Your review of the translation and its myriad pitfalls led me to the previous message, which was a lamentation of my inability to find Madame Bovary in hardcover for, as I said, "less than $100", which led to a further internet search, which led to the discovery of a Pleiade edition for only $80, which led to a purchase. I had vowed to not buy more books for some time. Now I find myself casting around and wondering how often to buy the damn editions in order to supplement my library with suitable editions of Camus, Sartre, Stendhal and Hugo.