Salammbô is set in ancient Carthage and talks about a war between mercenaries and the Carthaginean army, led by Hamilcar Barcas.

Flaubert has mixed classical greek elements with modern, realist ideas. The overall theme of the novel is arrogance -- not the god-defying hybris of classical tragedy, but the very human form: pride, jealousy, greed. These three human characters are intertwined thoughout the story. The mercenaries seemingly start their war because the Carthagineans don't want to pay them, but it is the slave Spendius who stirs them up, deliberately misleading them in his desire for power. Spendius also steers the mercenary general Mâtho, who is mostly driven by his lusting for Salammbô, into stealing the most sacred object of the Carthagineans: the Zaimph, the veil of the godess Tanith.

Though the gods seem to get their revenge in the end, it is man who drives the action. It is the greed of the Carthagineans that starts the war, it is the jealousy of the Council of Ancients that doublecrosses Hamilcar every time he is on the verge of winning, it is the pride of Hamilcar's political rival Hannon that leads to gruesome defeats.

Flaubert has interspersed his story with an exotic kind of realism, leading to elaborate descriptions of costumes, ceremonies, military movements, and torturous punishments. Salammbô is a distant relative of The Passion of the Christ in all its gorey historical realism, and perhaps the horrifying descriptions are all too gratuitious. But Salammbô goes deeper than this, it is a biting description of human society as a political structure, showing how party politics will work against the best intents of the state.

Salammbô is an exponent of the french exotism, which took a start with Napoleons Egyptian expeditions and influenced many other artists (Verdi's Aïda is another famous example). Unlike most, however, Flaubert did extensive research for his book, even traveling to Tunisia. Echoes of Homer and Xenophon are scattered throughout his work. It seems to me that the way the novel depicts Carthage as a major character has also inspired Albert Camus when he wrote La Peste, where another African city is closed off from the world while a pseudo-divine punishment chastises the inhabitants. ( )

1441 Salammbo, by Gustave Flaubert translated by J. C. Chartres (read 29 Mar 1977) I was not enthralled by this novel, which tells a story of the Carthaginian war with its mercenaries, wherein Hamilcar, Hannibal's father, was the chief Punic general. The book reeks in gore and realism--much more violence than I found I wanted to read about. In the finale Schahabarim scoops out Mathias' heart and Salammbo, Hannibal's sister, dies. At the end of the edition I read there is a criticism by Saint Beauve with a reply by Flaubert--both rather good. ( )

Unlike Madame Bovary, it is no ride in the park (But then what goes on inside is much more explicit). Julien Gracq likens the reading of it to a strenuous weight-lifting session. Like Gracq, Flaubert is not sparing with adjectives here and makes use of a richly recondite vocabulary. Briefly, the novel focuses on the barbarian mercenary wars against the city of Carthage - and the ambiguous relationship between Salammbo, the priestess-daughter of the Carthaginian Suffete, Hamilcar, and the leader of the mercenary armies. Most of the novel details the ongoing warfare between the mercenaries and the Punic forces - the savagery of which is ornately, even voluptuously detailed. Beautiful gardens, perfumes, comestibles and odalisques are lushly described as are exotic deformative diseases, varied perversities, mutilations, tortures, sadistic deceptions and punishments, cannibalism and child sacrifice. Salammbo is interesting as an historical novel, and as an exotic poetic work of erudtion and decadent excess.

I have an edition illustrated by Mahlon Blaine, in his usual style, but I agree with the author - illustrations are distractions here. ( )

Magnifique, tout simplement ( )

Superbe!!! ( )

An epic story combining lust, cruelty, riches, ritual and sensuality, few French historical novels can stand comparison with Salammbo.

Immediately after the protracted and crippling First Punic War with Rome, the Carthaginian army under Hamilcar was obliged to contend with a revolt by its unpaid mercenaries--an anarchic barbarian horde of mixed race--led by the Libyan Matho. It is a story of the most appalling savagery which Flaubert was anxious to render in spirit and in detail. His invention of the exotic and chilling Salammbo, priestess in the temple of the Goddess Tanit, and her obsessive relationship with Matho, lends dramatic unity to a tale of epic grandeur in which Flaubert gave full rein to his love of the gorgeous, the voluptuous and the bizarre.