I mentioned in the introduction to this blog that I wanted to write about the books I read, so here it is. I want to remind everybody I am not a literary critic and this is just my personal reflection. The book I want to write is Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. At the very beginning, I can say that this is one of the best books I have ever read.
It is interesting how Hugo chose the name of this novel -
Les Misérables - which means the pitiful ones. One of the questions that pose
upon us at the very beginning is: who are these Misérables? This is a story of
one man, former convict Jean Valjean, who returns to society after 19 years of
prison. He is then changed because of the grace he received. Still, for the
rest of his life, he struggles with his past that constantly haunts him. Should
we consider him, He is a kind of outcast hiding under false names for most of
his life, trying to redeem for his past and fighting his feelings to make
righteous decisions regardless of the price. Should we consider him as the one
to be pitied? Or, is the pitiful one inspector Javert who did not understand
mercy and grace, couldn’t tell the difference between human and God’s
righteousness and whose whole life lost its footing when a man whom he
considered dangerous and cruel criminal saves his life? Javerts lets him go
free despite everything he used to believe. Maybe we should pity the poor
abandoned children of Paris who had nobody to care for them. Those were boys and girls left to tend for themselves
at an early age, living, or better said hiding, in the black holes of a big
city. Maybe it is the daughter of thief Threnadier who was used by her own
father for his schemes. She fell in love with the only young man who ever
showed her mercy and for whom she sacrifices her life. All these are characters
whose life stories are intermingled in this novel. Maybe, in a way, they all are
Les Misérables.
Besides that, there are several specific things in this book
that had made a profound impression on me. First, it’s Hugo’s style of writing.
It seems like every few chapters he interrupts the plot and moves into some
completely different world, to some other place, people, and circumstances. You
follow the plot and, all of a sudden, you find yourself reading the description
of the Battle of Waterloo, or about political and social unrest in France in
the early 1900s, the history of different monastic orders and their meaning in
modern society. You read about the life of street children of Paris or the
history and development of the Paris sewage system. At first glance, all these
narrating seems completely unrelated. But, as Hugo develops the story and adds
new characters, each of these digressions helps us to get a clearer picture and
to better understand interactions between characters or social circumstances of
the time. I have to admit, on several occasions I wanted to skip these
descriptions (especially The Battle of Waterloo because I understood nothing
about the movement of English and French armies). But, I was also reminded of important history
lessons and googled the history of the French Revolution, Napoleon, and the
first half of 19. century so I could better understand who was he talking
about. Each time, Hugo would bring us back to the story and give it a new
dimension.
Second, throughout the book, there are spread social
elements. From the beginning to the end, the author is dissecting the society
he lives in with a special critical review of its social insensibility. This is
especially pronounced in the way society relates to the poor and the
description of the lives of street children. Not only that, we come across
criticism of the society that has become numb to the suffering of others and
which puts its self-righteousness above mercy. We see Jean Valjean sentenced to
prison for stealing bread to feed his sister’s family. Street children found by
police would be arrested and nobody cared if they were hungry, thirsty or if
they had someplace to spend the night. The only thing that mattered was that
they did not disturb the public. And, convicts in chains, on their way to
prison, had to walk two times longer route through Paris so they would not walk
the same streets as the king on his daily outing from the palace. God forbid
the king should see such an obnoxious scene.
And finally, I am convinced Hugo had true, deep faith in
God. We can see that from the very beginning of the book in the description of
the bishop who showed mercy and grace to Jean Valjean. We see it in a personal
metamorphosis of the main protagonist. We see it in the description of historic
events such as the French Revolution and the rise and fall of Napoleon as those
in which God had his sovereign rule as well as in many other small details that
point to deep Christian believes. The man was a believer. Or, if he was not, he
definitely understood Christianity way better than many people who consider
themselves believers.
Maybe it is this last two points that made me love this book
so much. Not the plot itself as much as Hugo’s way of thinking we can find on
the pages of this book. Although we have to consider many things in this novel
in the socio-economic and historic context of his time, many of his thesis and
points made me think about our modern society. We may have developed as a
society, but we still deal with the same issues in different forms. Regardless
of the revolutions and wars, development of industry, medicine, science, a
society itself, we still encounter greed, revenge, lack of compassion, and
superficial religion trying to disguise as true faith, but also truly changed
and transformed lives like the life of Jean Valjean.