Born in the town of Rouen, in northern France, in 1821, Gustave Flaubert was sent to study law in Paris at the age of 18. After only three years, his career was interrupted and he retired to live with his widowed mother in their family home at Croisset, on the banks of the Seine River. Supported by a private income, he devoted himself to his writing. Flaubert traveled with writer Maxime du Camp from November 1849 to April 1851 to North Africa, Syria, Turkey, Greece, and Italy. When he returned he began Madame Bovary, which appeared first in the Revue in 1856 and in book form the next year. The realistic depiction of adultery was condemned as immoral and Flaubert was prosecuted, but escaped conviction. Other major works include Salammbo (1862), Sentimental Education (1869), and The Temptation of Saint Antony (1874). His long novel Bouvard et Pecuchet was unfinished at his death in 1880. After his death, Flaubert's fame and reputation grew steadily, strengthened by the publication of his unfinished novel in 1881 and the many volumes of his correspondence.
Gerard M. Hopkins was born on July 28, 1844 in England, into a large and talented family. He attended Oxford, and entered the Jesuits in 1868. He later studied theology and, after destroying much of his youthful poetry, took up writing. In 1877, Hopkins was ordained as a priest. He was assigned to several churches and continued to write poetry, none of which was published until after his death. Hopkins's poems are noted for their intricate rhythm, which he labeled sprung rhythm. The poems are exemplified by their clever puns, wordplay and imaginative phrasing. His works include several series of sonnets, such as Pied Beauty and The Windhover, as well as "terrible" sonnets that explore the conflict between his sexual longing and his devotion to God. Gerard M. Hopkins died of typhoid fever on June 8, 1889, in Ireland.
Anita Brookner was born in London, England on July 16, 1928. She received a BA in history from King's College London in 1949 and a doctorate in art history from the Courtauld Institute of Art in 1953. She went on to lecture in art at Reading University and the Courtauld Institute, where she specialized in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century French art. She became the first woman to be named as Slade Professor of Art at Cambridge University in 1967. Her first novel, A Start in Life, was published in 1981. Some of her other works include The Bay of Angels, The Next Big Thing, The Rules of Engagement, Latecomers, Leaving Home, Incidents in the Rue Laugier, Look at Me, and Strangers. Hotel du Lac won the Booker Prize for Fiction in 1984 and was adapted for television in 1986. She has also written scholarly works about Jacques Louis David, Jean Baptiste Greuze, and Jean-Antoine Watteau. She died on March 10, 2016 at the age of 87.
