Madame Bovary Part 3, Ch. 6-8

1. Facies (page 280) : an appearance and expression of the face characteristic of a particular condition especially when abnormal

2. In chapters six through eight, Emma continues her affair with Leon, and one day when Emma and Leon were supposed to meet each other at a hotel, Homais decides to visit Leon and therefore Leon cannot see Emma and she gets very upset. However, she still continues spending and increasing her debt to the point that she got a legal notice and she began to sell objects from Charles' home in order to pay it off. Leon becomes annoyed with Emma, and in return she becomes disgusted with him. Emma starts to hang out with the wrong crowd, and she even accompanies them to a masquerade ball. After the masquerade ball, when she returns home she is presented with a legal notice saying that she must pay 8,000 francs, or she will lose her property. She begs Lheureux for money, but he says no. Lheuruex is hoping to gain control of everything that the Bovary's own. Officers show up at the Bovary home to take a look at all of their possessions. They leave an officer behind, and Emma hides him in the attic to prevent Charles from knowing about it. She tries to come up with a plan to get the money that she owes by telling Leon to steal from his work, he will not. Even though he is disgusted with her, he agrees to go to his friends for some money and send it to her. Despite the fact that she was trying to hide what was happening, she found a notice posted in Yonville about the auction they were holding to sell the Bovary's things. She goes to the town lawyer, but he will not help her unless she will make love to him. She refuses, and then goes to Binet the tax collector to try and get more time to pay her taxes. When this fails, she hopes that Rodolphe will help her. Rodolphe realizes her motive for visiting him and he will not help her either, so as a last resort she goes to the apothecary's and convinces Justin to let her get in to the cabinet where the arsenic is kept. She ingests a handful and returns home around the same time that Charles does. He sees the notice of the auction, and is quite worried and searches for Emma, he finds her in her bed where she gives him a letter and tells him that he cannot open it until the next day. At first, she feels nothing but then she becomes very sick and Charles reads the letter only to discover that she has poisoned herself. Charles and Homais call in doctors from other towns, but there is nothing to be done. So, they call in the priest to bless her. She is finally motherly towards Berthe, and kind to Charles as they all cry. The last thing she hears is the blind beggar singing the terrible song below her window as she dies.

3. I find it interesting how Emma kept spending, even though she knew how much she owed in debt. She does everything she can think of to try and come up with the money she owed, but failed, including visiting the lawyer who only agrees to help her if she has sex with him. She angrily refuses. I also think it is interesting the irony that Flaubert is trying to point out, the fact that she will not sleep with the lawyer but she practically throws herself at Binet, and also Rodolphe. Does Flaubert think that she is a prostitute or that she is just doing what she has to in order to get the money? Just like everything else in Emma's life, she does not halfway commit to anything. She gets so flustered with her life that the only other thing she can think of to do is to commit suicide. She storms into the apothecary's shop and ingests arsenic straight from the bottle. She does not have anything left in her life to throw herself at, so she commits to ending her life.

4. a) What was the significance of Binet being the tax collector? Or was there a reason why he was the tax collector?

b) Is there a relationship between Emma's spending and the depletion of her life?

c) Was Emma unconsciously contradicting herself in the fact that she was willing to give herself to Rodolphe, but not the lawyer?