Biography:
Guy de Maupassant (1850-1893)
(pronounced as Gee - dee - moh
puh soh)
He
was a French naturalist writer of short stories and novels who is known as the
greatest French short-story writer. He is known to depict human lives,
destinies and social forces in disillusioned terms. In the autumn of 1869
he began law studies in Paris, which were interrupted by the outbreak of the
Franco-German War. Maupassant volunteered, served first as a private in the
field, and was later transferred to the quartermaster corps. His firsthand
experience of war was to provide him with the material for some of his finest
stories. He later served as a civil servant.
Maupassant’s
mother close affectionate terms with Gustave Flaubert allowed Maupassant to
make the man’s acquaintance in 1867. This was the beginning of the
apprenticeship that was the making of Maupassant the writer. Flaubert would
lecture him on prose style, and correct his youthful literary exercises. He
also introduced him to some of the leading writers of the time, such as Émile
Zola and Henry James.
Maupassant
was a passionate lover of the sea and of rivers, which accounts for the setting
of much of his fiction and the prevalence in it of nautical imagery. In a
contribution to a volume called Les Soirées de Médan. Maupassant’s
story, Boule de suif (“Ball of Fat”), was not only by far the best of
the six, it is probably the finest story he ever wrote. He left the ministry
and spent the next two years writing articles for Le Gaulois and the Gil
Blas. The stories can be divided into groups: those dealing with the
Franco-German War, the Norman peasantry, the bureaucracy, life on the banks of
the Seine River, the emotional problems of the different social classes,
and—somewhat ominously in a late story such as Le Horla
(1887)—hallucination. Together, the stories present a comprehensive picture of
French life from 1870 to 1890.
Maupassant’s
extraordinary fascination with brothels and prostitution is reflected in many
stories. It is significant, however, that as the successful writer
became more closely acquainted with women of the nobility there was a change of
angle in his fiction: a move from the peasantry to the upper classes, from the
brothel to the boudoir.
Maupassant’s
work is thoroughly realistic. His characters inhabit a world of material
desires and sensual appetites in which lust, greed, and ambition are the
driving forces, and any higher feelings are either absent or doomed to cruel
disappointment. The tragic power of many of the stories derives from the fact
that Maupassant presents his characters, poor people or rich bourgeois, as the
victims of ironic necessity, crushed by a fate that they have dared to defy yet
still struggling against it hopelessly. Henry James commented that Maupassant
"fixes a hard eye on some spot of human life, usually some dreary, ugly,
shabby, sordid one, takes up the particle, and squeezes it either till it
grimaces or bleeds."
The Text:
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Meanings of difficult words and phrases:
Landau:
a type
of four-wheeled, convertible luxury carriage.
Bodice:
the part of a woman's dress covering
the body between the neck and the waist.
Boulevard:
a broad avenue in a city, usually
having areas at the sides for greenery.
Equipage: a
carriage drawn by horses
Chariot:
a light, four-wheeled pleasure
carriage.
Henry
IV: The King of France, also known as Henry the Great, ruled from 1589 to
1610. Clamorous: vigorous, loud, uproarious
Esterel:
The Esterel Massif is a Mediterranean coastal mountain range in the departments of Var and Alpes-Maritimes in Provence,
south-east France.
Apocalyptic:
predicting or presaging imminent
disaster and total or universal destruction:
Coat
of Mail: a long defensive garment made
of interlinked metal rings
Mlle:
short for
mademoiselle
Coquettish:
(of a woman) characteristically
flirtatious, especially in a teasing, lighthearted manner.
Chemise:
woman's loose-fitting, shirtlike
undergarment.
Legion
of Honor: is the highest French order of merit for military and
civil merits
Confounded:
bewildered,
confused.
Livery: a distinctive uniform or badge provided
by someone of rank to his servants; a uniform worn by servants.
Sphinx-like:
a mysterious, inscrutable person or
thing, especially one given to enigmatic questions or answers.
Feminist Critical Analysis:
The story begins with a heavy
description of the annual flower festival in France, and the activities of men
and women amidst a profusion of various flowers. There are two women ‘buried’ under flowers in a carriage,
their ‘delicate bodies’ almost ‘crushed’ by the load. The coupling of
women and flowers is usually a pleasant and romantic one; however, in this case
the choice of wording makes it very unpleasant and almost dangerous. The women
are described as if they are delicate pale corpses buried under flowers,
reminding the readers that flowers are often associated with death and pain
(since flowers are laid out over graves in many cultures) as well as love and
romance.
Whip, horses, wheels are all
symbolic of power, innovation, and war; all of them bearing masculine
connotations. However, they are decked out in flowers, as if showing how love
and war are not dissimilar concepts. The author likens two bouquets to the “two
eyes of this strange, rolling, flowery beast,” conjuring the image of the
two women having been swallowed by this beast of a carriage, bringing forth the
idea of death, pain, delicacy, femininity and love. At this point the women are
passive to the point of appearing dead, outlining how the masculine and
feminine roles in the society are acted out to the fullest.
The next four paragraphs detail the scene of the festival:
the activities of the festival are described as a ‘battle’ taking place. There
are a multitude of carriages, women, ribbons, and flowers. “Flowers passed in the air like balls, hit the fair faces, hovered and
fell in the dust where an army of street urchins gathered them.” This line
depicts how the simple, romantic game of throwing flowers can become brutal and
war-like, where the flowers hit the faces of women and are crushed under feet
or scooped up by the street rats, the homeless children. There are also
policemen on horses who push the curious crowds brutally, to keep the villains
from mingling with the upper elite. This is a realistic picture of a
festival enjoyed by the uppermost rich men and women of the French society, who
are at the center, while the poor and lower class proletariats are at the
fringes and peripheries. While the rich can waste tons of flowers, the street
urchins pick up the discarded ones so they might sell them later and make a
living. The police protects the rich so that their fun might not be spoiled by
the lower class onlookers. The description paints a true picture of any society
with a massive inequality of power and resources.
Meanwhile people
continue to be ‘bombarded’ with
roses; the battle imagery continues. Women in red are described as being
devilish and attractive, while one gentleman likened to ‘Henry IV’ is described
as playing with a bouquet held with an elastic, allowing the bouquet to hit
women’s faces and bounce back to his hand. Henry IV was a highly popular King
of France during the Renaissance era. Henry's womanizing became
legendary, earning him the nickname of Le Vert Galant (the old gallant). His sexual
appetite was said to have been insatiable, and he always kept mistresses, often
several at a time, as well as visits to brothels. Thus the gentleman’s
activities have sexual undertones. He displays (sexual and physical) power and
dominates the so-called battle while the women hide their eyes and turn away so
as to avoid his bouquet.
With
this description, Maupassant forms a final picture of the French upper class
society, marked by decadence, waste, wide rich-poor divide, depravity, sexual
perversion. It is a ‘battle of the sexes’, where women are sexual conquests who
passively or submissively receive flowers, attention, and favor from men, while
the latter are decidedly dominant in the act. All the while the lower class
dwindles, pines and struggles for their daily bread.
The
two women of the aforementioned carriage now weary of the festival have
travelled to the gulf where the sunset is represented as fire, contrasted with
the calm waters of the sea. Both fire and water are associated with death, but
also have life-giving properties. Here too, though, the war imagery chases us;
the squadron of ships is described as a “troop
of monstrous beasts” apocalyptic and terrifying. In describing the ships
and the carriages as beasts, perhaps the author is trying to evoke the idea
that these masculine means of transport have mastered natural elements like
rough terrain or turbulent oceans. They are masculine in the sense that they allow
men to roam the wide earth while women are traditionally confined to the home and
the hearth. If women use these means, they do it passively, and once they step
out of the house they are ‘pelted with flowers’ and sexualized much like in the
festival.
The
two women, Simone and Marguerite (Margot) begin to talk, the latter insisting
that while a woman’s body is satisfied, she still lacks nourishment for the
heart i.e. she lacks ‘love’. Marguerite insists that everyone needs love and
cannot do without it. Simone here claims she wouldn’t stand being loved by a
person of ‘no importance’, and
notices the two buttons shining on the coachman’s back. Notice that repeatedly
the themes of class divide and gender divide seem to overlap and intertwine.
The various symbols of eyes are repeated: the two bouquets, the eyes of the
ship, the two shining buttons; wherever the women go, they feel as if there are
eyes watching them, judging them perhaps, ensuring that they behave in
accordance with the limits of the society. Perhaps that is the reason why even
in solitude with her friend, Simone feels the need to insist that she would
want a ‘proper’ romance, with a man of her standing, rather than one of the
lower class. Marguerite too, continues to display amusement at the love of a
domestic servant, claiming that the mistress becomes severe, for if she is lax
with such a servant, there could be an incident that could lead to her disgrace
‘if she were observed’. One feels a clear sense of superiority of class
displayed in the dialogue of these women, yet there seems to be a hidden layer
of meaning. Marguerite acknowledges that all men become stupid when in love,
and even the love of a servant could flatter her ‘a little’. It is clear that
she feels differently from Simone about the matter.
The
story turns very interesting when Marguerite begins to recount an incident with
one of her servants, named Rose. This new maid had quickly charmed Marguerite.
Notice the pains she takes to describe just now accomplished and skilled Rose
was; she could sew, could wait upon a person extremely well, could speak
English, and in short was the perfect maid. She is described as having been a
friend rather than a servant. The intimacy between the two is very evident from
the description.
As
is usual with Maupassant’s works, the story takes a shocking turn when it is
revealed that a policeman came to search the house for a criminal, and that criminal
turned out to be none other than Rose, a man disguised as a lady’s maid. “John Nicholas Lecapet, condemned to death in
1879 for assassination preceded by violation.” The word violation has been
translated in other versions of the story as rape. One must pay special
attention to Marguerite’s cry ‘He led
away my maid!’ which is decidedly different from saying ‘He led away the
perverted murderer’.
The
feelings that she confesses to are those of anger and ‘profound humiliation … humiliation of a woman’. Upon Simone’s
confusion, she adds that the maid had been a rapist, and then repeats that she
felt humiliated. Simone looks at the shining buttons and smiles a sphinx-like
smile.
The
momentary confusion of the reader is dispelled once the reader realizes that
Marguerite painted ‘Rose’ in a positive, almost romantic light with lengthy
descriptions of her competence, and painted the policeman as an intruder who
took away this valuable maid. Once these descriptions are reread in the light
of new information (of Rose being a man, a rapist and murderer) it is odd that
Marguerite who seems to know much about male servants of lower class should not
be able to detect that Rose was a man the entire time. In addition, the
humiliation comes from her knowledge that a man had undressed her, massaged
her, bathed her and spent very intimate moments with her, and yet had made no
sexual moves toward her. In short, she feels rejected that a pervert who had
once raped and murdered a woman in order to satisfy his depraved desires, would
not even think of touching her, even after having seen her unclothed.
It
would be difficult to explain Simone’s smile, but perhaps she smiles because
she recognizes this sentiment, having experienced it herself (this is merely an
assumption). She eyes the coachman’s buttons as she smiles, perhaps wondering
of the things that go on behind closed doors, or perhaps recalling her own
adventures with a servant.
Two
things seem to become clear at this point: (1) Upper class women, though have a
power over the lower class, are still restricted and confined by their sex, and
(2) for the sake of propriety and dignity, women often suffocate and choke
their sexual needs. The imageries of war, death, love and sexuality come
together and make sense. Sexual encounters within one’s class are felt as a
battle, where women are targeted (the elastic-bound bouquet), pinned and
confined (the load of the flowers), conquered and discarded (like the flowers
on the road). They remain passive throughout the act, weary, and dissatisfied,
always feeling emptiness, a lack of love for the heart. Sexual encounters below
one’s class are forbidden, taboo and could be seen almost like an adventure
into the unknown. However, here too there is dissatisfaction because a scandal
could ensue if a woman was seen engaging in romance with a servant. At the same
time though, there is danger of being rejected by a servant, an event much more
painful to the ego than either of the former two.
In short, class divides and gender
divides work together in a very insidious manner to confine women and render
them mere corpses when it comes to sexuality.
Women have internalized the rules of conduct regarding their class (never
engage sexually with a servant), and regarding interaction between gender
(allow men to hunt you and satisfy themselves, but don’t show your own desires.
Allow no man to reject your physical beauty and attraction, for that is the sole
source of your pride and ego). This is a realistic, brutal and bleak picture,
but the sphinx-like smile in the end seems to hint that there is no need for despair.
There are hidden secrets behind that smile that are exclusive to women, and men
cannot reach, try as they may.
Themes:
(1)
Class divide and Inequalities between rich and
poor
(2)
Gender roles
(3)
Sexuality as an act of male dominance and power
(4)
Restriction of a woman’s sexuality
(5)
The need for woman’s space in a male dominated
society
(6)
Appearances and social codes of conduct
(7)
Private, hidden lives of women
Important Symbols and Images:
Flowers, especially roses:
symbolic of death (essential to graves and funeral rites), love, women and
sexuality
Carriages and ships:
symbolic of masculine strength, dominance, power and adventure
Water: symbolic of life
(nourishment leading to birth), death and mysteries (hidden depths unexplored
by humans)
Fire: symbolic of death,
destruction, war, and life (warmth)
Flower festival: symbolic
of the sexual act, the conquest of men over women, and love seen as an act of
war in which women are wearied and eventually retire
Dusty, trampled flowers: symbolic
of women discarded by men after used for sexual satisfaction
Metaphorical beasts and eyes
(shining buttons, bouquets): symbolic of men or the society keeping watch
on women and ensuring that they act according to code of conduct.
References:
·
Britannica Biography (Guy de Maupassant)
·
Wikipedia (search: Henry IV of France)
·
Dictionary.com (for meanings of words)
