Flaubert in the Ruins of Paris The Story of a Friendship, a Novel, and a Terrible Year

The author, an academic, has thought deeply about the meaning of Flaubert's work, and what we can deduce about Flaubert's political thinking, how it changed after the calamity of the Commune, and whether Flaubert changed, or was on the verge of changing his approach to writing as a result of being witness to the collapse of Napoleon III's regime. There is much to like about this book, particularly the letters between Flaubert and George Sand, whose relationship was arguably the most touching intellectual relationship of the 19th Century, built as it was on such mutual esteem and platonic love. The author's description of the events that led to the Franco-Prussian War, and then to the Paris Commune, and then to the violent reaction to the Commune has helped me understand this part of French history much more clearly. Helpfully, the Epilogue summarizes and clarifies many points that are worked through much more laboriously in the book. While I respect Peter Brooks' thoroughness, which reflects his deep interest in his subject, some of his arguments are either a bit strained, or there is just more information presented than is really necessary. His defense of Flaubert's statement that the catastrophe of the Commune, the Terrible Year of 1871, could have been avoided if only the French people had carefully read his book, Sentimental Education, is not credible; it doesn't pass the common sense test. It's not even clear that Flaubert believed his own statement. Likewise, Brooks' extensive exposition in contrasting and comparing Flaubert's books to those of other French, English, and Italian authors is engaging at times, but is generally a bit too much. I was, however, interested in the warm relationship between Flaubert and Turgenev; Turgenev was the one person other than Sand with whom Flaubert could be really free. I enjoyed reading Brooks' take on Flaubert's style, which Flaubert famously described by saying the author in his work should be like god in his universe, present everywhere, but visible nowhere ("L’auteur dans son oeuvre doit être comme Dieu dans l’univers, présent partout et visible nulle part."). Brooks believes Flaubert was moving toward a style in two of his unfinished works that would violate this maxim by taking a position on moral or even political issues. His unfinished Sous Napoleon III, in particular, appears from Flaubert's notes to have been headed in the direction of passing judgment on the "fakery" of that regime. His Bouvard et Pecuchet had already moved slightly in the direction of the author being a little bit visible in his work, with Flaubert's growing pro-republican sentiments informing his writing. More generally, Flaubert seemed finally, after her death, to be moved by Sand's exhortation to be plainer with his reader, not to make the reader work quite so hard to understand his books. Sadly, Flaubert was such a slow, careful writer that his changed political philosophy, made more compassionate both by his witness of the aftermath of the Commune's destruction, and by Sand's long, gentle influence on him, never made it into print. But one cannot read this book without coming to regard him at least a bit as Sand did, as a man who hid his emotions almost always, but who was in fact, "good from head to toe".