Аннотация: Love, money, forest trade, culture. The financial success of Gustave Flaubert. A literary note.
Love, money, forest trade, culture. The financial success of Gustave Flaubert. A literary note.
A good home, office-room, solitude, creativity. A years were passing, and this strange French writer became popular.
Many years of work on the same book. A dozens of pages in a few months. Such a literary activity did not provide significant fees.
The press, as a rule, was critical to the works of Gustave Flaubert.
Literary connections and a lawsuit over the first published book, "Madame Bovary", helped Flaubert. He became famous, and Flaubert's books began to sell.
The press did not cover the Flaubert's creativity as such. She covered the trial. This trial brought Flaubert to the brink of the nervous exhaustion. But that was the price of a popularity, the price of a notable circulations of his books and a notable (but not very high) royalties.
How did the course of events look like?
Flaubert wrote books for years, revolved in literary circles, the press criticized his books, Flaubert was nervous, worried, but readers continued to buy his books. Maybe there was and still exists some kind of channel of information about the work of the writer, except for the media?
They bought not a lot, but not a little. Moderately. For a Flaubert's life a literary fees were not enough.
Where did the money come from?
Flaubert came from a wealthy family. A good house, an excellent office-room, full financial security for creative work.
Flaubert's father died early. Mother took care of Gustave.
The stability of this financial situation was threatened.
First, Flaubert's niece, Caroline, fell in love with her teacher. She was an orphan (her mother, Flaubert's sister, had died), and Flaubert's niece was brought up in the Flaubert family.
Carolina fell in love with her drawing teacher, the talented artist Macia. They explained to the niece that it was not necessary to marry a too smart person. There is a wealthy man - a timber merchant. The niece, in the end, succumbed to the insistent, persistent advices of relatives (including Flaubert), and married a timber merchant. He at some point began to conduct business in an unsafe manner - he was selling the timber, but was not paying with his suppliers on time. Bankruptcy followed.
The fortune of Flaubert and his family was closely connected with the business of a new relative, a timber merchant. Flaubert was on the verge of a financial collapse.
Flaubert wrote about the mythical Madame Bovary, who ruined, ravaged others.
But the plot of the choice between a teacher (a talented artist) and a timber merchant is also entitled to the interest of the reading public.
The drawing teacher, with his relatively modest financial needs (even if he had not been a talented and successful artist), would have been a much more financially favorable and secure figure for the wealthy Flaubert family compared to the timber merchant who directed towards the bottom the fortune of the prosperous family, a fortune made up by the long - term efforts of the older successful Flaubert generation.
The fortune of Flaubert's family and his the personally fortune were sinking.
But there was such a factor, apparently peculiar to France, as respect for writers.
In literary circles Flaubert became acquainted with politicians. For example, among his acquaintances was Gambetta. Here we come out onto the shaky ground of analogies and assumptions. We can to remember the bankruptcy of Alexander Dumas-father. A bankruptcy for the great writer did not end with a nothing tragic - at least, for him.
The events that had brought the timber merchant to the edge of the precipice were moving more and more slowly. In the end, it seemed that things had taken a favorable turn.
He continued to rotating in literary circles and inform people involved in French culture about his plight.
In the end, he was given a decent pension, disguised as the salary of a supernumerary caretaker of one of the libraries.
France, the French Republic cared about own writers, about own culture (on "Madame Bovary" everyone can have their own point of view, but this is a popular book).
Gustave Flaubert lamented the humiliation of a having to live not on his own (not on a family) means, but on the state money.
Guy de Maupassant then achieved the literary success (with the assistance of Flaubert), and Flaubert was surprised, comparing Maupassant's circulations (of a high level) and his own circulations (between a medium and a low levels).
Then Flaubert died and was buried with honors.
"Madame Bovary", by all accounts, has no positive characters.
However, those who would draw pessimistic conclusions based on this book would be mistaken.
No need to be upset.
A love (to a teacher, to an artist) is higher than money (of a timber merchant). A culture is more expensive than money.
(In preparing of this note, in particular, the book "Flaubert" by Henri Troyat was used).
December 5, 2019 15:01
Translation from Russian into English: December 6, 2019 09:18.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'Любовь, деньги, торговля лесом, культура. Финансовый успех Гюстава Флобера. Литературная заметка.'.