Victor Hugo

The nineteenth-century Frenchman's epic work depicts the life of Jean Valjean, a reformed convict who has dedicated his life to helping others.

Les Misérables Volume Two

Ayden

it's been awhile since I've read this book but i just found a note that i wrote while reading it so I figured I'd type it out here.....

Cosette and Marius- I don't think I believe in love at first sight, particularly when it's not built on. But Hugo does so I can't really critique his beliefs. Well I can, but I believe that when it comes to love we don't have much figured out so who am I to contradict what Hugo believes is possible .
I found it interesting that Cosette is scared of a stalker until she finds out that he loves her then stalking is apparently OK.
 I will say that though I was criticizing throughout the book Marius’s deep love for someone that he doesn’t even know the name of. I have a great appreciation for the paragraph “ when they had finished, when they had told each other everything. She laid her head on his shoulder and asked him: what's your name? “ showing how unimportant superficial things are when it comes to love. Gravache- there's a hypocritical aspect to his ignorance to any other life and his imitation of the grubbers life.


and i guess that now that I've added some of my opinions about les mis I might as well give a brief review biased on what I can recall.

The story itself was beautiful but 2/3 of the book were completely irrelevant. Now I understand that jean valjean transformations was because of the pastor therefore making him crucial to the plot line. Butttttttt I didn't need to understand the depths of the psych of a character that was going to die in the beginning of the book particularly when our main character doesn't know him at all. And Hugo has this strange way of writing about a character where despite the fact that he gives us way too many stories so we can discern what an amazing person his character is. I still feel like I was spoon fed the characteristics and didn't really see anything for myself.

The story itself is achingly beautiful but did I really need a history lesson of Paris's sewers? That was a rhetorical question but no, I did not. And the entire battle of waterloo????
 I read online that it took Hugo 12 years to write this book and it's evident that he did NOT spend a lot of those years editing.

I regret the wasted hours

Les Misérables Volume Two

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