The Dance of Death

by Gustave Flaubert

Gustave Flaubert was born in Rouen in 1821. As a writer Flaubert was a perfectionist, who did not make a distinction between a beautiful or ugly subject: all was in the style. The idea, he argued, only exists by virtue of its form - its elements included the perfect word, cunningly contrived and verified rhythms, and a genuine architectural structure.