Beauty And The Bird

Gustave Flaubert’s description of objects and settings is utterly breathtaking: “He was called Loulou. His body was green, his head blue, the tips of his wings were pink and his breast was golden. But he had the tiresome tricks of biting his perch, pulling his feathers out, scattering refuse and spilling the water of his bath. Madame Aubain grew tired of him and gave him to Felicite for good” (Ch. 4). This description never tells the reader what to think of the bird: If you think that a green body with a blue head, pink wing tips, and a golden breast is ugly, then so be it. However, there is something about the description that makes us think of the parrot as beautiful, even if Flaubert doesn’t say so. Flaubert simply describes the characteristics of the bird and expects the reader to create their opinion of it. However, are we responsible for viewing the bird as magnificent, or is Flaubert sending a subliminal message to sway the reader to have an image of the bird? I believe in the latter. People appreciate exotic, uncommon things. This is why a multicolored bird appeals to the reader.

In the sentence, “But he had the…”, the word ‘but’ is demonstrating how the bird’s habits of “biting his perch…” opaque its beauty. Using only one word, Flaubert signals the existence of a positive trait by hinting the possibility of its corruption through bad habits. But while these hints are ingenious (Flaubert, anyone?), they force the reader to have to close-read most of the text, in search for these subtleties. The density of such text contrasts with the simple plot and characters of the story, like with the simplistic personality of simple Felicite.