Discuss the characterisation of Emma Bovary in the novel "Madame Bovary".

?Nowhere is the discrepancy between Emma?s dreams and the realities of the world outside made clearer than in her choice of lovers? (p.xiv) Discuss the characterisation of Emma Bovary in the novel. In the novel, Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert, the character of Emma has two different lovers, who present an impossible romantic ideal that she aspires to. She expected these men to transport her from her ordinary, mundane life, into of one …

…her idea of marrying a wealthy, respected doctor, of being with a rich decadent lover, or a young passionate student. Neither of Emma's relationship with her lovers were able to satisfy her innermost longings, she took what she could from them but kept dreaming of the perfect lover. Her dreaming led to her excess, which led to her suicide. Eventually she did see, and appreciate Charles? love, but much too late to act upon it.