Behind the shutters: What we don't see in Madame Bovary

Flaubert's Madame Bovary is justly honored for the detailed descriptions and the precise evocations of moments and events, but let's also recognize Flaubert for those moments of elision in the novel that make the narrative especially vivid, mysterious, and provocative. The most famous is the long scene in which the carriage travels through the streets of Rouen, everyone sees it passing again and again, and we are left to imagine the sex and the passion taking place inside. Flaubert is similarly discrete regarding the Bovary wedding night - we see Emma as a passionate sexpot and Charles as timid and kind of foolish during the wedding ceremony and celebration and during all the scenes preceding for that matter - but then when we see them after the ceremony, Emma is sullen and brooding and on edge and Charles is simpering and doting and possessive. We have to imagine the evolution of their feelings during their first sexual encounter - Charles awakened to a world of sensuality he had never known (certainly not in his first marriage), Emma disappointed - life, and her husband in particular, cannot match the rich and deep romance she has read of and imagined. From there, they are on a tragic course. It's easy to understand how the conventions of the time would have kept Flaubert the narrator outside of the bedroom (or carriage) door during the sex scenes; a more interesting and provocative elision is the scene in which Emma accepts Charles's proposal. Charles asks her father, the doting and seemingly wealthy country farmer, for her hand; dad says he will discuss with Emma and, if she says yes, he will open the shutter. Charles watches, impatient and in despair, for at least 20 minutes, he's about to leave - and the shutter opens. Great! But what did they discuss for 20 minutes? Did he have to persuade Emma? Did he order her to marry Charles? Or was it a simple, rational discussion - weighing the advantages and disadvantages, like buying a horse of a couple of acres? It's clear that part of the tragedy, of the novel and of the era, was the subjugation of women and the treatment of women as property. But that doesn't quite answer what was said or what happened inside the shuttered room. We never really know - but we are left wondering throughout, why did he pick Charles? Was he just eager to get rid of his daughter at any price? Or did he, incompetent farm manager that he was, just make another bad deal? And most important of all: What did Emma say?