behaved like Moreau. And we know and live in a society composed of people like the rest of the characters. Moreau's world is the world of bourgeoisie. 150 years later, in another language on another continent, I am surprised to see how little some things have changed.

Pierre Bourdieu, the French sociologist, has analyzed this novel extensively (see "The Rules of Art" and "The Field of Cultural Production") because he finds the document perfect for sociological analysis of the bourgeoisie and the intellectual communities that developed in Paris in 1848. Flaubert had a brutally frank eye and pen, quick to capture the most subtle social implications in a single gesture. After reading Flaubert and Bourdieu, I am haunted by how persistent and relevent Flaubert's vision of society and human relations continues to be.

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars DREADFUL Translation - go for Penguin Edition, June 1, 2006

By	Book Lover (Bethesda, MD) - See all my reviews

SENTIMENTAL EDUCATION is one of the glories of literature. While its context seems more dated than that in MADAME BOVARY, its language has the engaging richness of Flaubert in full glory. Knowing it and loving it, I decided it was time to reread it. Trusting to the word "Oxford," I bought and began this edition. Poor Flaubert must truly be spinning: this version is studded with the very sort of cliches that would have been anathema to him. After suffering through several of them, when I read that "his grand passion for Madame Arnoux was beginning to peter out", my patience for this version "petered out." I jettisoned this copy and ordered the also available PENGUIN CLASSIC edition with translation by Robert Baldick. I strongly urge you to select the Penguin rather than the Oxford World's version.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the greatest novels ever written, April 21, 2000

By	Joseph W. Smith III (Montoursville, PA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Sentimental Education: The Story of a Young Man (Oxford World's Classics) (Paperback)

My short list of great novels changes from time to time -- but it will always include this knock-out masterpiece by Flaubert. To be honest, I hated "Madame Bovary" (too depressing and contrived!), and tried this only on the recommendation of Woody Allen, whose character Isaac Davis in "Manhattan" lists this book as one of the things that make life worth living. He was right. The prose is flawless, the characters brilliant, the portrait of romanticism unexcelled. Don't miss this; it's one of the greats. (In case you're wondering, my current short list of "greats" also includes "Lonesome Dove," "Invisible Man" (Ellison), "The Stranger," "Heart of Darkness," and "The End of the Affair" (Graham Greene).) Happy reading!