Behind madness: Reinterpreting madness in Flaubert’s novels
疯癫的背后：福楼拜小说中疯癫形象的再诠释

摘要

福楼拜创作了众多具有鲜明疯癫特质的经典人物，如艾玛、布瓦尔与佩库歇等。这些人物属于不同类型的“疯癫变体”，突破了传统人物塑造的固有范式，深刻折射出现代社会中权力与个体主体之间的深层关系。同时，福楼拜本人离经叛道的思想与行为，也可视为一种有意识、自觉的疯癫实践。哲学家福柯与福楼拜具备诸多思想共性，其围绕理性与疯癫的系统性研究，打破了世俗对疯癫的片面认知，为长期被理性体系边缘化的疯癫正名，深刻揭示出社会权力运作的内在实质。本文以福柯权力理论为研究视角，重新解读福楼拜笔下的经典形象，挖掘出人物身上常被学界忽略的疯癫隐喻：权力规训造成主体独特性消解、多元话语失语；天真者的疯癫行为冲破理性桎梏，揭露理性世界的内在矛盾；理性建构的绝对真理存在局限性，而非理性个体具备重要的认识论启示价值。

Abstract

Gustave Flaubert has created a host of classic literary figures with distinct mad traits, such as Emma Bovary, Bouvard and Pécuchet. As different variants of “madness”, these characters break the inherent paradigm of traditional character shaping and profoundly reflect the in-depth relationship between power and individual subjects in modern society. Meanwhile, Flaubert’s unconventional thoughts and behaviors can also be regarded as a conscious and deliberate practice of madness. Sharing many ideological commonalities with Flaubert, the philosopher Michel Foucault conducted systematic research on rationality and madness. His studies have overturned people’s stereotyped perceptions of madness, redeemed madness long marginalized by the rational system, and profoundly revealed the inherent essence of social power operation. From the perspective of Foucault’s power theory, this paper reinterprets the classic images in Flaubert’s works and explores the overlooked madness metaphors embodied in the characters: power discipline leads to the dissolution of subjects’ uniqueness and the aphasia of diverse discourses; the mad behaviors of innocents break the shackles of rationality and expose the internal contradictions of the rational world; the absolute truth constructed by rationality has inherent limitations, and irrational individuals possess significant epistemological enlightenment value.