Les Misérables Analysis

We begin this story in the area of Digne, which is where Bishop Myriel lives. Later, we move to the towns of Montfermeil and Montreuil-sur-mer. So far, so good. But Victor Hugo saves his most vivid...

It's easy to miss, but the level of all-seeing power (or omniscience) that Victor Hugo claims in this book actually changes as we move from the early chapters to the later ones. In the early chapte...

Les Misérables is such a gigantic book that it actually covers several genres at once. For starters, it's an example of historical fiction because its second half is based on the June Rebellion of...

Victor Hugo might be a great poetic writer, but he's also a man of facts. In some cases, readers can't stand the way he follows any thought to its conclusion, regardless of whether it's important t...

When we say that Victor Hugo's tone is empirical, it means that he backs up everything he tells us about his characters with evidence. When he has no evidence to give, he makes no judgment, which i...

Most English readers call Les Misérables by its original French name because it's not hard to figure out what it means in English – the Misérables. It can also be translated as "The Wretched,"...

We'll let Jean Valjean's gravestone do the talking for us:"He sleeps. Although so much he was denied,/ He lived; and when his dear love left him, died./ It happened of itself, in the calm way/ That...

The most challenging thing about this book is how many times you're going to be turning the page. But along the way, the prose is totally readable and mostly plot-driven. Yes, you're going to face...

Bad Boy, Bad BoyMeet Jean Valjean. He's a paroled convict just trying to make a new life for himself … and not having a great time of it. When he steals the silverware from a too-good-to-be-true...

The book is called Les Misérables, so it's safe to say that someone is going to start off in a state of wretchedness. In this case, it's Jean Valjean. Nobody trusts an ex-con, so the poor guy ha...

Convict with a Heart of GoldEx-con Jean Valjean has some trouble finding lodging or food, since no one's willing to serve an ex-con. Lucky for him, he comes across the house of the nicest man in al...

Did you know that the stage version of Les Misérables is the third longest-running Broadway show in history? Guess what the other two are. (Source.) When Les Misérables was first released in 186...

When Fantine runs out of options for supporting herself with work, she sells her hair and her front teeth. When this money runs out, she becomes a prostitute because no other job can give her the m...

Emanuel Swedenborg (1.1.14.4)Blaise Pascal (1.1.14.4).Cicero (3.1.12.2)Edmund Burke (3.1.12.2).Jean-Paul Marat (3.3.3.2).Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote (5.1.20.24)Battle of Waterloo (2.1.1.1-2.1....