AN ANALYSIS OF BOURGEOIS CHARACTERS IN MADAME BOVARY

All characters in madame bovary have the features of the culture of living in the social class, norms and values that they belong to. the most important indicator that shows these features the are attitudes which they show against the concrete realities in which they live. all the characters that have secondary importance and take place around emma bovary, the main character of the novel, which flaubert handles in the frame of provincial (normandy) bourgeoisie, and they show common behavioral models except their personal characteristic features. town doctor charles bovary, pharmacist m.homais and merchant lheureux, who symbolize provincial bourgeoisie, which has started to rise from 1830s, determine emma bovary’s dramatic fate. novel’s subtitle provincial customs (taşra adetleri) is a criticism of materialistic, ordinary and petty, lower bourgeois customs which are closed into their own values, live in concrete ideas, bound to status quo, against intellectualism, art and literature. while charles bovary, who reduces life to the physical pleasure and financial satisfaction with his passive personality, selfishness, conformism and narrow point of view, indicates banality, insufficiency and foolishness of provincial bourgeoisie, pharmacist homais and merchant lheureux become symbols of sordidness, opportunism, exploitation, greed for money, social influence, show, self-arrogance and materialistic morality.