August 19, 2009 11:05 PM
Les Miserables book study - pages 941-1067
I am so sorry that my life took on enough drama that I had to leave this commentary for three weeks rather than one. But I think Hugo would agree that each personal narrative has value and requires as much attention as it requires.
I am so loving Les Miz this time around. As we age, we must bring more to each reading of a well-loved book. This is making me want to go back and re-read some other classics. So many books, so little time!
Don't you love Gavroche? He s ray of hope in this tale, isn't he? I mean, even though redemption is sprinkled throughout the book, there is something special about Gavroche as he seems spontaneously noble and good - with no role models or acts of mercy like that which redeemed Valjean.
He comes from the vilest of circumstances. A mother who hates and rejects boys and so has "relieved" herself of caring for her last two:
In this woman there was only a fragment of human nature. . .the Thenrdiess was a mother only to her daughters. Her maternity ended there. Her hatred of the human race began with her boys.
Gavroche's father - Thenardier/Jondrette - is beyond indifference, completely unaware of his children, except as they are useful to him in his criminal schemes:
At a certain depth of misery, people are possessed by a sort of spectral indifference, and look at their fellow beings as at ghosts. Your nearest relatives are often vague shadowy forms for you, hardly distinct from the nebulous background of life, and easily blended with the invisible.
That resonates with me as my own impoverished background and the resulting lack of connectedness between my family members stands in sharp contrast to the natural conviviality I see in the sons and daughters Tripp and I have brought up together after turning our lives away from darkness and toward the light.
Gavroche is tough and street smart, yet he is so tender and generous. His tale is laced with random acts of kindness, generosity and mercy. Though no one seems to have ever told him or set the example, he lives in a Christlike manner - always putting others before himself. And so spontaneously - without a struggle to overcome his own selfishness. Indeed, he seems to have not a selfish bone in his body.
We've already seen him steal the stolen purse from Montparnasse to gift M. Mabeuf (page 923). On page 947, he gives his woolen scarf to a beggar girl she is so astonished she can't even thank him. Hugo notes:
At a certain depth of distress, the poor in their stupor no longer groan over evil, and are no longer thankful for good.
Gavroche has a sense of humor. On the same page, he laughs off inclement weather:
"Rain again? Good God, if this continues, I'll cancel my subscription!"
When he finds two younger boys wandering - who unbeknownst to him are the two brothers his mother got rid of years ago - and asks if they have a mother and father, when they answer "yes, but we don't know where they are," Gavroche notes wryly, "Sometimes that's better than knowing."
He buys a piece of bread, divides it in three and though he is biggest and presumably never been taught to do this, takes the smallest piece for himself. The third act of mercy Hugo shows us, though we have every reason to believe that in the course of his short lifetime Gavroche has probably hundreds of similar selfless acts to his credit.
On page 959, Gavroche mutters between his teeth. "If I had any kids, I'd hug them tighter than this." Where did he ever learn this? For decades, the academic pendulum has swung from one extreme to the other in the nature v. nurture question. After raising 12 children, I am convinced that God endows us with unique qualities that are as strong as the grass that pushes up from the cracks in the sidewalk. And while they will definitely thrive in a nurturing environment, in some individuals they are so strong that they will have the power seen by the tree roots that disrupt the pavement as they grow.
Nothing seems to have been able to stop Gavroche from being a decent human being.
Gavroche - left to fend for himself by the Thenardiers accepts the responsibility of these two orphan boys (still not knowing they are his brothers) and not only feeds them, but gives them shelter in the gigantic elephant monument where he has taken up a risky residence.
The Elephant of the Bastille was an actual presence during the events Hugo describes. It was a plaster model intended to eventually be replaced with a bronze monument cast from the cannons of the Spanish vanquished by Napoleon.
Here is an engraving of the completed plaster model before it was moved outdoors:
This is what Napoleon envisioned:
From The France of Victor Hugo:
Napoleon intended the elephant to be cast in bronze and be big enough for visitors to ascend on an interior staircase to a tower on its back. Unfortunately, when the time came for the monument to actually be erected, France was engaged in an unsuccessful military campaign in Spain. So the elephant was cast in plaster instead of bronze, and two years later when Napoleon's Empire collapsed the "Elephant of Revolutionary Oblivion" was left to rot. It became overgrown and infested with rats. Locals petitioned for it to be removed, but it remained even when a column memorializing the dead of July 1830 was erected on the other side of the place de la Bastille. In 1846, the great unwieldy mass was finally removed.
The elephant was not an enduring monument in Paris, but it was loaded with meaning. Intended to be a symbol of Napoleon's might, its creation in plaster indicated the dire situation of the Empire. It was meant to be a marvel, but it became a home for vagrants and vermin. Most of all, the deterioration of the elephant and all it stood for countered the perseverance of revolutionary ideology in France.
Hugo's ironic take on the final disposition of Napoleon's unfinished monument to himself
is poetic and inspiring to those of us who think children are the ultimate treasure:
O unexpected utility of the useless! Charity of the great! Goodness of the giants! This monstrous monument that had contained an emperor's thought had become the box of a gamin. . . .This idea of Napoleon's, disdained by men, had been taken up by God. . . .God had done a grander thing with it, he sheltered a child.
[if possible, go to page 957 and read the entire text - you will be glad you did.]
Did it make your skin crawl to find that these three innocents would be sleeping in an edifice filled with rats? And how skillful of Hugo to appeal to our senses - as the candle is snuffed and the dim light gives way to the darkness, their frenzied scurrying begins. The children are protected only by the netting Gavroche has put together. He tucks them in "as a mother would have done."
I would early love to see a movie portrayal of these scary/tender'heartwrenching moments, but this is one of those scenes that doesn't make the first cut. In Les Miz, Gavroche is a tough little gamin - and we only barely intuit how lovable he is.
Here is Gavroche in the theatrical production (0:25-0:52):
Even as Gavroche is tucking in his charges, their father is escaping from prison - an escape described with as much drama and suspense as any of the Courne Identity movies. I was biting my nails, hoping Thenardier wouldn't make it. But ironically, Gavroche is called into service by the street thugs - including Montparnasse, from whom he'd stolen Valjean's purse to give to M. Mabeuf - to help the escapee. Only when he's done the job does he recognize his father, who apparently never recognizes him in return.
Pages 978-998 are a digression on Argot.
From Wikipedia:
Argot (pronounced /ˈɑrɡoʊ/; French, Spanish and Catalan for "slang") is a secret language used by various groups--including, but not limited to, thieves and other criminals--to prevent outsiders from understanding their conversations. The term argot is also used to refer to the informal specialized vocabulary from a particular field of study, hobby, job, sport, etc.[citation needed]Victor Hugo was one of the first to research argot extensively [1]. He describes it in his novel, Les Misérables, as the language of the dark; at one point, he says, "What is argot; properly speaking? Argot is the language of misery."
Then a philosophical aside on enlightenment, education, progress. It seems cleat that Hugo wrestled with humanistic philosophy v. belief in Divine Intervention. One reader has asked if I know a good biography for Hugo and I have promised to research it. Please speak up if you can recommend one.
Book Eight (page 1003) brings us back to Marius and Cosette and their chaste, romantic love. Marius comes every evening and Hugo notes:
If, at this period of her life, Cosette had fallen in love with an unscrupulous man, a libertine, she would have been ruined; for there are generous natures that give themselves, and Cosette was one. One of the generosities of woman is to yield. . . But what risks you run, O noble souls! Often, you give the heart, we take the body.God willed that the love Cosette met should be one of those loves that save.
In Hugo's eyes, women are by their very nature vulnerable. Fantine had the same womanly generosity, but yielded to the wrong kind of man.
Didn't you like the description of their romantic evenings?
During the sweet month of May, Marius and Cosette knew these transcendent joys:To quarrel and to say monsieur and mademoiselle merely to say Marius and Cosette better afterwards;
To talk at length and with most minute detail, of people who did not interest them in the least; a further proof that in this ravishing opera called love, the libretto is almost nothing.
For Marius, to listen to Cosette talking clothes;
For Cosette, to listen to Marius talking politics;
To hear, knee to knee, the wagons roll along the Rue de Babylone;
To gaze at the same planet glowing in space, or the same worm glowing in the grass;
To keep silent together; a pleasure still greater than to talk;
Etc, etc.
That passage is from page 1012, and is followed by Marius' unexpected meeting with Eponine. He is so confused by love, he is cold to her and she leaves. And Hugo had constructed this romantic interlude so well, that it sent a chill up my spine to have it end so abruptly. Did you feel a sense of foreboding? The romantic interlude is about to be intruded on by larger forces.
Thenardier and his band of thieves have gotten Valjean's address and appear outside his gate, ready to break in. Eponine stops them by threatening to scream. This is an intense moment in the play and the book. Again, Eponine - who has every reason to hate Marius for not returning her love - shows selfless love by doing what is best for Marius. In this way, she is like Gavroche - certainly nobler in character than her parents, though not as utterly selfless and charismatic as her brother.
As things draw to a climax, several things are going on - Valjean realizes he and Cosette are once more in danger and moves them both away, leaving Marius broken and torn; political events are moving swiftly towards an outbreak of revolution (pages 1047-1067); Eponine is pining for Marius; Javert is once more on the track of Valjean, and the Thenardiers are still up to no good. This is captured brilliantly in the play (this 10th anniversary production is done as a concert rather than a play):
Be back soon. Please leave comments.
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For all commentary, click here, scroll to bottom and read forward.
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Comments
Thank you for the elephant pictures!! That scene was out of a horror movie for me- the climbing and sniffing and gnawing of the rats was almost too much! And Gavroche is one of my favorite characters. I have grown to like him more than Marius.
The whole love affair between Marius and Cosette was so touching to me- I longed to go back and experience a love like theirs. It's what I would wish my children's romances to be. If only more people read Les Miz as young teens nowadays... it makes me ache for all the innocence that is lost for our kids these days. So many would scoff at Hugo's description of their love, thinking it impossible for two people to love so devotedly and selflessly. Truly though, I think Hugo has a better grasp on what a woman's nature is (before it is spoiled by the world's ways) and how a man's nature should behave. The internal strength and manliness of Marius's self control is incredible! What young man now has that self-discipline? Gives me something to aspire towards with my own children:)...
Posted by: Sarah | August 20, 2009 11:58 AM
This helped me picture the elephant. I had a much smaller one in mind during the reading.
I had noted several of the same passages as you brought out as ones to comment on. I won’t other than to say, I think your commentary was spot on here. Thanks!
I enjoyed the chapter on M. Mabeuf as well. So far I haven’t noticed him in any of the musical pieces. It is amazing to think that he turned in the purse from Gavroche as missing property and continued in his poverty. I was almost moved to tears as he sold first his life's work, then his precious books each for a fragment of their value to pay for food. On page 1044 Hugo says, “A child’s misery is of concern to a mother, a young man’s misery is of concern to a young woman, an old man’s misery is of concern to nobody. Of all miseries, this is the coldest.” What a stark, but all too often realistic contrast to Proverbs 16:31 and 20:29 which say, “Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life,” and “The glory of young men is their strength, gray hair the splendor of the old.” What an encouragement this is to honor our elders.
Posted by: Karen | August 23, 2009 8:28 PM
