Scenes of Suicide - A Comparison between Madame Bovary and the awakening.

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Jessica Wang

February 17, 2003

Dr. Smith

Scenes of Suicide: A Comparison between Madame Bovary and The Awakening 

        In Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary and Kate Chopin’s The Awakening the death scenes of both novels are one of the most essential scenes.  There are, in these scenes many major similarities and differences.  Both suicides arise from related circumstances.  Emma from Madame Bovary, and Edna from The Awakening are two women who suffer from the monotony of domestic life and dissatisfaction with their marital lives.  Yet chief differences lie within the different meanings of the respect deaths that the two dissimilar women hold.  The death scenes of the two protagonists (who are also sometimes the antagonists) can be compared through the circumstances and motivations that drive them to commit suicide, and the language and the structure that Flaubert and Chopin use to illustrate the death scenes.

        Their deaths parallel one another in that their discontent with their lives leads them to commit suicide.  Edna is bored with life, much like Emma, and cannot find any satisfaction with her husband.  Leónce, who is solely concerned with his business, views Edna as nothing more than another possession.  Early in the novel Chopin states that he looks "...at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage."  Emma also lives a life of boredom with a husband who treats her like a prize as seen when Flaubert writes, “Charles began to feel rather pleased with himself for possessing such a fine wife.” (Flaubert, 32)  This leads both of them to commit adultery, as they look outward for a means of solace (more so for Emma).  But when their lovers leave them, and they are left with little else to live for, they are driven to suicide.  

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        Even through there are similarities in their situations, striking differences arise from the basis of their desires—unattainable desires that propel them to kill themselves.  Emma cannot stand her current life, which seems to her dull and repetitious.  She yearns for a new life filled with the riches and wealth of the upper class, and fantasizes about living the life of someone else because of her unhappiness with reality.  Unfortunately, because of this, her fantasies are not part of a passing phase, but an undying obsession; it seems that she will never be completely satisfied with any life.  

Edna also ...

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