#The Success of Victurnien

[lesmisscraper]

The Result of Spying on Others Too Much

Vol. 1. Book 5. Chapter 8 and 1.5.9.

[lmchaptertitlebracket]

Volume I, book v: The Winners

To give the Volume 1 polls time to run through fully before starting on the next volume, I’ll be cataloging the winning translations/translators as well as some of my favorite observations on the posts!

I.v.1

This one was a win for Rose, with "A History of Progress in Black Glass Beads" getting 28.6%.

I.v.3

This one was pretty close, with "Sums Deposited With Laffitte" (of Hapgood, Denny, Rose, and Donougher) gaining a good amount of traction, but FMA's "Money Deposited with Laffitte" snuck out ahead with a 2.2% lead.

I.v.4

With a solid 49%, Hapgood and Walton's "M. Madeleine in Mourning" takes it.

I.v.5

To get a bit editorial here for a second, I love this chapter title a lot, and the winning Wraxall and Hapgood translation ("Vague Flashes On The Horizon", 59.2%) is the one I automatically go through, since I think it works so well. However I do have to say, I have a soft spot for Donougher's here. And if I had never started this whole translation comparison deal I might never've found that out!

I.v.6

Wilbour, Wraxall, Hapgood, Walton, FMA, and Rose's choice to translate this title in full as "Father Fauchelevent" won out over Denny and Donougher's choice to keep the French of "Pére Fauchelevent".

I.v.7

An impressive 90.5% of the vote for "Fauchelevent Becomes a Gardener in Paris" (as translated by Hapgood, Walton, Denny, FMA, Rose, ans Donougher). I expected that to win, but jeez, what a sweep!

I.v.8

FMA and Rose take this one, garnering 47.8% for "Madame Victurnien Spends Thirty-Five Francs on Morality". The biggest point here, though, is the oddness of a full half of the translations zorking up the numbers. @blatherby kindly checked the different French source texts, but determined they all had trente-cinque. Curiouser and curiouser.

I.v.9

A decently split race, but it's a W for the Ws, with Wilbour, Wraxall, and "Walton's Success of Madame Victurnien" getting the winning 30.4%. (I gotta say, I personally think folks were sleeping on FMA's great word choice here.)

I.v.10

Donougher's "The Consequences of Her Success" got 44.2% of the vote. I also want to point out our second ever 0% of votes! Congratulations to our good friend Norman Denny.

1.v.12

It was a battle between M. and Monsieur, but Walton's "The Idleness of M. Bamatabois" won with 49%. Also, our third 0%: Hapgood's "M. Bamatabois’s Inactivity".

I.v.13

Donougher wins, with 31.1% for "Resolving Some Questions of Municipal Policing".

And now the tally!

Wilbour: 2

Wraxall: 3

Hapgood: 4

Walton: 5

Denny: 1

FMA: 4

Rose: 4

Donougher: 3

A pretty decent spread! Honestly, the Walton W is kind of a surprise for me because his isn't super well known; it's partly to do with agreeing with other translators from time to time, but I'm happy to see some success from him.

[pureanonofficial]

LES MIS LETTERS IN ADAPTATION - Madame Victurnien's Success, LM 1.5.9 (Shoujo Cosette)

The old woman who had given her lessons in what may be called the life of indigence, was a sainted spinster named Marguerite, who was pious with a true piety, poor and charitable towards the poor, and even towards the rich, knowing how to write just sufficiently to sign herself Marguerite, and believing in God, which is science.

[bobcatmoran]

Chapter 1.5.9 of Les Mis, "Madame Victurnien's Success," is awful and everything hurts.

I'm so glad Fantine has Marguerite, someone to teach her the skills — and they are skills! — of living on next to nothing. (much, much, later on, Marius will also find him living on next to nothing, in a much more voluntary situation, and he…er…does not have these skills)

The horribleness is compounded by the fact that she's forking over a truly terrifying amount of what she earns to the Thenardiers, and if she went and fetched Cosette, they could live together and, without that drain on her finances, they could probably make it and be happy.

But she can't put up the capital to fetch Cosette, can't get enough saved to pay off her debts to the Thenardiers (ironically because she's paying the Thenardiers 5 out of every 6 sous she earns), and so she tells herself, Cosette is happier where she is. (she isn't though, and that makes it all the worse)

Arai is one of the very very few adaptations that includes Marguerite.

During his adaptation of this chapter (pages 415–419 of the first English omnibus), we get to see their friendship, with Marguerite helping her cut as many corners as possible and Fantine telling Marguerite about her daughter.

We also get an idea of how much Fantine is paying the Thenardiers. When her landlord comes knocking, having heard that she was fired and wanting the rent right now, Fantine tells him about her new job sewing shirts. The landlord does the math and says aloud that if she's making 18 francs a month, she should still be able to afford rent and therefore is allowed to stay — if she keeps up with her payments. And then, in a conversation with Marguerite, it's brought up that 12 of those francs are going to the Thenardiers, leaving Fantine only 6 to live on.

[katenepveu]

I'm now ahead on Les Mis Letters, having decided to read all of Part One in one gulp based on what @fremedon says in this post (thematic/tone description of the rest of the book, no plot spoilers).

A few comments on 1.5 through today's email, not recapping or comprehensive, just things I noted:

Chapter 1.5.4, "Monsieur Madeleine in Mourning": I cannot begin to say how upsetting I found the long paragraph about the beauty of "being blind and being loved" (by a woman, specifically):

to know you are the center of every step she takes, of every word, of every song, to manifest your own gravitational pull every minute of the day, to feel yourself all the more powerful for your infirmity, to become in darkness, and through darkness, the star around which this angel revolves—few forms of bliss come anywhere near it!

Gah!!!!!

Chapter 1.5.5, "Dim Flashes of Lightning on the Horizon":

What a heck of a character introduction:

The Asturian peasants are convinced that in every litter of wolves there is one pup who is killed by the mother because otherwise it would grow up to devour all the other pups.

Give that male wolf puppy a human face, and you’d have Javert.

(I strongly disapprove of Hugo's conflation of beauty with virtue, so this is not about the appearance but the analogy.)

Chapter 1.5.9, "Madame Victurnien's Success": Well. There's the interiority I was wondering if we'd get for Fantine. Shame it isn't under better circumstances.

Chapter 1.5.10, "Continued Success": Hugo loves irony with these chapter titles, huh? It really works.

Rose's translation of the last line here echoes the last line of book three. Compare:

... she had given herself to this Tholomyès as to a husband, and the poor girl had a child.

With:

The poor girl made herself a whore.

It's very effective.

[lesmislettersdaily]

Madame Victurnien’s Success

Volume 1: fantine; Book 5: The Descent; Chapter 9: Madame Victurnien’s Success

So the monk’s widow was good for something.

But M. Madeleine had heard nothing of all this. Life is full of just such combinations of events. M. Madeleine was in the habit of almost never entering the women’s workroom.

At the head of this room he had placed an elderly spinster, whom the priest had provided for him, and he had full confidence in this superintendent,—a truly respectable person, firm, equitable, upright, full of the charity which consists in giving, but not having in the same degree that charity which consists in understanding and in forgiving. M. Madeleine relied wholly on her. The best men are often obliged to delegate their authority. It was with this full power, and the conviction that she was doing right, that the superintendent had instituted the suit, judged, condemned, and executed Fantine.

As regards the fifty francs, she had given them from a fund which M. Madeleine had intrusted to her for charitable purposes, and for giving assistance to the workwomen, and of which she rendered no account.

Fantine tried to obtain a situation as a servant in the neighborhood; she went from house to house. No one would have her. She could not leave town. The second-hand dealer, to whom she was in debt for her furniture—and what furniture!—said to her, “If you leave, I will have you arrested as a thief.” The householder, whom she owed for her rent, said to her, “You are young and pretty; you can pay.” She divided the fifty francs between the landlord and the furniture-dealer, returned to the latter three-quarters of his goods, kept only necessaries, and found herself without work, without a trade, with nothing but her bed, and still about fifty francs in debt.

She began to make coarse shirts for soldiers of the garrison, and earned twelve sous a day. Her daughter cost her ten. It was at this point that she began to pay the Thénardiers irregularly.

However, the old woman who lighted her candle for her when she returned at night, taught her the art of living in misery. Back of living on little, there is the living on nothing. These are the two chambers; the first is dark, the second is black.

Fantine learned how to live without fire entirely in the winter; how to give up a bird which eats a half a farthing’s worth of millet every two days; how to make a coverlet of one’s petticoat, and a petticoat of one’s coverlet; how to save one’s candle, by taking one’s meals by the light of the opposite window. No one knows all that certain feeble creatures, who have grown old in privation and honesty, can get out of a sou. It ends by being a talent. Fantine acquired this sublime talent, and regained a little courage.

At this epoch she said to a neighbor, “Bah! I say to myself, by only sleeping five hours, and working all the rest of the time at my sewing, I shall always manage to nearly earn my bread. And, then, when one is sad, one eats less. Well, sufferings, uneasiness, a little bread on one hand, trouble on the other,—all this will support me.”

It would have been a great happiness to have her little girl with her in this distress. She thought of having her come. But what then! Make her share her own destitution! And then, she was in debt to the Thénardiers! How could she pay them? And the journey! How pay for that?

The old woman who had given her lessons in what may be called the life of indigence, was a sainted spinster named Marguerite, who was pious with a true piety, poor and charitable towards the poor, and even towards the rich, knowing how to write just sufficiently to sign herself Marguerite, and believing in God, which is science.

There are many such virtuous people in this lower world; some day they will be in the world above. This life has a morrow.

At first, Fantine had been so ashamed that she had not dared to go out.

When she was in the street, she divined that people turned round behind her, and pointed at her; every one stared at her and no one greeted her; the cold and bitter scorn of the passers-by penetrated her very flesh and soul like a north wind.

It seems as though an unfortunate woman were utterly bare beneath the sarcasm and the curiosity of all in small towns. In Paris, at least, no one knows you, and this obscurity is a garment. Oh! how she would have liked to betake herself to Paris! Impossible!

She was obliged to accustom herself to disrepute, as she had accustomed herself to indigence. Gradually she decided on her course. At the expiration of two or three months she shook off her shame, and began to go about as though there were nothing the matter. “It is all the same to me,” she said.

She went and came, bearing her head well up, with a bitter smile, and was conscious that she was becoming brazen-faced.

Madame Victurnien sometimes saw her passing, from her window, noticed the distress of “that creature” who, “thanks to her,” had been ��put back in her proper place,” and congratulated herself. The happiness of the evil-minded is black.

Excess of toil wore out Fantine, and the little dry cough which troubled her increased. She sometimes said to her neighbor, Marguerite, “Just feel how hot my hands are!”

Nevertheless, when she combed her beautiful hair in the morning with an old broken comb, and it flowed about her like floss silk, she experienced a moment of happy coquetry.

[garbagecann24601]

Madame Victurnien’s Success

Having been fired (without the mayor’s knowledge), Fantine goes around trying to find work as a servant, but no one will hire her. She is forced to sell back almost all of her furniture and begins sewing shirts to sell to soldiers. She begins living very frugally-- not lighting a fire in winter, only sleeping five hours a day so she can work the rest of the time, eating her meals by the window to save on candles. At first, she is ashamed to go out because people stare and point at her, but she eventually learns to ignore this.

[psalm22-6]

“Fantine or the Fate of a Grizette”

I already thought this New York Clipper article, which describes a 1863 adaptation of Les Misérables at Grover’s Theatre, was cool because I love the list of principal characters. (Blancheville gets to sing a song? Marguerite is included!) But then I got to the last part, where they mention that it has music by Charles Koppitz! And realized that this is the production which David Bellos discussed at BarricadesCon! (Actually the title of the play could have tipped me off to that but it didn’t). The score can be found here. An interesting little piece of history. But by no means unique. Well, this production might have been uniquely good by the sounds of it, but there were quite a few adaptations of Les Misérables being put on around the United States in 1862 and 1863. The earliest I have found (so far) was October 1862, in Marysville California with J. B. Booth Jr. (brother of John Wilkes Booth) as one of the principal actors (I wish I had more to say on that but so far I just have a one sentence mention of it in one newspaper). And you’ll notice that in this article, they say “still another” play “has come to light since our last.” That’s because this article is from January 31st 1863, but on January 17th they had reported a different production of Les Miserables entirely that was also being put on. And the next month there would be at least two other productions put on in the area, reported on by the same paper (one of which was notably long, only ending at one in the morning and later being cut down so that it ended at 11).         (This article was in that super dense no paragraph break style of newspapers of the time so I have broken it up considerably for readability). 

And still another dramatization of “Les Miserables” has come to light since our last. This last is the production of Mr. Albert Cassedy, of Washington, D.C., and was presented for the first time at Grover’s Theatre, on the 19th inst., continuing through the week. Mr. Cassedy calls his work “Fantine, or the Fate of a Grizette.” The cast embraces the entire company, and as our friends may like to see the distribution of characters, we give it, as follows: — Fantine, Kate Denin  Jean Valjean, Father Madelaine, M. Madeleine, Mayor, Charles Barron Bishop of Myriel, Ben Rogers Javert, M. H. Bokee Tholomyes, D. Setchell Blackeville [sic] (with a song), J. L. Barrett  Scaufflaire, Harry Clifford  Fauchelevent, H. McDolanld Little Gervais (with a song), Sophie Gimber Prosecuting Attorney, Alonzo Read Host of the Inn, M.A. Kennedy Champmathieu, T. M. Wemyss Brevet, J. V. Daily Listolier, E. S. Tarr Favorite (with a song), Viola Crocker Madame Magloire, Mrs G. O. Germon Sister Simplice, Isabella Freeman Baptistine, Addie Anderson Marguerite, Fanny Ryan Dahlia, Ada Monk Zephine, Flora Lee Cosette, Little Katy Madame Victurnien, Minnie Monk Madame Thenardier, Jennie Monk Extra pains were taken to give due effect to this great work, and the full resources of the establishment were called in, to place the play in a proper manner before the public. New music was arranged by Koppitz, the “Nightingale;” and fresh scenery and skilful effects introduced. The last scene is said to be a gem; it is an allegorical tableau, representing the finding of Cosette by Jean Valjean, and the Apotheosis of Fantine. 

Here is a review from the Washington DC Evening Star, 20 January 1863 

Mr. Cassedy’s dramatization from “Fantine,” drew an immense house last night. The author has certainly been very happy in his adaptation, and having a company from which to cast his characters, whereon he could depend, the success of the piece was hardly to be wondered at. Mr. Cassedy has in a very felicitous manner woven into the representation every prominent feature in the book, and he has performed the difficult task of giving a somewhat prominent part to each of some thirty performers. If Mr. Barron could be induced to dispense with some of his spasmodic actions and fifth-rate melodramatic rant in the part of Jean Valjean, it would be all the better for the play. “Fantine” will be performed again tonight. 

[everyonewasabird]

Brickclub 3.3.7 ‘A bit of skirt’

She foresaw some affair of the heart, more or less illicit, a woman in the shadows, a rendezvous, a mystery, and she would not have minded sticking her beak in it. Savouring a mystery is like being first one in on a scandal; holy souls are not at all averse to such things. There is in the secret compartments of bigotry a certain taste for scandal.

Mlle Gillenormand isn’t Madame Victurnien, but she’s going an uncomfortable distance down that road. Trying to unearth other people’s illicit secrets is never a good look in this text.

It’s another way this half of the book is revisiting the first with more nuance. Madame Victurnien had a sad history, but she ruined Fantine’s life on purpose, and that defines her. The stakes are much lower here, and Mlle Gillenormand is much less successful. Her bad impulses don’t do much harm--which is both a blessing and a curse, as it’s part of her absolute powerlessness.

“Are you sure that your cousin does not know you?"

"Yes. I have seen him; but he has never deigned to notice me.”

Marius is, in fact, absurdly proud, but I don’t think that’s what's going on here.

Instead, Theodule is reading Marius’s perpetual abstraction as pride, the same way people misinterpreted Fantine. It’s such a subtle callback, but it’s so on point. Marius has a much more fortunate social position than Fantine and much better luck, but his ability to read the world around him isn’t any better.

I’d say I'm on Team Marius-is-autistic, but that might be too obvious for anyone to disagree with.

Marius’s and Cosette’s relationship is a lot of things, and many of those things are pretty questionable, but they don’t fall into each others’ lives at random. Between their similar backstories, Marius’s resemblance to both Valjean and Fantine, and possibly even Cosette’s resemblance to Marius’s mother, Hugo set up a lot for them to bond over.

The Alfred line is hilarious, and I love it. It’s also a callback to the Tholomyes chapters:

However, we will remark by the way, everything was not ridiculous and superficial in that curious epoch to which we are alluding, and which may be designated as the anarchy of baptismal names. By the side of this romantic element which we have just indicated there is the social symptom. It is not rare for the neatherd’s boy nowadays to bear the name of Arthur, Alfred, or Alphonse, and for the vicomte—if there are still any vicomtes—to be called Thomas, Pierre, or Jacques.

Theodule feels like he’s wandered in from some other book: cheerful, shallow, interested in girls and money and looking fashionable, but also blithely decent to people. And he has no ability to comprehend Marius at all.

There really are only a tiny handful of neurotypical characters in this book, and Theodule might be the only one who's not a villain.

[fremedon]

Brickclub 2.8.7, “In Which We Find the Origin of the Saying, ‘Ne Pa Perdre la Carte’“

The conclusion of the caper. 

A fifteen-franc fine--three hundred sous--is a horribly harsh thing to hold over the head of a workingman. It’s so inordinately steep, but the horrible thing is that I can actually see it not having been punitive in intent--a chain of “for sanitary reasons, we need to make sure no one gets into the graveyard after dark because of the dangerous miasmas!” “Yes! Let us impose a fine--one high enough to act as a deterrant--on anyone trespassing there after dark, where no one has legitimate business being anyway.” “But what about the gravediggers? They might be detained there after dark.” “Ah yes. We will issue all the gravediggers passes, and anyone caught without a pass will pay the fine. This solves the problem completely with no unintended consequences whatsoever.”

But of course there are unintended consequences, as of course we see when Fauchelevent, his ruse with the card having successfully gotten Gribier out of the way, comes to his garret to return the pick:

Lids were displaced, ragged clothing was scattered about, the jug was broken, the mother had been weeping, the children had probably been beaten: signs of a distraught and bad-tempered search. It was plain that the gravedigger had been frantically hunting for his pass and held everything in the garret, from the jug to his wife, responsible for its loss.

Gribier is not a good person. The incidental beating of the children is not neutral in this book, but it would have been in some books of the day, and that last line seems meant to make certain readers don’t give him a pass (as it were): Gribier is desperate and frightened, but his first instinct when frightened is to blame and punish other people for his mistakes.

But the text goes on: “But Fauchelevent was in too great a hurry to bring this adventure to a conclusion to notice this sorry side of his success.”

THIS. THIS IS BAD. This is a level of neon flashing bad I can’t believe I never noticed. The text even echoes the title of the chapter where Fantine sells her hair and teeth: “Consequences of Her [i.e., Mme Victurnien’s] Success.”

Being unaware of the collateral damage of one’s actions does not excuse them--the book has made that very clear and Valjean knows that; he feels his debt to Fantine all the more keenly because he did not know the harm his policies had done to her, and he should have. He feels, ultimately, grateful for his chance to save Champmathieu, rather than live ignorant of the level of harm his existence as Madeleine would have caused.

(I am also reminded of how Valjean’s attempt to get the wheel fixed en route to Arras is thrown into relief by Champmathieu’s speech about working as a wheelwright, in winter, for pushy customers who want things done immediately--retrospectively showing how things look on the other side of a transaction.)

Valjean is outside in the street, and when Fauchelevent stole the card he was unconscious, but this is still his plan, and its success has done harm that Valjean cannot remedy because he doesn’t know about it. This is a WRONG TURN.

And yet, on their way to Gribier’s, Fauchelevent, who one page ago was weeping, says “How well everything’s going! What a good idea that was of yours, Père Madeleine!”

Fauchelevent had the right of it before, when he thought Valjean was dead: “But how did he get inside the convent in the first places? That’s how it all started. People shouldn’t do things like that.”

(And, a bit later, asking a question that’s equally relevant to Valjean’s next burial: “What would you expect me to do if you’d died? And your little girl?”)

For all that Fauchelevent is happy--”Joy is the ebbing of terror,” Hugo remarks, as though that’s a normal thing to say, Victor are you ok?--he and Valjean are still feeling the Gothic uncanniness of the cemetery: “Even restored to their senses, these two men without realizing it were troubled in spirit and felt a strangeness inside them, which was the sinister effect of the place.”

And we see it in Valjean, who in contrast to Fauchelevent is completely impassive: 

Jean Valjean had some difficulty in moving and walking. He had grown stiff in that coffin and become a little corpse-like. The rigidity of death had taken hold of him inside that wooden box. He had, as it were, to thaw out from being in the grave.

“You’re numb,” Fauchelevent says, and Valjean’s response is “A few steps, and my legs will be fine.” Except it’s not just his legs, it’s his everything--and his manner continues to be weirdly numb all the way through his interview next chapter. Look at what he says in this chapter: “I fell asleep [i.e., passed out],” “I’m cold,” the line about his legs, and, in answer to Fauchelevent asking him to point out number 87, “This is it here.”

He doesn’t express any joy over being alive, or over the plan having worked.

He doesn’t ask after Cosette.

He doesn’t ask after Cosette.

Fauchelevent mentions Cosette! Valjean doesn’t, not even after Fauchelevent brings her up. That, more than anything, underscores what a very, very wrong path he’s on.

One character note I liked a lot--when Fauchelevent conceives of the ruse with the pass, the dialog shifts from Gribier addressing Fauchelevent as “Peasant” or “Provincial” to Fauchelvent addressing him as “Novice” or “Newcomer.” Fauchelevent is very, very aware of where the power lies in an interaction.

[cyn-syti]

5.9 Success for Madame Victurnien | Beyond living on little, there is living on nothing. They are two rooms. The first is dark, the second is pitch-black.

[ There are exactly 365 chapters in Les Misérables. This is a chronicle of my attempt to finally read them all. Fingers crossed … ]

[meta-squash]

Brick Club 1.5.8 “Madame Victurnien Spends Thirty-Five Francs On Morality”

Hugo does this with so many of the societal tragedies in this book. He sets everything up like everything is great and everyone is happy, only to have the facade crumble. It happened with the students/grisettes outing in 1.4 and in the description of the Thenardier children at Montfermeil, and it’s happening now with the description of Montreuil-sur-Mer’s prosperity. Everyone’s so happy and has good income and pays taxes! Oh wait, here’s how the people of this town fucked over one poor woman. (And how many other women have had something similar happen to them because of the nosey people.)

I’m really stuck on the line that Fantine “forgot many things.” She admired her appearance and thought about Cosette and the future and was almost happy, but she also forgot many things. What did she forget? Not Tholomyes, I don’t think, because on the next page he says she thinks of him. It’s such an odd little phrase. I just can’t think of what “many things” she could forget.

Hugo says she rented a room and furniture on credit, “a remnant of her former disorderly ways.” Fantine thinks she’s getting herself back on track, that this renting stuff on credit will be the last time she’ll have to do something “disorderly” and that now that she’s making a living with her own work she’ll be fine. The Hapgood translation is “improvident,” by the way, which I think makes more sense. However I find it interesting that Hugo calls her renting a room on credit a lack of foresight, when really it’s just a necessity out of extreme poverty. She had 23 francs when she left Montfermeil, and I can’t imagine she has much--or any--left when she arrives. Her behavior in Paris, of not taking job opportunities when they arose because of her affair with Tholomyes, I think that makes at least a little sense to call improvident. But not her renting and furnishing her rooms on credit, which seems desperate rather than prodigal.

The townspeople whisper that Fantine “put on airs,” which is the same accusation Favourite had of her back in 1.3.4 while on the swing. Something about Fantine’s odd sort of innocence makes people think she feels superior to them. I was going to say I wonder if this is another way of Hugo insinuating her goodness, but I don’t think Fantine’s “goodness” is the same as Myriel or Valjean’s. Hugo called Fantine “wise,” and I think an aspect about her is that she’s wise on an emotional level, not on a social level. She understands the importance of emotional connection and devotion on a level we don’t see with the other grisettes or with the people of M-sur-M. She doesn’t seem to have any idea about the whisperings going on around her, she has no idea that her child has been discovered until she’s fired. And yet even when she hardens due to her suffering, she never loses the softness about Cosette. Her wisdom is about sacrifice, which is exactly the kind of wisdom that these nosey townspeople (and probably Favourite) lack.

I love Hugo’s condemnation of gossip and rubbernecking. It also makes me laugh because it’s so similar to the way that cops act. This feels like a condemnation of both gossips and cops. What’s the phrase? Kill the cop inside your head? Anyway, he sounds so frustrated and exasperated here. I haven’t read very much further into the Hugo bio, but I’m wondering if there was some rumor or scandal that he personally experienced that made him feel so strongly here.

Hugo’s really hammering home the beauty of Fantine’s hair and teeth here in preparation for two chapters ahead. Weirdly, this reminds me of the Bishop’s silver. Back in 1.1.6 we learn about Myriel’s silver, and it’s mentioned multiple times afterward. When he gives it up, he’s giving up the last thing that connects him to his past life and is put on the same level as any of the poor parishioners or citizens of Digne. When Fantine gives up her teeth and hair, she sacrifices the last two things that tie her not only to her old life in Paris, but to the possibility of success in society as a woman.

So from what I can tell, the Bernardines are a Catholic order also called “Cistercians.” Originally they tried to observe the Rule of St Benedict and focused mostly on manual labor, but later become more focused on intellectual and academic rigor. There was a semi-successful reform movement to go back to old ways in the 17th century. By the 19th century it seems it was mostly dissolved. The “Bernard” of Bernardine was Bernard of Clairvaux, a powerful French abbot who actually wrote up rules that allowed Templar knights to pass through all borders freely. He also encouraged the Second Crusade, though it failed. The Jacobins were anti-royalist republicans who encouraged dechristianization of the country. The Jacobins spoke on behalf of the people but many were bourgeoisie.

So Mme. Victurnien’s ex-monk husband went from being a monk of a fairly intellectual order who observed pretty strict Benedictine rules to joining the fairly atheistic, republican, radical Jacobins.

Madame Victurnien was strict and harsh because her husband was strict and harsh to her. Something I’ve noticed about the way Hugo writes about toxic/abusive/bad relationships between people is how children are affected versus adults. Victurnien and her dead husband, the Thenardier parents, even Gillenormand (with his spinster daughter) to some extent, are all horrible relationships where the treatment of each other means they both turn out pretty awful. However, the same treatment to children (Thenardier parents to their children and even more so to Cosette, Gillenormand to Marius) actually creates an opposite personality. Eponine and Gavroche are both pretty rough, but they’re also both fairly kind in certain ways, which their parents are definitely not. Marius is socially awkward but happy to help when he can. Cosette defies her childhood completely. It’s just an interesting observation that adults abused as adults become abusive themselves while children who were abused have the chance to end the cycle.

“She was a nettle bruised by a frock.” Does Hugo use “nettle” in this metaphor as a verb or a noun? Because to nettle someone is to annoy them, which works, as Victurnien seems to be an extremely annoying individual. But also we have nettles as prickly, stinging plants and as a metaphor from a few chapters ago for the way people become hurtful when neglected. Here we have Victurnien, this nettle bruised by a frock, hurt and damaged by this ex-monk, who becomes prickly and abusive herself. Perhaps with better treatment she would not have turned out this way; but she continues the cycle, beating down others and turning them into stinging nettles rather than them becoming useful.

Fantine is given her fifty francs upon her termination “on behalf of the mayor.” Madeleine is not even Madeleine at all in this chapter. He’s just “the mayor,” as Fantine had been just “the mother” back in 1.4.1. To her he’s this entity that has power over her, that even hates and persecutes her the way the townspeople are. She doesn’t see him, and neither do we; by this point he seems to have relegated factory admin jobs to others, who are then able to make the choice about who to dismiss and why. Again this presents a problem to his rules. People can make up any old rumor or reason to dismiss a person they don’t like or see as morally unfit, and because Valjean doesn’t seem to play as much a part in the running of the factory as before, there’s no way to dispute, except to go to him. And who’s going to go to him, if they feel the same shame that Fantine does?

Fantine is in limbo; she’s told to leave the city but she cannot because of debt. Hugo’s characters in limbo are usually on the edge of an emotional or ethical breakthrough, as with Valjean leaving Digne, Marius just outside the barricade, or Javert at the bridge. Fantine’s limbo doesn’t seem like the edge of a breakthrough, more like the edge of collapse. She really doesn’t have many avenues open to her anymore.

Also, what about sex workers who are more obvious? Later, we see Fantine walking the street in a ballgown. That’s very unsubtle. And, I don’t know, maybe it goes with her sort of social innocence that she would do something like that, but surely there are other desperate women who blatantly walk the streets like that. They haven’t been kicked out of the city. Surely they don’t--or can’t--hide their trade completely. It must be some sort of open secret. I understand that the reasoning for her being banished from M-sur-M is that Valjean has very strict rules, but it still seems so weird to me to set these rules up for some of the city but not all.

Fantine feels shame more than she feels despair. Which. Is a lot. It’s just awful that she has to feel ashamed for this thing that she would have kept hidden if the townspeople weren’t so awful. She has to feel ashamed for the one thing in her life that she truly actually loves and sacrifices for. Which is another parallel between her and Valjean. Fantine feels ashamed not because of her love of Cosette, but because of the “mistake” and stigma that Cosette’s existence implies. Valjean loves Cosette but he always feels a little bit ashamed, not at loving her, but because he feels she doesn’t deserve his love. Despite both of their shame regarding their love for Cosette, both Fantine and Valjean will sacrifice anything for her. It’s definitely a statement about the power of Love, but I think it’s also a good illustration of how both Valjean and Fantine seem to think of themselves as people meant to Suffer For The Good Of Another.

Fantine was “advised to see the mayor; she did not dare.” She believes this was his decision, and not some foreman’s. This is a failure on her part and on Valjean’s part as well. It’s a failure on Fantine’s part because had she gathered her courage and gone, she could have avoided everything that soon comes. But Fantine is so optimistic and sees through rose-tinted glasses, all the way until the moment everything collapses on her, and then she can’t go on. Her optimism doesn’t get her far enough to stand up again immediately; it has to rest first. But more than Fantine’s failing, this is Valjean’s. I assume he gets notified of who is hired and fired at his factory; does he not reach out when someone is dismissed to make sure they’re okay and to see if he can help? Even more of a failure is this rigid system he’s set up combined with his kind-but-mysterious air. He’s so nice and fair that the townspeople see these rules as kind and fair as well, when they’re very much not. But no one--including Fantine--is going to question it because they assume it’s set up in the spirit of kindness. Which I suppose it is, from Valjean’s point of view, but it’s misguided and twisted and ends up being far more damaging than it could ever be helpful.

[lmchaptertitlebracket]

I.v.10 Suite Du Succès

Results of the Success: Wilbour, Hapgood, Walton

Result Of Her Success: Wraxall

Continued Success of Madame Victurnien: Denny

Outcome of the Success: FMA

Continued Success: Rose

The Consequences of Her Success: Donougher

[lizardrosen]

BrickClub 1.5.8-1.5.9

Chapter VIII. Madame Victurnien Spends Thirty-Five Francs on Morality

“To live honestly by your labor, that was a blessing from above! A genuine love of work came back to her” Compare this to Marius falling out of the habit of doing work because he doesn’t want to owe anything to another person (and he’d rather be daydreaming). But Fantine really doesn’t have a choice, partly because her position as a woman is less secure, but also because she’s supporting Cosette so she can’t afford to just make do.

“No one pries as effectively into other people’s business as those whose business it most definitely is not.” Hugo Has Opinions About Gossip! Most of the things described in this paragraph are probably more extreme than your average nosy person would be, but it illustrates the point he’s trying to make very effectively.

Madame Victurnien is pretty awful and goes way out of her way to ruin Fantine for the sake of “morality” but it’s neat that she gets a paragraph of backstory. On the other hand, as other people have pointed out, she saw Cosette, and saw the horrible conditions she was living under, and decided that she should get the mother fired instead of doing anything to help this child. How’s that for morality?

Valjean isn’t directly involved in the decision to fire Fantine, and probably if she went to him he’d be able to do something more to help her, but it totally makes sense that she wouldn’t feel able to, considering how she’s been treated so far.

Chapter IX. Madame Victurnien’s Success

“this overseer, an impeccably respectable person, firm, fair, full of the charity that consists in giving, but not so full of the charity that consists in understanding and forgiving.” This is an important distinction Hugo makes, and I do think those are two different skillsets, but both are necessary in the more just world that he’s trying to lay out with this book.

In this chapter you can see why the book is called The Descent while Valjean’s backstory was The Fall, because everything happens in slow horrible steps, of people refusing to offer her work, and her landlord and furniture dealer refusing to forgive some of her debt. “You’re young and pretty, I’m sure you can pay.” UGH what a horrible and realistic line D:

But an old woman who lit her candle for her when she came home at night taught her the art of living in destitution. Beyond living on little, there is living on nothing. These are two rooms; the first is dark, the second is black.

I love Marguerite, and also everything is SAD. But it’s so good that Fantine isn’t completely on her own here, because that would be so much worse.

In small towns, a woman down on her luck is naked before the sarcastic remarks and curiosity of all and sundry. In Paris, at least, no one knows who you are and this anonymity cloaks you. Oh, how she wished she could get to Paris! Not possible.

I really like this commentary but I don’t have anything specific to say about it.

[pilferingapples]

Initial Reactions to Episode 3 Based on Seeing It One Time Now That I Finally Got To See The Ending:

Quick Recap of Everything : -We go straight to the trial (where Javert is still sitting); Valjean protests the charges against Champmathieu, and Javert takes him into custody. Then they go back to Montreuil, and Valjean finds out Victurnien didn’t bring Cosette.  Valjean breaks away from Javert, knocks over several guards, and fights his way to Fantine, where the deathbed scene goes roughly the way it does in the book. Then he’s re-arrested. The Red Font of BBC Les Mis Doom tells us it’s TWO YEARS LATER when we see Cosette again, doing chores and being beaten by Mme. T to the cheers of the tavern crowd (that is not a joke, they cheer her beating Cosette. A lot.) . Cosette meets Valjean in the woods, he walks her home, he sees her doing chores while Eponine and Azelma play and eat, he buys her the doll (which it’s heavily implied has Fantine’s hair); the next morning he gives the Thenardiers money and they leave.  Thenardier follows, with guns, to get more money; Valjean beats him up and then he and Cosette go on. Montage of Valjean and Cosette  being cute in Paris; meanwhile someone at the Vague Police Office brings Javert a report of Cosette’s “abduction”; Javert goes to Montfermeil (where Gavroche is now serving in Cosette’s place) and gets back on the Vajlean Trail. Shortly after, the Thenardiers are bankrupt and leave , trying without success to leave Gavroche behind, and leaving their dog tied to the house. 

In Paris, the Principal Tenant of the Gorbeau house has Suspicions about Valjean and the little girl he keeps with him; it’s pretty clear what those suspicions are, and she reports them to the police. Javert recognizes Valjean and leads a Special Strike Superteam after him, and Valjean and Cosette escape through the streets into the Picpus convent, where Valjean opens the door onto a roomful of nuns, including, conveniently, Sister Simplice. Simplice vouches for him, the Reverend Mother covers for him when Javert comes looking, and Valjean is allowed to stay in the convent.  

SO OBVIOUSLY THERE ARE SOME CHANGES HERE  Well That Was Fun:

-Champmathieu was wonderful; he fully delivered all the anger and confusion and grief and humility and even a little of the humour his Brick self has, and I wanted to rescue him from the hell of the court right away. A+++ Champmathieuing.  

-The BBC Antagonists continue to be the best versions of themselves I have seen?  The Thenardiers in particular were great (I am setting aside discussions of last week’s One Scene ) ; this may be the best versions of their Worst Selves I’ve ever seen. 

-on the Antagonist Front, I’m glad they kept the deathbed scene playing out as  brutally as it does in the book. 

-I saw someone talking about the Symbolic Haircuts this series has going and YEAH they’re sure sticking with that! I Approve Wholeheartedly, hit me with that Symbolic Parallel. 

-also on the Yay Symbolism Front, I think there’s something pretty coherent going on with the Dogs and Valjean throughout this show. 

-this show still has The Cutest Children and I’m adopting Gavroche effective yesterday.

- Under the heading of Understandable Cuts But I Am Maybe a Bit Sad About It: No Orion?  no coffin shenanigans?>: yes I know they almost never make it in, but the way Davies went On about getting in Book Details and his obvious interest in Javert and Valjean above all made me hopeful that at least Valjean’s adventures would get a little more time.

No Champmathieu and no Convent  Husbands made me Very Unhappy at first, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more it feels...okay. Champmathieu is someone that Brick!Valjean needs and deserves. This Valjean is not at the same place on his Emotional Journey; he needs another dose of Divine Grace and Forgiveness. 

 And I’m gonna go ahead and say that I like the nuns knowing what’s going on, and being participants,on a character level, though on a political/thematic level hnnnnngh WOW there’s a Lot To Unpack with this now. Still, a Potential Interesting Development? Especially since the Mother now knows  that Valjean is Valjean; he’s going to be living openly in a community for years. I hope they do more with that. 

Annnnnd Complaints/Confusions: 

-this show got real dark this week, and by that I mean I Can’t See Squat. I realize it’s the Hip Modern Way to Film , but: LIGHT LIGHT , FLOOD IT WITH LIGHT, let me at least see the actors’ expressions properly! 

- WHERE is the little bird ornament from last week? are they gonna spend that much time on it and then it just falls out of the story?!? I will be watching to see if it returns

-...also Where is Marius?? Why spend so much time on him the last couple of episodes and yank HIS story all out of alignment if we didn’t need him to be in a specific part of his arc, or even on screen, Now?

-Why is the “principal tenant” so Fancy? She’s the housekeeper and cook and maid-of-all-work in the house, and it’s basically a  slum property. It’s weird to see her in dressy-ish clothes.

-oh gad the implication that Catherine has Fantine’s hair makes leaving her behind (and on purpose, at Valjean’s decision) just HORRIBLE 

-Changes, Changes, All Of Them...Why?? I really don’t know why the timeline’s been jerked around so weirdly; none of it seems necessary in any way to the rest of what Davies is doing with the story?  If it felt like this was all tilting to a specific goal I’d be okay with it, certainly Hugo’s timelines around M-sur-M and Montfermeil are eehhhhhh, but I just don’t know what the point  is? Why have Fantine wait so long to come to Montreuil , why have her stay there so short , why have Valjean take two years  to get Cosette?  Why...any of this?  it hasn’t changed a bit of the actual plot and it just makes the pacing feel weird, like Fantine left Cosette and died in a single Very Busy Month. That everyone’s back on the timeline they had before just makes it feel super pointless? 

-Oh Hurray, Cosette calls people a bitch. By golly THAT makes her a Real Solid Character! Thanks Davies! -More Changes: Javert being at the trial and arresting Madeleine on the spot, again...why? and I still  don’t know what Javert was thinking, being there! This Javert is ...well he’s definitely not the character I look for in the role, but he might be an interesting version if I could draw any consistent line on motivation for him besides “super obsessed with Valjean”, which, separate from his underlying authoritarianism, is not interesting to me at all.

-Valjean continues to be....look I’m sorry to say it, but this Valjean...is boring . He’s just Angry and Angry and Angry, a big He Yell meme. His reaction to everything  pre-Cosette is He Yell-- unless it’s He Attac.  He’s so violent so  often, and sure, Valjean is always truly a Dangerous Man, but post- Bishop he always resists that ,  and this constant violence is just ...really saying he hasn’t moved on since then. 

His reaction scenes with Cosette  are better (their montage in the Gorbeau place is genuinely charming) but like. No. Someone who yells and threatens and breaks out the violence constantly, but not against just One Person, around a small child who specifically asks him to Not Beat Her is...well It’s Not Great.  And I know other people are getting more off him but he’s just coming across as so flat  to me. Angry and violent, angry and loud,angry and angry (angry and especially bad about women, and in a way that does not fit with his brand of protective patriarchal sexism at all...). 

It’s plausible for someone who’s been through his traumas, sure. But it’s not This Specific Character. Champmathieu felt far more like Valjean to me, in his limited screen time. West!Jean doesn’t project any particular warmth, he doesn’t have any of Valjean’s gentleness or thoughtfulness (until he starts parenting Cosette, but those are Valjean Traits already ,  even if they develop more while parenting her).  I think it’s all summed up for me by the fact that when he meets Cosette in the woods, she is  scared of him; he has to convince her to like him, there’s no instinctive draw-- and I wouldn’t have believed it if she hadn’t been. 

It does seem like they might have been saving all his character development for the arrival of Cosette, so maybe I’ll warm up to him in the next three episodes. But so far, he’s one of my least favorite Valjeans ever, and between than and Javert’s Enigma Mystery Burrito of a character, the central ~~tension of their Whatever That Is means nothing at all to me, so that’s been...dull.  Shouting and throwing furniture is not interesting all on its own! 

...at the end of all that, I’m still really curious  about where they’re Going with this.  I will be tuning in next week For The Nuns; I really hope they do more with them! 

And WHERE THE HECK IS PONTMERCY. 

[starberry-cupcake]

just curious about your les mis ep. 2 summary, tbh i fully agree with you on the sexism present in the writing, but do you think it's mainly andrew davies' choices that create this problem, or do you think it's just the inherent sexism of that time period?

Oh boy, I’m going to try my best to summarize my response as much as I can, because this is a matter of a long discussion, I apologize in advance for the length. I hope I can explain myself well enough. 

In my opinion, when you adapt a piece of media and you have the depiction of a certain kind of oppression to consider, inherent of the context or time period, you have to consider two layers: the actual oppression showcased in the source material and your contemporary interpretation or lens in which you will view it. Meaning, the way Fantine is treated in canon is one thing, the way she is written by every adaptation is another. 

Both layers are in conversation in an adaptation, because they will re-contextualize canon in whichever new context you’re bringing it to. For example, different stagings or performances of the musical will carry a different context depending on how and by whom Fantine is portrayed. Patti LuPone performing I Dreamed a Dream after Fantine gets dismissed isn’t like Anne Hathaway performing it after she has become a prostitute and neither carry the same implications as Allison Blackwell in the Liesl Tommy Dallas modern production influenced by her experience in apartheid South Africa. It’s the same song, the same character, but they all have different lenses and focus on different things. 

Now, this version isn’t supposed to be taking the musical into consideration, so let’s go to the brick (because the musical basically starts in Fantine’s downfall and we don’t see her making the choices that will lead to her worst, we just assume it all by phrases in the songs). 

I’m gonna use Hapgood’s translation of the brick, because it’s the English version I have more at hand, so I apologize because I know it isn’t the most preferred, but it’ll do. This is from Volume I, Book V, Chapter X: Result of the Success: 

One day she received from the Thenardiers a letter couched in the following terms: "Cosette is ill with a malady which is going the rounds of the neighborhood. A miliary fever, they call it. Expensive drugs are required. This is ruining us, and we can no longer pay for them. If you do not send us forty francs before the week is out, the little one will be dead."

She burst out laughing, and said to her old neighbor: "Ah! they are good! Forty francs! the idea! That makes two napoleons! Where do they think I am to get them? These peasants are stupid, truly."

Nevertheless she went to a dormer window in the staircase and read the letter once more. Then she descended the stairs and emerged, running and leaping and still laughing.

Some one met her and said to her, "What makes you so gay?"

She replied: "A fine piece of stupidity that some country people have written to me. They demand forty francs of me. So much for you, you peasants!"

I’m offering just this bit, but I think we can glimpse here a side of Fantine that didn’t appear in the miniseries. The series took the time to show Fantine prior to her downfall, which the musical doesn’t do. It spent at least 1 and a half episodes on that, showing Fantine’s relationship with Tholomyès, her choice to leave Cosette with the Thénardiers and lying (to Valjean in his face in this version) about not having a child. The show focuses on how clearly shady Tholomyès is, gives her a “voice of reason” in a friend telling her it’s a doomed relationship and makes the viewer complicit, through how Tholomyès is portrayed and shown, on the inevitable betrayal and, like so, making Fantine look like Snow White getting handed an apple by a very clearly shady witch she doesn’t know. It happens again with the Thénardiers, not only with how clearly non trustworthy they are shown to be but on how Fantine responds to every letter with concern and not doubting what they demand, when in the brick she did understand there was a chance they were lying, but she couldn’t fathom Cosette possibly being ill or cold. When she lies to Valjean in the miniseries, he is kind and reassuring, clearly understanding, and they insist various times on whether or not she has a family, also making the clear attempt to show to the audience how she’s taking the wrong turn. 

But, leaving the brick behind a bit, as someone who brings the story back for a modern audience, you can allow yourself some leeway in how to portray a character or a situation. A comparison I drew in my other summary about the Fantine/Tholomyès relationship was how Great Comet portrayed the Natasha/Anatole relationship, how they placed Natasha less as a naive child and more as an inexperienced girl who felt lonely and inadequate, with a lot of family pressure, and who was taken advantage of, but Anatole was portrayed as charming and likable to the audience, even flirting with people sitting close to where he was, so that the audience understood how magnetic he could be, how much you just can’t hate him. This way, you understand her choices, rather than blame her. 

Making the audience complicit in Fantine’s decisions being doomed since the start and portraying her without any spunk and as just a tragic figure is what overlays with the other things to make it a sexist problem. It isn’t just Victurnien calling her a whore 5 times in 2 minutes, it’s her doing so in a context in which Fantine is being shown under the light of someone who is constantly a victim of bad choices that we, as an audience, know are bad choices from the start. She is only given agency to choose what is clear to the audience that is the worst decision. That is patronizing and, yeah, sexist, in this context. It’s also so far not been good on the Cosette representation side either, but we’ll wait and see how that goes. 

So, all in all, to me this is a problem of the writing, but that’s just my own opinion. I’m not the most proficient in all things Les Mis, so I might be wrong, but that’s my two cents, I hope this answers your question! And sorry for the length!