Bouvard et P cuchet details the adventures of two Parisian copy-clerks, Fran ois Denys Bartholom e Bouvard and Juste Romain Cyrille P cuchet, of the same age and nearly identical temperament. They meet one hot summer day in 1838 by the canal Saint-Martin and form an instant, symbiotic friendship. The work resembles the earlier Sentimental Education in that the plot structure is episodic, giving it a picaresque quality. Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880)...