Frédéric and Charles run into Monsieur Roque, a friend
of Madame Moreau and steward to a man named Monsieur Dambreuse.
Roque is not well respected because he lives with his housekeeper.
They continue on. Deslauriers advises Frédéric to take advantage
of Monsieur Roque’s connection to Monsieur Dambreuse and become
his wife’s lover. He also advises Frédéric to do well in school,
and that he’ll see him again soon. The men say goodbye.
Analysis: Part One, Chapters 1 and 2
The first few paragraphs of Sentimental Education provide
relevant information about the seafaring setting in which the novel
opens, but, more important, they function as a zooming camera lens
that starts wide and then focuses in on the protagonist, Frédéric
Moreau. The sweeping first sentence of the novel, with its grand
pronouncement of the date and time and the striking image of a boat
ready to set sail, immediately narrows to more specific images of
people on board the boat. We see their baggage and hear the ship’s
clanging bell. Flaubert then narrows further, to an anonymous young
man standing on the deck, watching Paris slip away. Only after Flaubert describes
the sights he is seeing—Notre Dame, the Ile Saint-Louis, the Cite—does
he provide us with a name. This zooming-in of the opening paragraphs
mimics the structure of the novel as a whole. Sentimental
Education is a sweeping historical novel, and it is fitting that
we see the big picture before we see one specific human being. Throughout
the novel, this one individual will live against a larger, wider
background of politics and social change.
The first two chapters contain several goodbyes. The novel
actually opens with a goodbye, as Frédéric leaves Paris to return
home. He sadly says goodbye to Monsieur Arnoux after meeting him
and his wife onboard the ship. Before they actually part, Frédéric
dreads the separation—almost as soon as he meets Marie, he feels
a void open between them, since they will soon have to part. Once
he returns home, he makes a temporary departure from his mother
to visit Charles, and we learn of their own sad separation when Charles
left school to move to Paris. Reunited briefly, they part again
at the end of chapter 2. The frequency of
separation in these early chapters, and the varying degrees of distress
Frédéric feels every time, suggests that more goodbyes are in store
for Frédéric.
In chapters 1 and 2,
Frédéric has encounters with two men—Monsieur Arnoux and Deslauriers—that
reveal Frédéric’s tendency to be easily impressed and influenced
by other men. When he first talks to Monsieur Arnoux, he is immediately
struck by Arnoux’s wealth, confidence, and masculinity. Arnoux discusses
such things as tobacco and women, mistresses and celebrities, and
he offers fatherly advice. Arnoux’s higher social station intimidates
Frédéric, but he still follows Arnoux belowdecks, even though he
has no money to spend. Arnoux seems to all but ignore him, but still Frédéric
vows to befriend him somehow. Frédéric is just as struck by his
friend Deslauriers, who, though seemingly just as much of a dreamer
as Frédéric, impresses Frédéric with his confidence and gall. Frédéric
trusts Deslauriers so much that he feels shaken after they meet
and talk. Frédéric’s father died before he was born, and the intensity
of Frédéric’s reaction to and trust in other men suggests that he
is in some ways searching for a father figure.
