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3.85 AVERAGE
3.85 AVERAGE
Terrific book, well worth the read. Quasimodo owes his life to the archdeacon. He ends up repaying him in the end. La Esmeralda was a pawn in a chess game for her life. Regardless of the outcome she would lose. Very tragic, very cool.
3.5.
Tough to rate as it was clearly meant to be read in 19th century Paris, which doesn't include me (one of my many defects). First half may have lost some power over time, but second half filled with humanity. Everyone's miserable, mostly because of misunderstandings
Tough to rate as it was clearly meant to be read in 19th century Paris, which doesn't include me (one of my many defects). First half may have lost some power over time, but second half filled with humanity. Everyone's miserable, mostly because of misunderstandings
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
An iconic French classic and tragedy, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (original French title: Notre-Dame de Paris; translated: Our Lady of Paris) by Victor Hugo is about a man who's been deformed since birth and mistreated by everyone and falls in unrequited love with a beautiful woman.
Summary: In the glorious cathedral Notre-Dame de Paris lives a hunchback named Quasimodo. Being born deformed, he is called a creation of the devil and is constantly mistreated. A woman named Esmeralda comes to Paris in search of her birth mother, and Quasimodo falls for her and her kindness.
Tropes/Genres:
• historical fiction
• tragedy
• French Gothic architecture
• set in medieval Paris (1482)
Review: I read the unabridged version translated by Isabel F. Hapgood, which meant that I had to sit through Victor Hugo going on about the architecture of Notre-Dame de Paris and his description of Paris. That's really the only bad part about this book, to be honest, and it's not even that bad – the whole point of the author's anecdotes about Paris is to provide a vivid setting and emphasise the importance of preserving French Gothic architecture, given that Notre-Dame de Paris had fallen into a state of disrepair at the time of writing. As such, while the long chunks are unneeded, I feel that they do add more substance to the story, as all the talking made sense towards the end of the book.
The story is great, and I really like how it touches on various traits of humanity. I really felt bad for Esmeralda and Quasimodo. They deserved so much better. Being beautiful, Esmeralda catches the attention of many men, including Pierre Gringoire, Claude Frollo, Captain Phoebus de Chateaupers and, of course, Quasimodo. The main antagonist Claude Frollo is irritating in a good way. He's just... crazy. He claims to love Esmeralda but is also willing to destroy her. Crazy! It also makes me sad and angry to see how badly Quasimodo was treated just because he was ugly. Is it a crime to be ugly? Is it his fault he was born that way? People ought to learn to keep their thoughts to themselves. It's honestly amazing how a book written two hundred years ago can relate to the things we see today. The ableism and misogyny seen in this book can be seen on a similar scale today. Perhaps that's why it's a classic.
I find it very cool how the author created a story about a building, all while showing the positive and negative traits of humanity. Esmeralda is compassionate and kind, and it's saddening that such good traits often don't translate to good rewards. Again, it's something that relates to the world today. Quasimodo may be kind and the literal definition of a "nice guy", but he's still treated like a monster just because his appearance is not desirable. Again, it's another thing that relates to society today – judging a book by its cover. Phoebus and Frollo both struggle with lust – well, Phoebe embraces it and wants to fool around with women, while Frollo believes it's a sin and represses his sexual desires, only to have it manifest in extremely unhealthy ways. Misogyny is also displayed in this story, which is shown clearly through Frollo's treatment of Esmeralda. It's really tragic.
Overall, this story has many underlying themes. It's a work of art, and there's a reason why it's a classic. I recommend it to people, though those who may not be able to stand chunks of text that don't necessarily directly relate to the story may want to read the abridged version instead.
———
Pre-Review:
There's just so much to talk about. The story is very good. I don't know how to describe it, but it felt deep.
Summary: In the glorious cathedral Notre-Dame de Paris lives a hunchback named Quasimodo. Being born deformed, he is called a creation of the devil and is constantly mistreated. A woman named Esmeralda comes to Paris in search of her birth mother, and Quasimodo falls for her and her kindness.
Tropes/Genres:
• historical fiction
• tragedy
• French Gothic architecture
• set in medieval Paris (1482)
Review: I read the unabridged version translated by Isabel F. Hapgood, which meant that I had to sit through Victor Hugo going on about the architecture of Notre-Dame de Paris and his description of Paris. That's really the only bad part about this book, to be honest, and it's not even that bad – the whole point of the author's anecdotes about Paris is to provide a vivid setting and emphasise the importance of preserving French Gothic architecture, given that Notre-Dame de Paris had fallen into a state of disrepair at the time of writing. As such, while the long chunks are unneeded, I feel that they do add more substance to the story, as all the talking made sense towards the end of the book.
The story is great, and I really like how it touches on various traits of humanity. I really felt bad for Esmeralda and Quasimodo. They deserved so much better. Being beautiful, Esmeralda catches the attention of many men, including Pierre Gringoire, Claude Frollo, Captain Phoebus de Chateaupers and, of course, Quasimodo. The main antagonist Claude Frollo is irritating in a good way. He's just... crazy. He claims to love Esmeralda but is also willing to destroy her. Crazy! It also makes me sad and angry to see how badly Quasimodo was treated just because he was ugly. Is it a crime to be ugly? Is it his fault he was born that way? People ought to learn to keep their thoughts to themselves. It's honestly amazing how a book written two hundred years ago can relate to the things we see today. The ableism and misogyny seen in this book can be seen on a similar scale today. Perhaps that's why it's a classic.
I find it very cool how the author created a story about a building, all while showing the positive and negative traits of humanity. Esmeralda is compassionate and kind, and it's saddening that such good traits often don't translate to good rewards. Again, it's something that relates to the world today. Quasimodo may be kind and the literal definition of a "nice guy", but he's still treated like a monster just because his appearance is not desirable. Again, it's another thing that relates to society today – judging a book by its cover. Phoebus and Frollo both struggle with lust – well, Phoebe embraces it and wants to fool around with women, while Frollo believes it's a sin and represses his sexual desires, only to have it manifest in extremely unhealthy ways. Misogyny is also displayed in this story, which is shown clearly through Frollo's treatment of Esmeralda. It's really tragic.
Overall, this story has many underlying themes. It's a work of art, and there's a reason why it's a classic. I recommend it to people, though those who may not be able to stand chunks of text that don't necessarily directly relate to the story may want to read the abridged version instead.
———
Pre-Review:
There's just so much to talk about. The story is very good. I don't know how to describe it, but it felt deep.
Che dire? Gli scritti di Hugo mi hanno sempre affascinata, nonostante la sua prolissità e la lunghezza delle sue opere! Riesce a farmi innamorare dei personaggi e della storia nonostante tutto questo! Concordo con chi ha detto che la vera protagonista è la cattedrale con la sua architettura e i suoi abitanti. Il prete è il personaggio più terrificante di cui io abbia mai letto....descritto in modo molto efficace....la storia è molto interessante e abilmente intrecciata, esattamente come piace a me!
I started reading Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris with very little knowledge of what the novel contains. I knew there was a hunchbacked bell-ringer named Quasimodo (but didn’t realize that his name comes from the Sunday after Easter in the church calendar), a woman named Esmeralda, and a bad priest. I think I watched the Disney cartoon years ago, but (probably mercifully) didn’t remember much about it. I’d been told that the novel includes long sections about the architecture of Paris. But that was it. And that lack of prior knowledge was a blessing. It made the reading very exciting, because as Hugo introduces a large number of characters early in the story, I had no idea which characters would become important, nor what their narrative trajectory was going to be. In hindsight, I find it fascinating that Hugo immediately brings us into a scene that includes almost all of the characters who will prove to be important to the story, along with other characters and actions that have much less significance. It’s a technique Hugo employs throughout the novel that I loved: show the reader something whose importance won’t be clear until much later in the book. It’s one of many ways that Notre-Dame de Paris reminded me of Dickens, as Hugo weaves different characters together in ways that are just on the edge of being too coincidental, but that usually made me smile when the connections were made clear.
In his introduction, translator John Sturrock notes the “feverishly operatic plot” of the novel, and I think that’s an apt description. The story Hugo spins always veers toward the sentimental and melodramatic, and I could see the characters as stock types who come onstage and play their expected roles. (Pierre Gringoire, the philosopher and writer, seems to come straight out of a Shakespeare play.) But what grounds Hugo’s writing and elevates it above just the story itself is the larger ideas the author is incorporating into it all throughout. Hugo is concerned with the deterioration of Paris’s architecture, and so he invites us to ponder the ways that we ourselves, as individuals and society, might be changing and even deteriorating. Claude Frollo’s early promise in his studies and career descends into madness; Louis XI is presented as feeble and fickle; Jehan and Gringoire are never able to rise to their true potential in society, and in fact everyone seems in danger of being pulled downward to the criminal truant community. Characters who do experience some form of redemption and completion (Quasimodo, La Esmeralda, Sister Gudule) only come to it after extreme persecution from society, and they don’t live long enough to enjoy the other side of redemption; so we feel a sense of hopelessness in Paris 1482, as Hugo tells it (though, intriguingly, he is also setting up the foundation for the French Revolution, three hundred years after the events in this novel). In the thirty years between Notre-Dame de Paris and Les Misérables, Hugo found ways to deepen the idea of redemption, making Jean Valjean’s story much more compelling and complete than anything in the earlier novel.
Hugo is also suggesting that the deterioration of architecture (the result more of humans’ poor decisions than of time and the elements) is connected to the rise of the printed word—another “in hindsight” insight, as he’s writing about events in 1482. Architecture, Hugo asserts, was the common language of humanity before the writing took over. With his focus on inevitable deterioration and unwise human choices, Hugo might suggest that writing will also be eclipsed by something else. Hugo wouldn’t have known that the “something else” would be the moving image, but looking at changes in common communication since Hugo’s time, we might easily apply his own concept of hindsight and see that his ideas continue to have merit.
These larger ideas that Hugo weaves into the novel are not seamless, and chapters about the minute details of medieval Paris architecture might seem out of place. But I actually love that aspect of the novel. As I read, I got the sense that Hugo felt like there was too much going on in his mind, and he was struggling to keep it all contained in novel form. There is so much that he wants us to know, and he truly believes it’s all vital to the story he’s telling. The chapter about the cathedral’s history and architecture does help us understand Quasimodo’s world later in the book; and the chapter about Paris’s architecture becomes more important when Claude flees the city, and we can picture where he is with much more precision than we would otherwise. But even apart from direct connections that allow these seemingly extraneous chapters to make sense, I love Hugo’s delighted excessiveness in wanting to tell us so much. It’s like Dickens and other novelists, but it’s its own style.
After knowing about this book for so long, I’m really glad I finally read it. It’s challenging in the ways that I like, and it’s given me a lot to think about, all the way through.
In his introduction, translator John Sturrock notes the “feverishly operatic plot” of the novel, and I think that’s an apt description. The story Hugo spins always veers toward the sentimental and melodramatic, and I could see the characters as stock types who come onstage and play their expected roles. (Pierre Gringoire, the philosopher and writer, seems to come straight out of a Shakespeare play.) But what grounds Hugo’s writing and elevates it above just the story itself is the larger ideas the author is incorporating into it all throughout. Hugo is concerned with the deterioration of Paris’s architecture, and so he invites us to ponder the ways that we ourselves, as individuals and society, might be changing and even deteriorating. Claude Frollo’s early promise in his studies and career descends into madness; Louis XI is presented as feeble and fickle; Jehan and Gringoire are never able to rise to their true potential in society, and in fact everyone seems in danger of being pulled downward to the criminal truant community. Characters who do experience some form of redemption and completion (Quasimodo, La Esmeralda, Sister Gudule) only come to it after extreme persecution from society, and they don’t live long enough to enjoy the other side of redemption; so we feel a sense of hopelessness in Paris 1482, as Hugo tells it (though, intriguingly, he is also setting up the foundation for the French Revolution, three hundred years after the events in this novel). In the thirty years between Notre-Dame de Paris and Les Misérables, Hugo found ways to deepen the idea of redemption, making Jean Valjean’s story much more compelling and complete than anything in the earlier novel.
Hugo is also suggesting that the deterioration of architecture (the result more of humans’ poor decisions than of time and the elements) is connected to the rise of the printed word—another “in hindsight” insight, as he’s writing about events in 1482. Architecture, Hugo asserts, was the common language of humanity before the writing took over. With his focus on inevitable deterioration and unwise human choices, Hugo might suggest that writing will also be eclipsed by something else. Hugo wouldn’t have known that the “something else” would be the moving image, but looking at changes in common communication since Hugo’s time, we might easily apply his own concept of hindsight and see that his ideas continue to have merit.
These larger ideas that Hugo weaves into the novel are not seamless, and chapters about the minute details of medieval Paris architecture might seem out of place. But I actually love that aspect of the novel. As I read, I got the sense that Hugo felt like there was too much going on in his mind, and he was struggling to keep it all contained in novel form. There is so much that he wants us to know, and he truly believes it’s all vital to the story he’s telling. The chapter about the cathedral’s history and architecture does help us understand Quasimodo’s world later in the book; and the chapter about Paris’s architecture becomes more important when Claude flees the city, and we can picture where he is with much more precision than we would otherwise. But even apart from direct connections that allow these seemingly extraneous chapters to make sense, I love Hugo’s delighted excessiveness in wanting to tell us so much. It’s like Dickens and other novelists, but it’s its own style.
After knowing about this book for so long, I’m really glad I finally read it. It’s challenging in the ways that I like, and it’s given me a lot to think about, all the way through.
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
sad
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
dark
sad
slow-paced