From Publishers Weekly
Gustave Flaubert's boyhood desire to become an actor was "his way of living the situation assigned to him in the Flaubert family," writes Sartre. This monumental life study draws on psychoanalysis and existentialism in imagining how Flaubert forged his inner self. Sartre portrays the author of Madame Bovary as a Nero of words whose towering literary ambition was the revenge of a child seething with rage at his manly, overpossessive mother. Though this volume covers Flaubert's early literary career, the emphasis is on childhood and adolescence. His fetishes, homoerotic affairs, self-proclaimed desire to be a woman and masochism add up to a seldom-seen side of the polished literary stylist. Readers not put off by the dense academic prose and highly speculative approach will find much to ponder. Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
The assumption in this "biocritical" study is that we are familiar with Flaubert's biography. This fourth of a projected five-volume English translation (Vol. 1, LJ 9/1/81; Vol. 2, LJ 3/15/87; Vol. 3, Univ. of Chicago Pr., 1989) is a treatise on (ostensibly) the years 1821-1857. Yet we find Sartre concentrating meticulously on almost every nuance of Flaubert's words in his letters regarding his seizures in 1884 and his ensuing neurosis. Flaubert's temporary loss of interest in writing is rationalized by Sartre as a "loser wins" tactic: in L'Education Sentimentale , the hero, Jules, achieves genius through absolute failure, not by accident but intentionally. The Family Idiot is a particularly digressive, personal interpretation of important years in Flaubert's life. The French version, with its lengthy and ponderous sentences, is not easy to digest; Cosman's translation is a mirror that reflects remarkably well Sartre's style and manner.- Danielle Mihram, Univ. of Southern California Lib., Los AngelesCopyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Language Notes
Text: English, French (translation)

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Jean-Paul Satre discusses Flaubert's personal development, his relationship with each member of his family, his decision to become a writer, and the psychosomatic crisis or 'conversion' that liberated him from his father's domination and enabled him to devote himself to his art. Sartre's psychoanalytic approach merges with a sociological study of the ideology of the period, the crisis in literature, and Flaubert's role as one both influenced by all this and himself influencing the future of literature. Translated by Carol Cosman.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

In this second in a proposed five-volume translation of Sartre's biographical magnum opus, Sartre traces the psychosocial development of Flaubert from childhood through young adulthood. The philosopher's excursuses on such topics as comedy as a social agency and aesthetic theory realized through the life of Flaubert are relevant and provocative inclusions in a text already made engrossing by the facts of the novelist's development (from ``imaginary child'' to actor to writer) and Sartre's psychoanalytical insights. As she did in Volume 1, Cosman has rendered the text both faithfully and readably. A necessary addition to philosophy and literature collections, along with Volume 1 and Hazel Barnes's commentary, Sartre and Flaubert (both LJ 9/1/81).Francisca Goldsmith, Golden Gate Univ. Lib., San Francisco

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