Synopsis-
One of the most widely read novels of all
time, Les Misérables was the crowning
literary achievement of Victor Hugo’s
stunning career. Though he was
considered the greatest French writer of
his day, Hugo was forced to flee the
country because of his opposition to
Napoleon III. While in exile he completed
Les Misérables, an enormous melodrama
set against the background of political
upheaval in France following the rule of
Napoleon I. Les Misérables tells the story
of the peasant Jean Valjean—unjustly
imprisoned, baffled by destiny, and
hounded by his nemesis, the
magnificently realized, ambiguously
malevolent police detective Javert. As
Valjean struggles to redeem his past, we
are thrust into the teeming underworld of
Paris with all its poverty, ignorance, and
suffering. Just as cruel tyranny threatens
to extinguish the last vestiges of hope,
rebellion sweeps over the land like
wildfire, igniting a vast struggle for the
democratic ideal in France. A
monumental classic dedicated to the
oppressed, the underdog, the laborer, the
rebel, the orphan, and the
misunderstood, Les Misérables is a rich,
emotional novel that captures nothing
less than the entirety of life in
nineteenth-century France.
Excerpt-
In 1815, M. Charles–François–Bienvenu
Myriel was Bishop of Digne He wasan old
man of about seventy–five years of age;
he had occupied the seeof Digne since
1806.
Although this detail has no connection
whatever with the real substanceof what
we are about to relate, it will not be
superfluous, if merelyfor the sake of
exactness in all points, to mention here
the variousrumors and remarks which had
been in circulation about him from the
verymoment when he arrived in the
diocese. True or false, that which is saidof
men often occupies as important a place
in their lives, and above allin their
destinies, as that which they do.
M. Myriel was the son of acouncillor of
the Parliament of Aix; hence he belonged
to the nobilityof the bar. It was said that
his father, destining him to be the heir
ofhis own post, had married him at a very
early age, eighteen or twenty,in
accordance with a custom which is rather
widely prevalent inparliamentary families.
In spite of this marriage, however, it was
saidthat Charles Myriel created a great
deal of talk. He was well formed,though
rather short in stature, elegant, graceful,
intelligent; thewhole of the first portion
of his life had been devoted to the world
andto gallantry.
The Revolution came; events succeeded
each other with precipitation;
theparliamentary families, decimated,
pursued, hunted down, were
dispersed.M. Charles Myriel emigrated to
Italy at the very beginning of
theRevolution. There his wife died of a
malady of the chest, from which shehad
long suffered. He had no children. What
took place next in the fateof M. Myriel?
The ruin of the French society of the
olden days, the fallof his own family, the
tragic spectacles of '93, which were,
perhaps,even more alarming to the
emigrants who viewed them from a
distance,with the magnifying powers of
terror,—did these cause the ideas
ofrenunciation and solitude to germinate
in him? Was he, in the midst ofthese
distractions, these affections which
absorbed his life, suddenlysmitten with
one of those mysterious and terrible
blows which sometimesoverwhelm, by
striking to his heart, a man whom public
catastropheswould not shake, by striking
at his existence and his fortune? No
onecould have told: all that was known
was, that when he returned fromItaly he
was a priest.
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