The Wet-Nursing Business in Nineteenth-Century France

Bibliographic Data

ID8940960
AuthorsGeorge D Sussman (corresponding author)
Year1975
Volume9
Issue2
Pages304-304
Publication date1975-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueFrench Historical Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0016-1071 • E-ISSN: 1527-5493
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/286130
OpenAlexW2313362921
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited1

Emma Bovary put her baby out to be nursed by another woman for wage. For the social historian Madame Bovary belonged to the rural professional class: she lived in small bourg north of Rouen her husband Charles, who was an officier de sante, second-class physician. One day Emma was suddenly seized the desire to see her little girl. The wet nurse, poor carpenter's wife, lived at the other end of the village. Emma found the nurse at the gate of her cottage with baby she was suckling on one arm. But this was not Emma's child. With her other hand the wet nurse held another child, also not Emma's, but a poor puny little fellow, his face covered scrofula, the son of Rouen hosier, whom his parents, too taken up their business, left in the country. Go in, the nurse directed Emma, your little one is there asleep. Inside, Emma lifted her daughter from the cradle, coddled her and sang to her, until the baby vomited on her mother's shoulder. Emma abruptly returned her daughter to the solicitous nurse, who pursued her visitor out the door and down the path, sabots clattering, begging for gifts of soap, coffee, and brandy.l Is Flaubert's account of French family life in the middle of the nineteenth century overdrawn? Could many mothers have been quite so insensitive as Emma Bovary? Could infant care and feeding have Mr. Sussman is assistant professor of history at Vanderbilt University

Feminism, Gender, and Sexuality Studies · French Literature and Criticism · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · History · Medicine · Nursing

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub