France v. England: Simmonds' culture wars...

The tale of Gemma Bovery's tragic demise was a great story in and of itself, but I was particularly interested by the undercurrent of culture clash between the British and French sensibilities of our dear characters. Simmonds seems to have fun playing with stereotypes, especially in the "graphic" side of the novel. Joubert, for example, is a classic round-nosed old Frenchman, surrounded by his baguettes the first time we see him (2) and several times after throughout the book. Simmonds continues with the awkwardly rumpled (and charmingly British) Charles, and the cool eyes and aristocratic nose of Herve's wealthy French mother (77).

I found the culture clash most interesting as it manifested in the transformation in Gemma. She begins as a slightly plump British woman, clothed in floor-length skirts and oversized t-shirts (23). Her idea of France is romantic at first, a way to escape Charlie's ex-wife. "She begins to dream of a place unclogged by traffic, a landscape of tranquil communities"--in contrast to London, which she now perceives as full of "'nauseating middle-class ghettos full of dimmer switches, panic buttons and kids behind burglar bars.' As for the English countryside, 'nothing left of it, just one big suburbia overrun with cars and garden centres'" (28).

However, the mysticism dissipates soon after she arrives and realizes that France is just as "real" a place as the one she left behind. "I did not come to Normandy to think of bum creams," she complains (39). Failed by the French countryside, she finds her romantic countryside in the arms of Herve, under the failing roof of his aging chateau. This is when she begins to come around, to abandon her British sensibilities--her British husband, the unabashedly in-your-face middle-class Wizzy Rankins (see page 43!), and especially her looks. She gets slimmer and slimmer, gets a more stylish haircut, and streamlines her wardrobe, at the same time daydreaming about becoming "like an 18th-century mistress" (70).

So if Simmonds is showing the process of a character abandoning their culture in pursuit of another, is there a moral? What does Gemma's death mean? And what does it have to do with the role of "Madame Bovery" in the text, especially as it plays out as a symbol of "Frenchness" that Gemma isn't--and is unwilling to become--aware of?