#I'm now waiting for les amis and Grantaire's classical rants

[dolphin1812]

Waterloo may be a digression, but Hugo’s giving it the feeling of having a plot by focusing on specific “characters” in this chapter. He still holds to his point on the overall chaos of battle by switching rapidly between them; the first paragraph alone covers various men and battalions, most of whom die suddenly within that very paragraph after being introduced. In addition to the randomness conveyed by this rapidity, Hugo specifies the unexpected ways in which many of them were killed as well. To offer just one example:

“A sergeant of the English Guards, the foremost boxer in England, reputed invulnerable by his companions, had been killed there by a little French drummer-boy.”

The “invulnerable” is suddenly killed at the hands of one who appears weak; experience and strength only offer so much protection against this form of carnage. 

This section honestly feels like parts of Homer’s Iliad (as well as the mythology around it). The “weak” killing someone “invulnerable” resembles Paris taking down Achilles after the events of the epic and towards the end of the Trojan War. Similarly, the “listing” of deaths is common in several books of the Iliad where the focus is less on the feats of individual characters than the totality of the war itself, with many of the fallen characters being given a brief description of their deaths at most. Some examples from this chapter are:

“ Baring had been dislodged, Alten put to the sword.”

“ out of three lieutenant-colonels, two lay on the earth,— Hamilton wounded, Mater slain. Ponsonby had fallen, riddled by seven lance-thrusts.”

And here’s an example from Butler’s translation of Book XV of the Iliad:

“ Hector killed Stichius and Arcesilaus, the one, leader of the Boeotians, and the other, friend and comrade of Menestheus. Aeneas killed Medon and Iasus. The first was bastard son to Oileus, and brother to Ajax, but he lived in Phylace away from his own country, for he had killed a man, a kinsman of his stepmother Eriopis whom Oileus had married. Iasus had become a leader of the Athenians, and was son of Sphelus the son of Boucolos. Polydamas killed Mecisteus, and Polites Echius, in the front of the battle, while Agenor slew Clonius. Paris struck Deiochus from behind in the lower part of the shoulder, as he was flying among the foremost, and the point of the spear went clean through him.”

There’s a similar trend of giving quick lists of deaths, with occasional background (”lieutenant-colonels” vs “leader of the Boeotians”) or information on how they died (”seven lance-thrusts,” “point of the spear”). Overall, it’s quite gruesome and monotonous, making the battle as a whole feel senseless, gory, and dull in contrast to the “heroic” exploits of individuals, who are praised for participating in this same activity because they’re somehow considered distinctive (like Napoleon and Wellington here or any of the major Greek or Trojan heroes in the epic poem).

As in the rest of the epic, some characters are given moments of “glory” that highlight their courage and/or strength. In this chapter, Wellington stays standing in the middle of a rain of bullets even as his aide dies by his side, not flinching in the face of the French forces. While this certainly adds to the drama of the chapter, it also glorifies Wellington to an extent (which, of course, further raises the tension).

Spoilers below:

It’s notable that Hugo doesn’t only use this language for Waterloo; he takes this same approach to describe the deaths of most of Les Amis. He even makes the comparison explicit, quoting the Iliad immediately after they die. And of course, where Enjolras goes, classical metaphors will soon follow. He was the only one not wounded (suggesting invulnerability, like Achilles), and he’s also called “Apollo” (a deity) before he dies. Hugo certainly wants the reader to view their cause as glorious (hence the descriptions of Enjolras), but he also wants to underscore the pain and senselessness involved in any form of battle. It’s less “battle is awful and should be avoided at all costs” and more “we should live in a better world where les Amis wouldn’t have died like this, fighting for basic human dignity.”