6 OCTOBER 1967, Page 28

Flaubert's education

Sir: In an article on Flaubert appearing in your issue of 1 September Sir Denis Brogan suggests that the world 'Bovarysme' could profitably form part of the English language.

At page 113 of Aldous Huxley's The Devils of Loudun, published in 1952 by Chatto and Windus, we see where the author borrows and anglicises the word originally coined by Jules de Gaultier and adds the derivates 'bovarist' and 'bovaristic.' He goes on to give examples of bovarism in such fields as bourgeois snobbery, politics, culture, aesthetics, and religion.

We also learn that the word is not invariably used in a pejorative sense.

H. C. Caley 5127 Borden Avenue, Montreal 29, Quebec, Canada