SOURCE: “The Indomitable Emmerdeuse,” in Times Literary Supplement, July 22, 1994, p. 13.

In the following mixed review of Rage and Fire, Annan argues that “inside Gray's combative treatise a spirited and sympathetic biography is trying to get out.”

Louise Colet was Flaubert's mistress from 1846 to 1855, and he wrote some of his most memorable letters to her. She was “a literary star” in the Paris of her time. Her life, especially her love-life, was exceptionally eventful; her vast literary output mediocre. She is well worth a biography, though perhaps not quite such a long one as this.

Rage and Fire starts with a prologue dramatizing Maupassant's account of how, in 1879, he watched Flaubert burn Colet's letters, together with her silk slipper, her handkerchief and a faded rose. Everything seems set for a breathless, romantic biography, and that is what you get, though not all you get. The prologue ends with a...