Sentimental Education

Gustave Flaubert
Translated by Helen Constantine and Edited by Patrick Coleman

Oxford World's Classics

A new translation of one of the most important of all French novels, admired for its artistry and its impact on the history of the genre
Flaubert's portrait of an idealistic but indecisive protagonist suggests that in a disenchanted bourgeois world heroism can only be imagined in ironic terms. Frédéric Moreau's abortive search for fulfilment through love, art, and politics has new things to say in today's postmodern, ostensibly post-ideological age
Flaubert's experiments with form and narrative techniques inspired modernist writers in particular, and inspired the later experiments of Proust and Joyce
Helen Constantine's translation is faithful and eminently readable
Patrick Coleman's introduction incorporates recent research into the genesis of Flaubert's novel as well as current critical interest in the fictional representation of historical events and Flaubert's place in the history of literary modernism
The edition includes extensive explanatory notes, an Historical Sketch clarifying the relation between the sequence of fictional and historical events, a Glossary of Historical Figures and an up-to-date bibliography

Sentimental Education

Gustave Flaubert
Translated by Helen Constantine and Edited by Patrick Coleman

Description

'For certain men the stronger their desire, the less likely they are to act.'

With his first glimpse of Madame Arnoux, Frederic Moreau is convinced he has found his romantic destiny, but when he pursues her to Paris the young student is unable to translate his passion into decisive action. He also finds himself distracted by the equally romantic appeal of political action in the turbulent years leading up to the revolution of 1848, and by the attractions of three other women, each of whom seeks to make him her own: a haughty society lady, a capricious courtesan, and an artless country girl.

Flaubert offers a vivid and unsparing portrait of the young men of his generation, struggling to salvage something of their ideals in a city where corruption, consumerism, and a pervasive sense of disenchantment undermine all but the most compromised erotic, aesthetic, and social initiatives. Sentimental Education combines thoroughgoing irony with an impartial but unexpectedly intense sympathy in a novel whose realism competes with that of Balzac and whose innovations in narrative plot and perspective mark a turning-point in the development of literary modernism.

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Sentimental Education

Gustave Flaubert
Translated by Helen Constantine and Edited by Patrick Coleman

Oxford World's Classics

Author Information

Helen Constantine was Head of Modern Languages at Bartholomew School near Oxford before retiring from teaching in 2000. She is now a full-time translator and editor. Her translations include Paris Tales (OUP, 2004), French Tales (OUP, 2008), Laclos, Dangerous Liaisons (Penguin, 2007), Gautier, Mademoiselle de Maupin (Penguin, 2005), and for Oxford World's Classics, Balzac, The Wild Ass's Skin (OUP, 2012) and Zola, The Conquest of Plassans (OUP, 2014) . From 2003-12 she was co-editor of the international magazine Modern Poetry in Translation.

Patrick Coleman has taught at UCLA since 1975. He has published widely on French literature and his books include Anger, Gratitude, and the Enligtenment Writer (OUP, 2011). For Oxford World's Classics he has edited translations of Rousseau's Discourse on Inequality and Confessions, Constant's Adolphe, and Balzac's The Wild Ass's Skin.