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cher_n_books 's review for:
Les Misérables
by Victor Hugo
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
4 stars = Fantastic and easy to recommend.
“Revolutions are not born of chance but of necessity.”
It is easy to see why this renowned classic is still beloved and relevant 163 years after its publication. It is a timeless story with a mixture of memorable characters that encompass everything on the human spectrum from pure evil to angelic innocence with a large variety of those that are a complex mixture of the two.
“Let us fear ourselves. Prejudices are the real robbers; vices are the real murderers. The great dangers lie within ourselves.”
Hugo at times feels like he interrupts this riveting tale and inserts instead a related but lengthy nonfiction essay he wrote about the battle of Waterloo, the history of a mentioned abbey, and a passionate argument for why slang is culturally significant and should be included in books. Readers and critics are of mixed opinions about these digressions. I found their material to be pertinent but that their timing was disruptive to the flow of the story, and distracted from the enjoyment of the novel’s reading. I wish they had instead been shortened to extensive footnotes, or included at the end instead.
“Nothing is more dangerous than to stop working. It is a habit you lose. A habit easy to give up and difficult to resume.”
The novel is well known for its themes of revolution, social injustice and the life changing power of love. But I thought the author's most forcefully and ardently argued message was that ignorance fuels evil, and widespread education is the remedy. This resonates deeply, especially considering the current state of regressive nations and the blatant cruelty being rendered with the enablement of their most ignorant citizens, as their tyrannical leaders ban books and dismantle education systems.
“Underlying society there is - and there will be until the day ignorance is dispelled - the great cavern that is evil.”
At over 1300 pages, it is not a classic I would recommend to casual readers that typically read a couple of books a year while on their summer vacations. It is enthusiastically recommended instead to those not intimidated by chunky reads, are interested in historical fiction about the French revolution, enjoy the satire Dickens used to expose social injustice, and are deeply troubled by the current loss of human rights and travesties being committed around the world alongside a rapid increase of ignorance, apathy and bigotry.
“Insurrection, riot, and how the former differs from the latter - the true bourgeois knows nothing of such nuances. In his mind all is sedition, resistance pure and simple, the dog rebelling against its master, an attempt to bite that must be punished with the chain and the kennel, barking, yapping - until the day when the dog’s head, suddenly grown bigger, appears dimly out of the shadows as the face of a lion.
Then the bourgeois shouts, ‘Long live the people!’”
-----
First Sentence: In the year 1815 Monseigneur Charles-François-Bienvenu Myriel was Bishop of Digne.
Favorite Quote: There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.
“Revolutions are not born of chance but of necessity.”
It is easy to see why this renowned classic is still beloved and relevant 163 years after its publication. It is a timeless story with a mixture of memorable characters that encompass everything on the human spectrum from pure evil to angelic innocence with a large variety of those that are a complex mixture of the two.
“Let us fear ourselves. Prejudices are the real robbers; vices are the real murderers. The great dangers lie within ourselves.”
Hugo at times feels like he interrupts this riveting tale and inserts instead a related but lengthy nonfiction essay he wrote about the battle of Waterloo, the history of a mentioned abbey, and a passionate argument for why slang is culturally significant and should be included in books. Readers and critics are of mixed opinions about these digressions. I found their material to be pertinent but that their timing was disruptive to the flow of the story, and distracted from the enjoyment of the novel’s reading. I wish they had instead been shortened to extensive footnotes, or included at the end instead.
“Nothing is more dangerous than to stop working. It is a habit you lose. A habit easy to give up and difficult to resume.”
The novel is well known for its themes of revolution, social injustice and the life changing power of love. But I thought the author's most forcefully and ardently argued message was that ignorance fuels evil, and widespread education is the remedy. This resonates deeply, especially considering the current state of regressive nations and the blatant cruelty being rendered with the enablement of their most ignorant citizens, as their tyrannical leaders ban books and dismantle education systems.
“Underlying society there is - and there will be until the day ignorance is dispelled - the great cavern that is evil.”
At over 1300 pages, it is not a classic I would recommend to casual readers that typically read a couple of books a year while on their summer vacations. It is enthusiastically recommended instead to those not intimidated by chunky reads, are interested in historical fiction about the French revolution, enjoy the satire Dickens used to expose social injustice, and are deeply troubled by the current loss of human rights and travesties being committed around the world alongside a rapid increase of ignorance, apathy and bigotry.
“Insurrection, riot, and how the former differs from the latter - the true bourgeois knows nothing of such nuances. In his mind all is sedition, resistance pure and simple, the dog rebelling against its master, an attempt to bite that must be punished with the chain and the kennel, barking, yapping - until the day when the dog’s head, suddenly grown bigger, appears dimly out of the shadows as the face of a lion.
Then the bourgeois shouts, ‘Long live the people!’”
-----
First Sentence: In the year 1815 Monseigneur Charles-François-Bienvenu Myriel was Bishop of Digne.
Favorite Quote: There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.