The chronotope and the generation of meaning in novels and paintings

Criticism, Spring, 1994 by Janice Best

Comme on avait coutume alors de se vetir sordidement en voyage, presque tous portaient de vieilles calottes grecques ou des chapeaux deteints, de maigres habits noirs, rapes par le frottement du bureau, ou des redingotes ouvrant la capsule de leurs boutons pour avoir trop servi au magasin; ca et la, quelque gilet a chale laissait voir une chemise de calicot, maculee de cafe; des epingles de chrysocale piquaient des cravates en lambeaux; des sous-pieds cousus retenaient des chaussons de lisiere; [...] Le pont etait sali par des ecales de noix, des bouts de cigares, des pelures de poires, des detritus de charcuterie apportee dans du papier; trois ebenistes, en blouse, stationnaient devant la cantine; un joueur de harpe en haillons se reposait, accoude sur son instrument; on entendait par intervalles le bruit du charbon de terre dans le fourneau, un eclat de voix, un rire....(L'Education sentimentale, 36)

As it was then the custom to dress sordidly while travelling, almost everyone was wearing old greek skullcaps or faded hats, threadbare dark suits, worn out by constant rubbing of the office, or frock coats whose buttons were popping open from too much use in the store; here and there, a shawl vest revealed a calico shirt, stained with coffee; pins of fake gold were stuck in ties that were in tatters; sewn-together straps held up slippers of selvage; [...] The bridge was littered with nut shells, cigar butts, pear peels, left-over bits of smoked meat wrapped in paper; three cabinet makers, in smocks, were parked in front of the cantina; a harp player in rags was resting, leaning on his instrument; by intervals the sound of coal in the furnace, a shout, a laugh was heard....

It is against this background of tumultuous vulgarity, of receding shores and dreams, that the profile of Mme Arnoux appears for the first time, on the threshold between this world and that of the upper class, becoming almost instantly the new centre of Frederic's universe,(20) the fixed point of this world in constant flux: "Elle etait en train de broder quelque chose; et son nez droit, son menton, toute sa personne se decoupait sur le fond de l'air bleu" (L'Education sentimentale, 37) (She was embroidering something; and her straight nose, her chin, all of her being stood out against the background of the blue air.). Dazzled by this apparition, Frederic notices nothing else; her attitude of immobility allows him to contemplate her at his ease and to lodge in his memory details which will come back later with extraordinary sharpness. The permanence of this vision contrasts thus both with the vulgarity and with the fluidity of everything which surrounds it. Yet even though Frederic loses himself in the contemplation of Mme Arnoux, he can see no more than scattered details of her --her hat, the oval shape of her face, the folds of her dress, her fingers through which light seems to pass. Just as the impressionist painters sought to capture the different effects of light on the people and objects they painted and ended by disintegrating their very contours,(21) Flaubert succeeds here in offering us a vision which will be the permanent center of his entire novel and a portrait whose principal characteristics are the lack of solidity and disintegration. Failing to create a stable image of the woman he contemplates, Frederic soon realizes that he is slipping away from her: "Plus il la contemplait, plus il sentait entre elle et lui se cresuer des abimes. Il songeait qu'il faudrait la quitter tout a l'heure irrevocablement, sans en avoir arrache une parole, sans lui laisser meme un souvenir!" (L'Education sentimentale, 39) (The more he contemplated her, the more he felt chasms opening up between them. He thought that he would soon irrevocably have to leave her, without having obtained a single word from her, without even leaving a memory with her!).