Rage and Fire: A Life of Louise Colet--Pioneer, Feminist, Literary Star, Flaubert's Muse - Softcover

Most English-language readers are familiar with the notoriously tempestuous and beautiful Louise Colet as Gustave Flaubert's only love and his model for Emma Bovary. But in addition, she was, at the summit of her career, one of the most famous female literary figures in France. In describing Colet's ascent to literary fame, Gray draws on Louise Colet's recently discovered journals to capture the spirit of this fiercely independent woman. She also illuminates in vivid detail the intellectual, social, and sexual mores of nineteenth-century France.

Written in a richly textured, novelistic style, Rage and Fire brilliantly captures the complexities of a woman who ascended to fame and literary respectability through her talent and a willful spirit that refused to acknowledge the word no.