On the 15th of September, 1840, about six o’clock in the morning, the Ville de Montereau, just on the point of starting, was sending forth great whirlwinds of smoke, alongside the Quai St Bernard.
The opening line is purposely deceptive and misleading. It almost sounds like something from a historical report or at the very least a work of non-fiction. The precision of the date, the time, the name of the ship and the circumstances are all very factual and drily presented. What follows, however, is Flaubert’s experimentation in moving away from historically-grounded realism and toward a more impressionistic sort of writing that stands in ironic counterpoint to its opening lines by virtue of not being rooted in such particulars.
Frédéric was thinking about the room he would occupy in Paris, about the plan of a drama, subjects for pictures, future passions. He found that the happiness merited by the excellence of his soul was slow in arriving. He declaimed some melancholy lines of poetry to himself; he walked with rapid step along the deck; he went on till he reached the end at which the bell was – and, in the centre of a group of passengers and sailors, he saw a gentleman addressing gallant remarks to a countrywoman.
The notable aspect of this paragraph is the persistence of passivity in describing the novel’s protagonist. He is a thinking, he is waiting for happiness, alone he recites poetry to himself. Frederic is a man out of sync and out of step, always on the outside looking in.
“Ha! a few of the citizens are getting a crack.”
Only one part of the novel is given its historical due as normal by Flaubert, the Revolution of 1848. And yet, in keeping with the novel’s general fluidity regarding time and place, that historically situated section is subjugated to a single chapter. This, too, is in keeping with the idea of the protagonist as existing out of sync with the events of reality around. While the violence of rebellion takes place around, Frederic walks through the streets with Rosanette and after being enveloped by what sounds like a huge piece of silk being sheared right through (it is the sound of musket fire) Frederic, who has been in a light mood all day, responds thusly. The narrator steps in with commentary upon Frederic’s observation: “there are situations in which a man of the least cruel disposition is so much detached from his fellow-men that he would see the entire human race perishing without a single throb of the heart.”
“That was the best time we ever had!” said Frederick.
“Yes, perhaps so, indeed! It was the best time we ever had," said Deslauriers.
Flaubert ends A Sentimental Education with a line that is considered one of the most perplexing in the history of the novel. What Frederick is referring to is a memory of an event so inconsequential to the narrative that this is the first time it is ever mentioned. Worth mentioning is that Flaubert once again situates this memory within a factual time frame: it occurred three years before the opening scene when the two men were vacationing. The best time they ever had turns out to be a visit to a brothel at which is ambiguously suggested that Frederick prematurely ejaculated just shortly after walking in. At any rate, the facts explicitly state that upon seeing all the prostitutes Frederick turned pale, turn away and ran away with the sound of the women’s laughing echoing behind him. Deslauriers had no choice but to leave as well, since Frederick was carrying their money. The bewilderment this final scene engenders is much easier understood than Flaubert's intention.
