Summary

The Visit to the Dentist

This is another letter from Flaubert that the author has reinterpreted. In this letter Flaubert has had to go to the dentist because he is experiencing some tooth pain. The dentist has urged him to adopt a ‘wait and see’ mentality to see if the pain may, in time, go away. It does not and Flaubert’s tooth becomes infected. He makes an appointment to go back to the dentist to have it pulled and dreads it. On his way to the dentist’s office he crosses the square where executions used to take place. He remembers that, as a boy, he had once walked past there just after an execution had taken place, seeing all of the blood. Now, as he’s on his...