As good as the play is it is but a hearty soup when compared to the book. Of course, at 1100 pages, some folks may consider the book a gluttonous meal. For this reader, in those 1100 pages, I found very few times that the book dragged.
The book is many things besides the story of Jean Valjean and company. At its heart it is a religious work. At the beginning of the 7th book of volume II, Hugo pens:
“This book is a drama, whose leading personage is the Infinite. Man is the second.”
With the story as the driver, Hugo interweaves history, philosophy, sociology, politics, religion and accounts of contemporary social norms and practices. Ultimately, it is a book about morality and self-sacrifice.
This is a story we all know well from the play and from the movies.
Jean Valjean is sentenced to the galleys, basically hard labor on the seas, for stealing a loaf of bread. He stole not for himself, but for his hungry nephews and nieces. Add in a few escape attempts and 19 years of his life passed as a galley convict. His time is up, and he is turned loosed with “one hundred and nine francs fifteen sous” for 19 years worth of work. Everyone he knows is either dead or lost to him. He is also forced to show his yellow passport everywhere he goes which brands him as a convict and an outcast. He cannot even buy a meal or lodging with his money because of the passport. Finally a bishop takes him in and feeds him. Jean Valjean returns the favor by robbing him. Brought back to the Bishop with the stolen loot, the Bishop tells the police that he gave it to Jean Valjean and adds two silver candlesticks he had forgotten. Add in a reflexive robbery of a beggar boy, and Jean Valjean has an epiphany.
Due to various circumstances he is able to hide his real identity in the town of M. sur M. There he invented a new method of making black glass trinkets, the primary industry of the town. With this new method he revived the whole economy of the area and made himself rich also. Instead of living royally with his new wealth he was intent on following the example of the Bishop and doing good. He became the major charitable benefactor of the region in many areas. Eventually, he is appointed mayor of the town.
The drama comes in when the local police authority, Javert, has inkling that he knows who this man is, but cannot quite place him. Javert is a driven man who only sees two shades, it is good or it is bad. There is no room for grey in his life.
A crisis arises when a not so innocent man is about to be convicted for petty crimes. It is thought that he is Jean Valjean so the punishment would be life without parole on the galleys. Jean Valjean after much soul searching reveals his true identity saving the not so grateful individual.
Woven into the narrative is the story of a country girl who went to Paris; she regretfully fell in love with a rich young man who left her pregnant. She returns to M. sur M., but leaves her child, Cosette, with the Thenardiers who are at the time running an inn. She does this because the ostracization of an unwed mother would not have allowed her to make a living in M. sur M. Cosette’s mother, Fantine, dies despite the best efforts of Jean Valjean or as he is known in M. sur M. as Monsieur Madeleine, the Mayor. Fantine dies, but not before Jean Valjean promises to get her Cosette. Woven in the drama of Fantine’s death is the crisis of the man being falsely accused of being Jean Valjean.
Jean Valjean is forced to the galleys again after his confession. He escapes, gathers Cosette from the not so comical Thenardiers. He sets up housekeeping in a depilated old building converted into apartments, but has to flee Javert shortly. They end up spending several years in a convent, Cosette as a student and Jean Valjean as a gardener. Worrying about Cosette’s happiness behind the walls of the convent as she matures he leaves the convent and begins to live a better life in an unassuming residence in Paris.
Enter Marius Pontmercy, a young man on the outs with his rich grandfather and aunt. There also is a connection between Marius and the M. Thenardier. Thenardier while robbing bodies at the battle of Waterloo inadvertently saved Marius’ father’s life. During his routine walks around Paris Marius discovers Cosette who walks regularly with her “father”, Jean Valjean. In a very Victorian way, the two fall in love. Only Marius does not play his cards well, and Jean Valjean believes him to be a police spy. So they disappear again.
With the help of Thenardier’s daughter, Eponine, Marius locates Cosette again. Unfortunately, Thenardier discovers Jean Valjean as a rich man who might be an easy mark. He recruits some of his criminal cohorts to help extract money from him. Marius has wind of the plot, not knowing that it is Cosette’s father they are about to rob. He informs the police, who turns out to be Javert. So Marius nearly gets Jean Valjean captured again, and saves his life at the same time.
In the background while all this is happening is political unrest in France and particularly in Paris. At the death of a popular general, a resurrection begins in Paris. Marius and many of his young bohemians are involved in the unrest and end up constructing a barricade that brings on the army. Javert and Valjean by various methods and not in concert end up at the barricade. The two discover each other. The revolutionists wish to kill the police spy and Jean Valjean volunteers to do so. He takes him around a corner, fires into the air and allows him to go free. Jean Valjean’s purpose at the barricade is to save Marius if at all possible. He is extremely jealous and resentful of Marius as he feels he is stealing Cosette’s affection from him. However, Cosette’s happiness trumps his own, so he must save Marius.
The barricade falls. Jean Valjean undertakes a long tramp through the sewers of Paris carrying an unconscious Marius to escape the police and the army ensues. They encounter Thenardier in the sewer, but neither man recognized each other. Thenardier unlocks the grate to the sewer knowing they will fall into the police’s hand. Javert nabs them. Uncharacteristically, Javert allows Jean Valjean to return Marius to his grandfather. Again uncharacteristically, he allows Jean Valjean to return to his apartment to arrange things for Cosette. Javert leaves Jean Valjean there and does not arrest him. He has seen all the good this man has done. Jean Valjean spared his life on the barricade when it would have been in is interest to kill Javert. Javert has a crisis and commits suicide. He saw grey for the first time and it overwhelmed him.
Marius is unaware of who brought him to his grandfather or how he got there. Cosette is reunited with Marius in his grandfather’s house. After many months of recuperation they are married. Jean Valjean reveals his history to Marius who then begins to freeze him out of Cosette’s life. In the end M. Thenardier, again inadvertently, reveals the good that Jean Valjean has done, including saving Marius’ life. Marius regrets his behavior, and he and Cosette rush to Jean Valjean, only to find him dying. But Jean Valjean is at peace as he finally sees Cosette again and dies a happy man.
A few of the primary characters:
Myriel– The bishop of Digne. The first fifteen or so chapters deal with the M. Myriel, a man who came to the clerical calling late in life and became bishop by a fluke of fortune.
“In 1804, M. Myriel was the Curé of B—— [Brignolles]. He was already advanced in years, and lived in a very retired manner.
About the epoch of the coronation, some petty affair connected with his curacy—just what, is not precisely known—took him to Paris. Among other powerful persons to whom he went to solicit aid for his parishioners was M. le Cardinal Fesch. One day, when the Emperor had come to visit his uncle, the worthy Curé, who was waiting in the anteroom, found himself present when His Majesty passed. Napoleon, on finding himself observed with a certain curiosity by this old man, turned round and said abruptly:—
“Who is this good man who is staring at me?”
“Sire,” said M. Myriel, “you are looking at a good man, and I at a great man. Each of us can profit by it.”
That very evening, the Emperor asked the Cardinal the name of the Curé, and some time afterwards M. Myriel was utterly astonished to learn that he had been appointed Bishop of D——“
Hugo uses this character in several ways. Foremost, he is the catalyst that pushes Valjean from a life of despair and crime into one of giving and goodness. Secondly, he uses Myriel to paint a picture of what a clergy should be. Myriel is a man of unknown secular past who now in all ways tries to emulate Christ, and who succeeds as well as any human. One of his first acts as bishop is give up the huge parsonage to be used a hospital, and he moves himself into a smaller, humbler abode. His career as bishop is a series of such selfless actions. Thirdly, he uses Myriel’s Christ like impulses to criticize the current Catholic Church in France. This is not a church that follows Christ’s humble example.
Jean Valjean – This is the main character of book. A man of mean and humble beginnings whose punishment far exceeds the petty crime he committed. Inspired by the bishop of Digne he seeks to live the good, virtuous life despite all obstacles. The bishop was seeking to emulate Christ, and Valjean sought to emulate the bishop.
Javert – He is the antagonist of the novel. He is a police inspector who in the book is frequently referred to as a police spy. The man sees the world as a dichotomy, good and evil. It is either black or it is white there is nothing in the middle. He is rigid and dogged in the pursuit of duty, and except towards the end there is not an ounce of pity or mercy to be found in his soul. It is his pursuit that keeps Jean Valjean on the lam long after most of the world had stopped caring about who or where Jean Valjean was. It is his rigidness that finally causes him to commit suicide. He could not stand the thought of Jean Valjean showing him mercy, or for that matter him showing Jean Valjean leniency.
Fantine – She is a working class girl impregnated by an unconcerned upper class young man. She bears Cosette, but gives her up to the Thenardiers as she needs to make a living in order to support Cosette. When Valjean discovers the wrong that one of his factory supervisors did by firing Fantine which forced Fantine into prostitution he does his best to correct the situation. As Fantine dies she extracts a promise from Valjean for him to get her Cosette.
Cosette – This is Fantine’s daughter and the center of her life even though they are separated. Cosette spends the first few years of her young life essentially as a slave for the Thenardiers as they continually milk more money out of her impoverished mother. Jean Valjean rescues her from the Thenardiers, and makes it his life work to raise her the best way he can. Jean Valjean has never really loved before and he loves Cosette in an obsessive paternal manner. While she is the central character that so much of the novel turns around, she is not the most developed character in book. She is essentially a good person, and the love interest of Jean Valjean and Marius Pontmercy.
The Thenardiers – I am going lump husband and wife together. In the play they are the comical relief, basically amoral, lovable scamps who only look out for themselves. In the book, they have no redeeming qualities except perhaps M. Thenardier’s native intelligence. M. Thenardier will use and abuse anyone to achieve his ends. There is nothing comical about them. Madame Thenardier is so base as to abandon or sell her own children if they are not girls. Hugo uses them to turn the plot at several key points.
Marius Pontmercy – This is the love interest that drives the later part of the work. Marius is the son of a colonel who served in Napoleon’s army whose life was inadvertently saved by M. Thenardier. Napoleon also made the Colonel a baron, a title he passes on to his son although in a post Napoleon France the title has no meaning. The title excites Marius’ grandfather in a negative way. The grandfather raised Marius, and also forced the Colonel to have nothing to do with his son. The grandfather is a Royalist, a Napoleon hater, and very rigid, but he loves Marius immensely. They have a riff and Marius is cast adrift with very little money. Marius thus lives a life of poverty as he obtains his law degree, a degree that he has no relish for using for quite some time. Adrift in this poverty he makes friends with some the agitators who later construct a barricade in rebellion to the established order. It is he who Jean Valjean goes to the barricade to save his life for Cosette.
Eponine – She is one of the two daughters of the Thenardiers. After the Thenardiers lose the inn, they end up living in the same building as Marius. I would describe the building as basically a flop house. Marius is there because he refuses to take any money from his grandfather. The Thenardiers are there because they have no money, and no honest prospects. Marius at one point anonymously donates money to the family. The family however finds out who helped them which only propels the father at a later time to seek more money from Marius. It is from this that Eponine begins her infatuation with Marius. It is she who finds Cosette for Marius again, after Jean Valjean moves fearing Marius is a police spy. Eponine does it from love, and from love she finally dies.
The book is rich in various characters, but these are the main drivers of the story.
Some thoughts:
A moral quandary – One of the most dramatic portions of the book is Jean Valjean arguing with an old philosophical argument. A minor criminal was about to be sentenced to life without parole to the galleys as he is believed to be Jean Valjean. Jean Valjean has transformed M. sur M. with his new black glass process. It has been a dramatic economic revival for the whole region. At the same time Jean Valjean is using his new found wealth in chartable ways, making a huge difference in uncounted lives. He continues to live simply, simply trying to be the best he can be and to do the most good that he can. This creates a moral crisis within Jean Valjean’s soul. Does he let this man be convicted as Jean Valjean and not say anything? If he goes to the trial and tells all, the good he is doing will collapse. He knows this. But is it right to let this man be convicted for his supposed crimes? And around and around he goes. In the end he opts to out himself as he felt this to be the only moral path he could follow. To steal a bit from a Star Trek movie, The Wrath of Khan:
‘Spock says, “Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” Captain Kirk answers, “Or the one.”’
I felt he made the wrong choice here, but Hugo needed him to do so to drive the narrative forward. It would have been far better to have taken on the guilt, and continue to do the good that he is doing for a large number of people.
France’s penal system – Jean Valjean’s minor crime and horrendous punishment is used as vehicle for Hugo to criticize the justice system of that period. Essentially, it was felt that the state should come down on any crime with maximum force. There is not thought of rehabilitation. The thought being if the punishment is so awful it will make people think twice before committing crimes. Good luck with that approach. Also Hugo goes on to editorialize that the system actually makes the situation worse as it hardens the convicted, and leaves them with no opportunity when they do manage to get out of the system.
Gamin – This is defined as street urchin. Volume 3 starts with a long discussion of the street life of the gamins of Paris. Lacking any welfare system, orphaned or abandoned children usually ended on the streets making their way the best they could. One the main gamins featured, Gavroche, is the son of the Thenardiers who have abandoned him to the streets. This character has a good heart, and good intents, not something that could be said about many of the gamins who frequently had to resort to petty crime to make their living.
Waterloo – Napoleon runs through this book, as well he might be in a story set in the first half of the 1800s in France. While no longer in power he was still a strong force in French thought. Volume II begins with a long discussion of Waterloo. It discusses the strategy, the little things that battles seem to turn on, and its importance in the wider scope of history.
Convents and the monastic life – Hugo uses Jean Valjean and Cosette’s disappearance into the convent as a vehicle to describe monastic life. He is not approving:
“From the point of view of history, of reason, and of truth, monasticism is condemned. Monasteries, when they abound in a nation, are clogs in its circulation, cumbrous establishments, centres of idleness where centres of labor should exist. Monastic communities are to the great social community what the mistletoe is to the oak, what the wart is to the human body. Their prosperity and their fatness mean the impoverishment of the country. The monastic regime, good at the beginning of civilization, useful in the reduction of the brutal by the spiritual, is bad when peoples have reached their manhood. Moreover, when it becomes relaxed, and when it enters into its period of disorder, it becomes bad for the very reasons which rendered it salutary in its period of purity, because it still continues to set the example.”
There is a reason this book shows up on every list of top novels of all time. There is a reason so many adaptations have been done of the book. It is a great narrative story with strong, broad characters. I found it time well spent, and it is book that stays with you long after the barricade has fallen.
This book is in the public domain and can be downloaded for free.
Audio book from LibriVox.org: Les Misérables
E-Book from Gutenberg.org: Les Misérables
Link to the musical: Les Misérables (musical)
Film adaptations:
Les Misérables (2012) starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway
Les Misérables (2000) TV mini-series starring Gérard Depardieu, Christian Clavier, John Malkovich
Les Misérables (1998) starring Liam Neeson, Geoffrey Rush, Uma Thurman
Les Misérables (1978) TV movie starring Richard Jordan, Anthony Perkins, Cyril Cusack
Les Misérables (1982) starring Lino Ventura, Jean Carmet, Michel Bouquet
Les Misérables (1958) starring Jean Gabin, Bernard Blier, René Fleur
Les Misérables (1952) starring Michael Rennie, Robert Newton, Debra Paget
Les Misérables (1935) starring Fredric March, Charles Laughton, Cedric Hardwicke
Les Misérables (1934) starring Harry Baur, Charles Vanel, Paul Azaïs