29 pages • 58 minutes read
Guy de MaupassantBoule De Suif
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1880A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Food
Food and eating constitute one of the most prominent motifs in the story, developing the theme of The Inescapability of Social Class. At first glance, food seems to cut across class divisions. Regardless of their societal status, everyone needs to eat, as Loiseau points out: “[U]nder such circumstances we are all companions in misfortune and bound to help each other. Come, ladies, don’t stand on ceremony—take what you can get and be thankful” (18-19). As the characters join Boule de Suif in her lunch, some of their disdain for her seems to evaporate, and they even converse pleasantly with her.
Ultimately, however, the solidarity Loiseau expresses goes in only one direction. The story repeatedly associates Boule de Suif with food, from her nickname (“ball of fat”) to the imagery used to characterize her physical appearance: Her fingers are “like thick, short sausages,” her face is “like a ruddy apple,” her teeth are “milk-white,” and her breasts are “appetizing” (12). Boule de Suif is also, of course, the only traveler who thinks to pack lunch during the first day’s coach ride, and she shares this food as freely with the other passengers as they later expect her to share her body with the Prussian officer. When she does not, the other travelers turn on her, implying that however generous and accommodating a person of her status is, it will never satisfy her social “superiors.” When stuck in the carriage without food, Loiseau jokes about eating Boule de Suif, and this is metaphorically what the other travelers do by the end of the story, food becoming a vehicle to expose her exploitation.
The Coach
The coach symbolizes society at large with all its divisions, prejudices, and hypocrisies. Guy de Maupassant makes this all but explicit with his description of the count and countess, Loiseaus, and Carré-Lamadons as “representatives of revenued society” (11); by extension, the other passengers likewise stand in for their respective corners of society. The coach also contains food that the passengers divide among themselves, recalling how society at large distributes its resources. Lastly, the snowstorm has rendered the coach barely functional: “[T]he whole vehicle groan[s] and creak[s], [and] the horses slip[], wheeze[], and smoke[]” (8). The many descriptions of the coach struggling to make progress figuratively suggest that society in its current form is aimless and inefficient—ill-equipped to deal with any challenges that come its way.
The Snowstorm
The snowstorm symbolizes the Prussian occupation of France and all that comes with it. An analogy likening the arrival of the occupying troops to a natural disaster lays the groundwork for the parallels: “The people in their darkened dwellings fell a prey to the helpless bewilderment which comes over men before the floods, the devastating upheavals of the earth, against which all wisdom and all force are unavailing” (3). As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that the storm and the occupation have similar effects. Both, for example, are associated with hunger—the occupation because the troops requisition local supplies, and the storm because it delays the arrival of the coach in Tôtes. This delay is the most significant parallel between the two, as it foreshadows the Prussian officer’s refusal to let the travelers proceed (notably, the sun emerges on the day the coach finally continues on its way).
In its association with coldness, the storm also suggests the coldness and indifference that the upper-class characters display toward Boule de Suif. In this respect, the reemergence of the sun at the story’s conclusion is ironic, as it coincides with the passengers’ renewed hostility toward her.
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