Desire and writing in Flaubert\'s youth

Author(s)

Bruno Penteado Natividade Moreto

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2009-03-06

Examining board members

Cleusa Rios Pinheiro Passos; Vilma Sant\'Anna Arêas; Philippe Leon Marie Ghislain Willemart

• Advisor: Cleusa Rios Pinheiro Passos

Abstract

The first goal of this work is to approach several perspectives on Gustave Flauberts (1821- 1880) juvenilia. We have based ourselves on the concept of desire, borrowed from Psychoanalysis, and writing, developed by Roland Barthes. Therefore, we intend to comment on some approaches to the juvenilia, especially those of two Flaubertian critics, Jonathan Culler and Timothy Unwin, so as to scrutinize the aesthetic solutions adopted by Flaubert in many of the texts he wrote in the 1830s. We subsequently move on to the analysis of a short story written in 1837, Passion et Vertu. Not only is the story interesting due to its connections to Madame Bovary, it is also the most successful text from the 1830s in condensing the aesthetics of the authors first writings. Basing ourselves on Jean-Paul Sartres insightful approach, we intend to propose, still having Psychoanalysis as our main support, how a series of elements intertwines so as to constitute a whole which, notwithstanding its structural incongruity, is acutely expressive and enjoys great ideological power. (AU)