[In the following essay, Busst studies symmetry and parallelism in the four meetings between Salammbô and Mâtho, within the context of the novel's overall structural opposition of male and female principles.]

Few modern critics would endorse Sainte-Beuve's judgement that Salammbô, showing no signs of an architect, is without unity and structure.¹ Although regret was expressed not so long ago at the novel's disjointedness² and its lack of ‘architectonic order’,³ there is nowadays general agreement that the unity of the novel is assured by the subordination of apparently disparate elements to a single vast conflict between the male and female principles, represented respectively by the sun, Moloch, Mâtho and the Barbarians, and by the moon, Tanit, Salammbô and Carthage. In fact, the identification and association of elements within each group is not as simple as it might appear. For example, both Carthaginians and Barbarians obviously include men as well as women; Carthage, sacred to Tanit, also contains worshippers of Moloch, with which god its leaders Hamilcar and Hannon in particular have associations;⁴ and the deities themselves can be seen to exhibit a certain hermaphroditism.⁵ Nevertheless, thanks to the all-pervasive effect of the dominant imagery and symbolism, which ever stresses the opposition of the two principles and of their attributes and representatives,⁶ the story can be seen to describe broadly the rise and subsequent fall in the power of the male principle, with a symmetrical decline and rise in the influence of the female principle.

Symmetry, which thus governs the basic structure of the novel, has on several occasions attracted the attention of critics of Salammbô: for example, R. B. Leal speaks of the ‘symmetry and almost mathematical precision’ of Flaubert's work and of the ‘symmetry’ of various sections and refers to the ‘symmetrical whole’,⁷ while Anne Green remarks on the ‘beautiful symmetry of the novel's structure as a whole.’⁸ It seems curious then that what is, not only in itself, but also for its influence throughout the novel, of paramount importance for any study of both symmetry and structure in Salammbô, should in this context have been almost completely overlooked: that is, the sequence of the four encounters between Mâtho and Salammbô in Chapters i, v, xi and xv.

These four meetings are placed symmetrically at equidistant points in corresponding pairs in the novel: one pair, comprising the meetings which effectively begin and end the action, being appropriately set in the first and last chapters; and the other pair, in which the meetings represent pivotal points in the development of the action, appearing in Chapters v and xi—the fifth chapter from the beginning and the fifth chapter from the end, with five chapters intervening. Not only are the scenes within each pair amazingly symmetrical in form, content and effect, but all four are linked by careful cross-referencing.

With regard first of all to the opening and closing scenes, one of the main obstacles to the recognition of any fundamental correspondence⁹ between the two may be that, in what remains the fullest study of Salammbô's skeletal structure, R. B. Leal's French Studies article of 1973, the two final chapters do not even figure in the analysis of the main architecture of the novel; these chapters are relegated to a separate conclusion which, according to Leal, ‘Flaubert considered to be relatively distinct from the main body of the work.’¹⁰ The only evidence advanced in support of this contention is a page reference to Flaubert's Correspondance, which is not however quoted. The relevant passage appears to be the following: ‘je retravaille avec plus d'acharnement que de succès, étant maintenant dans un passage atroce. […] Après quoi, j'aurai encore deux grands chapitres de la conclusion.’¹¹ The assertion that Flaubert considered these two chapters somehow separate from the rest of the work is hardly justified by this statement, any more than by the fact that they do not fit conveniently into Leal's system, even though this scheme has never been challenged, and actually provides the framework for P. Brady's recent alchemical interpretation of Salammbô.¹² In fact, although Flaubert's correspondence and the early drafts of Salammbô indicate that he hesitated during its composition about the number and numbering of chapters, the circumstances of Mâtho's death do figure in all the drafts and scenarios of the novel.¹³ Thus it is clear that the parallelism between the first and last encounters of Mâtho and Salammbô, essential to the total structure of the novel, must have been ever-present in Flaubert's mind, as is indicated by the care with which, in the last complete, detailed scenario before actual composition, Flaubert includes in the sketches of the first and last chapters many of the most important symmetrical details of those meetings.¹⁴

This symmetry between the first and last encounters is indeed extensive. What first arouses the male principle to conquer the female is the drink offered by Salammbô to Mâtho; as it is interpreted as an offer of herself, Mâtho determines to possess Salammbô by any means, including the use of the mercenary army's might to smash Carthage. Some of the drafts emphasize that the Mercenary War, which provides the novel with by far the greatest part of the action, is caused by Mâtho's fury at being rejected by Salammbô.¹⁵ As for the last encounter of Mâtho and Salammbô, however it is interpreted—is it a true mystic marriage of Mâtho and Salammbô, as certain of Flaubert's drafts would suggest?¹⁶ or is it the final dissolution through death of a marriage of desire?—there is one certainty: it ends the association of Mâtho and Salammbô and the action of the novel and, as far as Flaubert's narration is concerned, the conflict of Moloch and Tanit and of Barbarians and Carthaginians. It is fitting therefore that the drink proffered at the beginning should reappear at the end. M. Z. Shroder has remarked interestingly on the resemblance of the drink poured by Salammbô for Mâtho to the love philtre of the Tristan legend.¹⁷ It is, however, important to note that Mâtho does not actually drink the wine (‘Il prit la coupe et il la portait à ses lèvres quand […]’ (39))—any more than Salammbô drinks from her cup at the end of the novel (‘Salammbô se leva […] avec une coupe à la main, afin de boire aussi. Elle retomba […]’ (311)). On each occasion, what passes for a couple's marriage toast is prevented by an intruder who is the would-be husband of the other scene: the toast between Mâtho and Salammbô in the first scene, merely delayed by the Gaul's enthusiastic intervention, is thwarted by Narr'Havas; whereas, in the second scene, that between Narr'Havas and Salammbô is cut short by Mâtho, and by the effect of his atrocious death. In both cases, the vessel is a coupe, but only Mâtho's is specifically said to be made of gold. However, since at their marriage Salammbô and Narr'Havas are to drink the same toast together, it does not seem unreasonable to suppose that, as ‘Salammbô se leva comme son époux, avec une coupe à la main’, they are to drink from identical vessels; and Narr'Havas's is precisely ‘une patère d'or.’ In the draft of Chapter i published by P. M. Wetherill, d'or is twice deleted and twice restored;¹⁸ and a scenario presents both Narr'Havas and Salammbô drinking from a coupe.¹⁹ These hesitations are intriguing. We know that, when composing the later chapters, Flaubert reworked earlier ones in order to remove certain repetitions.²⁰ Did he feel that symmetrical effects involving excessive repetition might appear too contrived and that the identity of particular details should only be discreetly suggested? Certainly, although there is considerable repetition from scene to scene, in a number of instances identical terms have been deleted in the drafts and, as we shall see below, these terms do not appear in the final version.

The settings for these symmetrical drinks are also very similar: both present crowds at alfresco feasts, with tables laden with food and drink, and the statement in Chapter xv, that ‘le festin devait durer toute la nuit’, refers back directly not just to the subject, but even to the title of Chapter i, a parallelism reinforced by specific recollections, for ‘quelques-uns se rappelaient le banquet des Mercenaires’ (308). The mention of Salammbô's noces in Chapter xv (304) recalls the question: “‘A quand les noces?’” of Chapter i (39). This time the wedding is to Narr'Havas, but just as he diverted attention to himself in the first encounter, so he now tends to be supplanted by Mâtho in the people's imagination and anticipation. The procession of priests, which in Chapter xv precedes Salammbô as she descends from her palace, had of course followed her down from that same palace in Chapter i. It is, however, Mâtho's arrival in Chapter xv that most closely parallels that of Salammbô in Chapter i. Salammbô first appears at the top of her palace (‘à sa plus haute terrasse’), just as Mâtho comes into view at the top of the Acropolis (‘au sommet de l'Acropole’), and the appearance of both is preceded by the opening of a door (‘la porte […] s'ouvrit’ (36); ‘la porte venait de s'ouvrir’ (308)). In both cases, what is first presented as une femme in Chapter i, and as un homme in Chapter xv, is seen standing sur le seuil (36, 308). Salammbô immediately comes down two flights of stairs and, with one staircase still to descend, she pauses immobile; and then we are given a picture of her in a pose presenting several similarities to that of Mâtho as he pauses, immobile, at the top of the single flight of stairs leading down from the cell. If Salammbô has la tête basse (in the draft published by P. M. Wetherill (p. 314): baissant la tête), Mâtho is courbé en deux. The curiosity each arouses is all the more intense for being partly religious: the Mercenaries feel with regard to Salammbô that ‘quelque chose des Dieux l'enveloppait comme une vapeur subtile’; whereas for the Carthaginians, Mâtho's body is something ‘décorée d'une splendeur presque religieuse.’²¹ Soon, both move again, and short paragraphs begin in similar fashion: Enfin elle descendit, and Enfin il s'avança. Flaubert's original intention appears to have been that, at first, both should have their arms folded, Salammbô's presumably in front of her and Mâtho's behind. However, although in the final version Mâtho still appears with ‘ses bras croisés’, the description of Salammbô reproduced in the draft edited by P. M. Wetherill ‘la tête basse, les bras croisés, immobile’²² is finally reduced to ‘immobile et la tête basse.’ As Salammbô advances, those seated move back to examine her (‘se reculaient […] en la regardant passer’ (but ‘pour la voir’ in a draft²³), just as Mâtho's observers move forward to see him (‘se penchaient pour le voir’). And, in both scenes, Salammbô is drawn towards Mâtho involontairement.²⁴

As far as the meetings of Mâtho and Salammbô in Chapters v and xi are concerned, their symmetry becomes apparent only if the encounter in Chapter xi is correctly interpreted as the occasion of Salammbô's loss of virginity and if this defloration is seen to represent a victory for Mâtho. Unfortunately, the validity of both of these hitherto generally accepted interpretations has recently been challenged by critics. First of all, it has been argued that because of ‘male hysteria’ Mâtho was unable to perform the sexual act, and that this failure is indicated in the final version by Mâtho's weeping and, in the drafts, by Salammbô's humiliation.²⁵ Such a reading, however, is at variance with both the drafts and the final version. To take Mâtho's tears as proof of his impotence seems preposterous in view of the fact that, in the drafts, it is precisely after what Flaubert refers to crudely as the ‘baisade sous le péplos’, that Mâtho weeps, expressing his hopes and dreams to Salammbô and surprising her by his ‘faiblesse.’²⁶ And as for Salammbô's humiliation, neither the drafts nor the final version give any reason to believe that it could be caused by Mâtho's supposed impotence. On the contrary, in the drafts where Salammbô's humiliation or shame are mentioned, it is again following the act of intercourse. In Folio 200, after the ‘baisade sous le voile’, it is noted that ‘Salammbô se sent dégradée. Honte qui tourne en haine’, further details suggesting that, in spite of the mystical state that should accompany what could be considered a sacred prostitution, she feels degraded on the human and feminine plane by this act.²⁷ And in Folio 201, it is again after the ‘baisade sous le péplos’, after Mâtho's confidences followed by sleep, and after the revelation of his ‘faiblesse’, that Flaubert notes in Salammbô: ‘Honte vague. Comprend maintenant, remords, envie de tuer.’²⁸ Here the sense of the scenario seems to be what is suggested in the final version: initial regret for an act performed with a being she took for a god, but who now, with the revelation of his human frailty, appears merely a man. This shame at having given herself to Mâtho, leading to the desire to kill him, also seems plainly indicated in the final version. Salammbô blushes on seeing her broken chain, but the desire to kill Mâtho comes when she perceives a smile on the lips of this satisfied, sleeping man, and notices in his half-closed eyes ‘une gaieté silencieuse et presque outrageante’ (212, my italics). Viewed in the light of these facts, Salammbô's shame seems to confirm her loss of virginity, rather than suggesting it never took place!

If the theory of impotence, based on Mâtho's weeping and Salammbô's shame, need not detain the alert reader, the allegation that Mâtho was prevented by his falling asleep from having intercourse with Salammbô is far more serious—not because it is any more convincing, but because this utterly ludicrous suggestion has been given wide circulation in the Notice to the important Club de l'Honnête Homme edition of Salammbô, and in M. Bardèche's L'Œuvre de Flaubert (1974). Supposedly, Flaubert ‘triche […] en esquivant cette rencontre tragique, en frappant ce Mâtho aux larges épaules d'un sommeil soudain, bien inattendu en cette circonstance.’²⁹

The illogicality and inconsistency of this interpretation become evident later on in the Notice, when it is admitted that the symbolism of the broken chain shows that Salammbô does indeed lose her virginity on this occasion.³⁰ Since there is no opportunity for this to happen after Mâtho's rudely interrupted sleep, it must have taken place before, and in that case the sleep appears perfectly natural. Indeed, the drafts and scenarios also present Mâtho falling asleep after the ‘baisade’,³¹ and this sequence of events, clearly of great importance for Flaubert, should therefore have been accepted by the editors of the Club de l'Honnête Homme edition as being also that of the final version, since they assert that ‘pour Salammbô la composition du roman était arrêtée dès les premiers scénarios. Flaubert […] n'y changeait rien d'essentiel.’³² This sequence must also be deduced from the account given by the honest and wily Giscon, according to whom, after an accouplement, in which he heard Salammbô ‘râler d'amour comme une prostitutée’, Mâtho related his ‘désir’ while kissing her hands. This latter episode, described also in the drafts (‘Expansion de Mâtho. Rêves de bonheur, îles fortunées (v. Critias)’),³³ is told in the final version in the paragraphs beginning ‘Il baisa tous les doigts’ and ‘“Emporte-le”’. It seems likely, therefore, that it is the previous paragraph that describes the ‘accouplement’ itself, and this interpretation is lent force by the account of what happens immediately before, when Mâtho seizes her heels, breaking her chain, whereupon the zaïmph falls about them and she perceives Mâtho above her chest. It is significant that throughout the drafts the act is referred to as the ‘baisade sous le manteau’ (or ‘péplos’, or ‘voile’)³⁴ and that, according to the detailed scenarios: ‘Un accident fait tomber le péplos’.³⁵

This interpretation of Chapter xi is supported by the fact that, when writing for publication, Flaubert treats the sexual act with an extreme discretion contrasting markedly with the gross obscenity of his private correspondence and of the drafts. No one has ever doubted that, in the forest scene of Madame Bovary (Deuxième Partie, Chapter ix), Emma has intercourse with Rodolphe. And yet, there is no description of the act itself, which occurs in an interval in the text, after which, adopting Emma's viewpoint, we share in the experience of her afterglow. The act is, however, prepared by an objective description dependent on the use of three verbs: renverser, défaillir and s'abandonner. It is significant that, in Salammbô, the sexual act is preceded by a similar, objective description, in which the same three verbs convey the same meaning, whereupon Mâtho grasps Salammbô's heels, breaking her chain, and the veil falls. Differently from Madame Bovary, however, we are immediately presented, through Salammbô's sensibility, with this innocent girl's experience of the act itself, as she sees Mâtho above her: ‘—“Moloch, tu me brûles!” et les baisers du soldat, plus dévorateurs que des flammes, la parcouraient; elle était comme enlevée dans un ouragan, prise dans la force du soleil’ (211).

If Salammbô's loss of virginity in Chapter xi thus seems undeniable, for the parallelism of this encounter with that of Chapter v to become apparent, this defloration must be seen to represent a victory for Mâtho. Now, Leal perceives both in the sexual union of Mâtho and Salammbô, and in the symbolic and corresponding union of Moloch and Tanit, an expression of equality, partly on account of the ‘equalizing effect’ of certain consequences of these encounters, and partly because ‘in the sexual act, male and female both give and receive.’³⁶ Nevertheless, whatever may be the contribution of each partner in a sexual encounter, and however much compensations following defeat may equalize the effects of victory, it is certain that, in the context of the novel and in the view of Flaubert, the union of Mâtho and Salammbô represents domination, possession and victory for the male.

The symbolic sexual union of Moloch and Tanit, which brings rain through the fertilization of the goddess, is presented as just as much a victory for the male god and the result of his domination as the sacrifice to him of the children, which propitiates him and joins him with Tanit; so that effectively ‘il avait vaincu Tanit’ (270). Similarly, Mâtho recognizes that what guides him on his path of violence against Carthage is the desire to possess Salammbô: ‘“je voulais abattre ses murailles afin de parvenir jusqu'à toi, pour te posséder”’ (209). And it is evident in the earliest drafts that Mâtho's gentleness is the means to possession: ‘Mâtho veut la posséder. Il est doux et lui fait la cour’.³⁷ In the final version, his tender words, his self-abasement, lead precisely towards this conquest of Salammbô, in which she finds herself ‘comme enlevée dans un ouragan, prise dans la force du soleil’ (211). And Flaubert himself sees in this scene, not any sexual equality, but domination by the male—as he makes clear when commenting in his letter to Sainte-Beuve on the symbolic significance of the accompanying storm: ‘l'âme de cette histoire est Moloch, le Feu, la Foudre. Ici le Dieu lui-même, sous une de ses formes [i.e. Mâtho], agit; il dompte Salammbô. Le tonnerre était donc bien à sa place: c'est la voix de Moloch resté en dehors.’³⁸

If Mâtho's union with Salammbô in Chapter xi thus represents victory for him, then he must have been defeated in Chapter v by his failure to achieve this, in an encounter not even mentioned by Leal, in whose scheme Chapter v illustrates exclusively the ascendancy of the male principle.³⁹ However, that Flaubert intended that this scene should represent the rejection and defeat of Mâtho by Salammbô is clearly indicated by the use in the scenarios of such terms as refus, refuse, repousse, sourire de pitié.⁴⁰ Since victory for the one is defeat for the other, and vice versa, the fundamental symmetry of the scenes becomes obvious. Moreover, in the two encounters, the victory or defeat is immediately followed by an event of immense importance which, both in itself and in the influence it exercises on the fortunes of each of the collectivities, represents a complete reversal of the victory or defeat: the loss or acquisition of the zaïmph, the changing possession of which largely determines the course and final outcome of the conflict on all levels. In Chapter v, then, Mâtho is defeated by Salammbô, but gains the veil, which the victorious Salammbô thus loses; whereas in Chapter xi, Mâtho conquers Salammbô, who nevertheless acquires the veil. This symmetry is emphasized by many of the events preparing the two encounters, which are both brought about by another person's urge to gain the veil with the help of Mâtho or Salammbô: Spendius in the first case, and Schahabarim in the second. It is also the slave Spendius who guides Mâtho to Salammbô; but Salammbô too is led to Mâtho by a slave.

This curious parallelism is heightened by other symmetrical effects. On both occasions, in rooms lit at night by a single lamp, and each with an escabeau, the beds appear blue: Salammbô's, ‘un grand carré d'azur’, is enveloped by curtains in ‘une atmosphère bleuâtre’ (101), whereas when Salammbô first perceives Mâtho's, it is covered with ‘quelque chose de bleuâtre’ (207). To Salammbô's question: ‘“Qu'est-ce donc?”’ (101), corresponds Mâtho's later ‘“Qui t'amène? pourquoi viens-tu?”’ (207). In both cases, she asks for the veil: the direct speech of the first (‘“Donne-le”’) is paralleled in the second by indirect speech (‘elle lui demanda le zaïmph’). Whereas, in the first: ‘elle s'avançait toujours’, in the second: ‘elle s'avança vivement’. In both, while she is preoccupied with the veil, which in both he offers her, Mâtho, we are told, ‘la contemplait’ (102, 207). To her ‘“Plus près! plus près!”’ of the first scene corresponds his ‘“Oh! approche! approche!”’ of the second. And in both he expresses his love in the same simple terms: ‘“Je t'aime!”’. In both he mentions the same sacrifice: ‘“J'aurais abandonné l'armée”’ (102), and ‘“j'abandonne l'armée”’ (211). And Salammbô's exclamation ‘“Va-t'en! va-t'en!”’ (103) is strangely echoed in the later scene by Mâtho's ‘“Ne t'en va pas!”’ (210), and Giscon's ‘“Va-t'en!”’ (214). The curse Salammbô lays on Mâtho, ‘“Malédiction sur toi”’ (103), is exactly repeated against her by Giscon (214). At one point in both scenes, each stands immobile (101, 212), contemplating the other sleeping with half-closed eyes (101: ‘ses paupières entre-closes’; 212: ‘les paupières à demi closes’); and in both cases this sleep ends amid the lurid glow of flames, as first the mosquito net and then the camp are set alight. In both scenes, ‘une longue flèche’ comes perilously close to striking them, Mâtho after the meeting (104), and Salammbô before (205). And Salammbô, whom Mâtho tries in vain to ‘envelop’ in the veil in Chapter v (‘tendant vers elle le zaïmph, il allait l'envelopper dans une étreinte’ (102)), is finally ‘enveloped’ in it by accident in Chapter xi (‘Le zaïmph tomba, l'enveloppant’ (211)). In the corresponding scenes, Mâtho and then Salammbô leave at dawn, with the veil wrapped around them, searching a way out of an unknown maze, Mâtho out of Carthage and Salammbô out of the camp, only to find themselves halted by a high and seemingly insuperable obstacle, Mâtho by the Khamon Gate, and Salammbô by the rampart. After escaping, both Mâtho and Salammbô display the sacred veil as prominently as possible: Mâtho ‘l'éleva sur sa tête le plus haut possible’ (104), and Salammbô ‘en écartant les bras […] déploya le zaïmph’ (217), both watched with consternation, the first by the Carthaginians and the second by the Barbarians.

These four scenes, immensely important for the development of the action,⁴¹ and bound together in pairs linked by elaborate symmetry, are also all connected by careful cross-referencing. It is noticeable that in each successive encounter, reference is specifically made to each of the previous ones. The meeting of Chapter v, for example, is brought about by the memory of Mâtho's encounter in Chapter i, since when, we are told, ‘il montait continuellement cet escalier’ (100), and emotion increases as he recognizes her door, first seen in Chapter i. In Chapter xi, Salammbô reminds Mâtho of the circumstances of their previous two meetings, which Mâtho also recalls. In the final encounter, reference is made not only to the first meeting, as was shown above, but also to both of the other two: for example, Mâtho remembers the second meeting, when he left protected by the veil, just as Salammbô is reminded of her experience in Mâtho's tent.

The four encounters are not only connected by the characters' recollections, but also by the subtle resumption of certain words and images. Firstly, we have seen how, in all four scenes, the word immobile is used to describe the posture of the rapt onlooker: of Salammbô in Chapters i and xi, and of Mâtho in Chapters v and xv; and it could be added that Chapter xi associates this immobility with a tête baissée and bras croisés, as it was shown above to be the case in Chapters i and xv. The ribald question of Chapter i: ‘“A quand les noces?”’ is echoed in the exchange between Tanaach and Salammbô, as the latter prepares for the meeting in Mâtho's tent, where she loses her virginity: ‘“Tu ne seras pas plus belle le jour de tes noces!”—“Mes noces!” répéta Salammbô’ (200); as also by the mention in the last scene of her ‘noces’ with Narr'Havas—just as the possession of Salammbô that Narr'Havas here claims (311) reminds us of Mâtho's protestation, in his previous encounter with Salammbô, that all his efforts have been undertaken with the same possession of Salammbô in mind: ‘“pour te posséder”’ (209). The snake images, of which D. L. Demorest has underlined the prevalence in Flaubert's work,⁴² provide another link between these scenes, especially as they connect Salammbô's chaînette d'or with Mâtho's arms. Salammbô's chain, described in the first encounter, is broken in the third, when Mâtho seizes her heels, its two ‘bouts’ (211) or ‘tronçons’ (212) appearing in a draft as ‘les deux tronçons d'un serpent’⁴³ and in the final version as ‘deux vipères rebondissantes’—just as, in the last scene, Mâtho's arms resemble ‘des tronçons de serpent’, which, because they are bound behind his back, cannot now encircle Salammbô as they had attempted to do in the second meeting, and succeeded in doing in the third, as Salammbô remembers in the fourth.⁴⁴ We are reminded here of the python which, in the rituals performed before her meeting in Mâtho's tent, hangs around Salammbô's neck, its two ends dangling like a broken circle: ‘le python se rabattit et lui posant sur la nuque le milieu de son corps, il laissait pendre sa tête et sa queue, comme un collier rompu dont les deux bouts traînaient jusqu'à terre’ (198); and of the other sacred python which, in the last chapter, completing the circle, ‘décrivait en se mordant la queue un grand cercle noir’ (307). And the similarity between, in the last scene, Mâtho's broken bonds, of which it is stated: ‘ses liens rompus pendaient le long de ses cuisses’, and the trailing ends of Salammbô's chain is reinforced by the fact that patrician virgins' chaînettes are referred to as ‘ces entraves’ (212).

The symmetry associated with these four meetings between Salammbô and Mâtho helps therefore considerably to reveal what remained invisible for Sainte-Beuve: the workmanship of the architect of Salammbô, whose achievement is all the more impressive as the structure had to include parts already shaped by history.

Notes

1. Sainte-Beuve, Nouveaux lundis (Paris, 1881), vol. iv, p. 82.

2. Notice to Salammbô in the Œuvres complètes de Gustave Flaubert, Club de l'Honnête Homme, vol. 2 (Paris, 1971) (hereinafter designated CHH), p. 18 (reproduced in M. Bardèche, L'Œuvre de Flaubert (Paris, Les Sept Couleurs, 1974), p. 250): ‘En somme, il y a un abîme que l'auteur n'arrive à aucun moment à nous faire franchir entre le romanesque et extravagant poème d'amour sur lequel il a construit son intrigue et les événements historiques qui l'intéressent et qu'il a entrepris de raconter.’

3. D. Porter, ‘Aestheticism versus the Novel: The Example of Salammbô’, Novel, 4 (1971), 101-06 (p. 105).

4. See Anne Green, ‘Salammbô and the Myth of Pasiphaë’, French Studies, xxxii (1978) 170-77 (p. 171); and A. Green, Flaubert and the Historical Novel: ‘Salammbô’ reassessed (Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 54, 125, 135.

5. For example, in the hymn to Moloch, in the invocation: ‘Père et Mère […] Dieu et Déesse’, Salammbô, Garnier-Flammarion edition (Paris, 1964), p. 265 (hereinafter referred to simply by numbers within brackets); and in the mention of the ‘hermaphroditisme’ of Tanit (p. 306). See also H. Suhner-Schluepp, L'Imagination du feu ou la dialectique du soleil et de la lune dans ‘Salammbô’ de G. Flaubert (Zurich, Juris, 1970), pp. 30-84.

6. See, for example, D. L. Demorest, L'Expression figurée et symbolique dans l'œuvre de Gustave Flaubert (Paris, 1931), pp. 481-95.

7. R. B. Leal, ‘Salammbô: An Aspect of Structure’, French Studies, xxvii (1973) 16-29 (p. 19).

8. A. Green, Flaubert and the Historical Novel, p. 65.

9. On points of detail, J. Rousset has nevertheless perceptively underlined certain of the symmetrical effects of perspective between the first and last encounters, where the crowd's eyes are focused on an isolated and descending protagonist, representing the opposed collectivity, and also the presence in both scenes of a feasting crowd and of references to a wedding, where Mâtho and Narr'Havas are present as rivals (‘Positions, distances, perspectives dans Salammbô’, Poétique, 6 (1971), 145-54). L. Bottineau (‘La Représentation de l'espace dans Salammbô’, in B. Masson (ed.), Gustave Flaubert I, Flaubert, et après … (Paris, Lettres Modernes (1984) 79-104 (p. 85)) also notes the symmetry with which a crowd's sharp and penetrating gaze is focused on a central character in Chapters v, xi and xv—to which he could have added on Salammbô also in Chapter i.

10. Leal, p. 26.

11. Flaubert, Correspondance, Nouvelle édition augmentée, Quatrième série (Paris, Conard, 1927), p. 433.

12. P. Brady, ‘Archetypes and the historical novel: the case of Salammbô’, Stanford French Review, 1 (1977) 313-24 (p. 318).

13. CHH, pp. 284, 286, 289, 292, 304, 330, 332.

14. See the text published by A. Green (1981), p. 49. See also CHH, pp. 309, 312.

15. See, for example, Folio 190: ‘Mâtho furieux regrette de n'avoir pas enlevé Salammbô. Appelle à la révolte toutes les villes’ (CHH, p. 300).

16. See the scenario (Folio 220) first published by L. Abrami in the Conard edition (Paris, 1910, repr. 1936), p. 470, and included in CHH (p. 286): ‘Regard de la jeune fille sur le corps déchiré de Mâtho. Elle l'aime. C'est lui l'époux. Ils ont été mariés par la mort. Elle pâlit, et tombe, dans le sang de Mâtho.’

17. See M. Z. Shroder, ‘On Reading Salammbô’, L'Esprit créateur, 10 (1970) 24-35 (pp. 27-28).

18. P. M. Wetherill, ‘Une Version manuscrite du premier chapitre de Salammbô’, Lettres romanes, 32 (1978) 291-331 (p. 322).

19. Published by A. Green (1981) p. 49. See also CHH, p. 332.

20. Flaubert, Correspondance, Troisième Série, 1854-69 (Paris, Conard, 1910), p. 301.

21. Compare the scenario in Folio 207: ‘Le corps de l'ennemi (l'hostie) est une chose religieuse’ (CHH, p. 338).

22. Wetherill, p. 314.

23. Wetherill, p. 315.

24. As has been pointed out already by Shroder (pp. 27-28).

25. B. F. Bart, ‘Male Hysteria in Salammbô’, Nineteenth-Century French Studies, 12 (1984) 313-21 (p. 320).

26. Folios 190 and 201 (CHH, pp. 302, 326).

27. CHH, p. 312.

28. CHH, p. 326.

29. CHH, p. 25, and Bardèche, p. 256.

30. CHH, p. 37.

31. CHH, pp. 299, 302, 326.

32. CHH, p. 341.

33. Folio 190 (CHH, p. 302); see also Folios 188, 201 (CHH, pp. 299, 326).

34. Folios 238, 182, 188, 190, 200, 201 (CHH, pp. 287, 289, 299, 302, 312, 326).

35. CHH, p. 299; see also pp. 302, 326.

36. Leal, p. 25.

37. CHH, p. 285.

38. Sainte-Beuve, p. 442, my italics.

39. Leal, p. 22.

40. CHH, pp. 287, 289, 291, 297, 300.

41. It is significant that, when condensing the action of the novel for an opera libretto outline, Flaubert accorded in turn a central position in four of the five acts to each of these four encounters: in Act i, the appearance of Salammbô and the ensuing quarrel between Mâtho and Narr'Havas; in Act ii, Mâtho's visit to Salammbô's room, and his rejection by her; in Act iii, Salammbô's visit to Mâtho's tent, and the ‘scène d'amour entre Salammbô and Mâtho’; and in Act v, at the wedding feast for Salammbô and Narr'Havas, the torture and death of Mâtho, leading to the death of Salammbô (CHH, pp. 365-68).

42. Demorest, pp. 489-90.

43. CHH, p. 326.

44. ‘il allait l'envelopper dans une étreinte’ (102); ‘il lui entourait la taille de ses deux bras’ (210); ‘lui entourant la taille de ses deux bras’ (310).