Novel
Les Misérables
Victor Hugo · 1862
Opening lines
En 1815, M. Charles-François-Bienvenu Myriel était évêque de Digne.
In 1815, Monsieur Charles-François-Bienvenu Myriel was Bishop of Digne.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
Jean Valjean leaves the penal colony after nineteen years, first convicted for stealing bread. Rejected everywhere, he is taken in at Digne by Bishop Myriel, from whom he steals the silverware; the bishop, far from denouncing him, claims to have given it to him and adds two candlesticks. Transformed, Valjean takes the name M. Madeleine, makes an industry prosper at Montreuil-sur-Mer and becomes its mayor. There he meets Fantine, a working woman who has entrusted her daughter Cosette to the Thénardiers, while Inspector Javert begins to suspect him.
Context
Begun on 17 November 1845 and interrupted in 1848, the novel was resumed in exile in Guernsey in December 1860 and completed in June 1861. It appeared in instalments in the spring of 1862, under the imprint A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven et Cie, simultaneously in Paris and Brussels. The preface states its aim: to deal with the degradation of man by the proletariat, the fall of woman through hunger and the stunting of the child by darkness.
Who it is for
Very long, mixing narrative, history and philosophy; some digressions can be read separately on a first reading.
Prizes and reception
Translated as soon as it appeared into Italian, Spanish, English and German, it is still being translated: Christine Donougher produced an English version for Penguin.
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