FSL speaker: I've read it in English and at the time found it a change from more morally upright 19th century English novels. Tried to read it in French a decade later, couldn't buy into anyone's characterisation (look at female writers' characterisation of women who are more on the sensitive or romantic side, vs. Flaubert's) or the descriptions of Emma's fingernails, got bored, read (also in French) the blingtastic D&D campaign that is Salammbô instead, and now incapable of ever taking Flaubert seriously as a writer. Hard to believe he'd ever really met people, especially women.