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highly recommended |
What it means to be truly human 
A masterpiece of a novel, complete with numerous detailed sidetrips to the battlefields of Waterloo, a strict convent, the Bastille, and even the sewer system of Paris. Victor Hugo uses his hero's resolution of many conflicts between conscience and reason to show what it means to be truly human.
The characters are immortal, the plot is second to none, and the writing is absolutely superb.
I wish there would be six stars to give.
One of my favorite stories!
There is no doubt that Hugo can be quite long winded in telling this story, but it is worth every second. A classic story of human suffering, kindness, cruelty and redemption.
The Most Beautiful
Simply the most beautiful work of art I have ever been exposed to...anything beyond the brevity of this statement is an attempt in vain to "review" genius.
Every Christian Should Read This Book
I have read this incredible work of art several times and never cease to be amazed by the enormous impact it has on me. The first time I ever read it, I cried off and on for about three days, I was so moved. Victor Hugo tapped into something profound when he penned this story. It is long, yes, but I find that every little rabbit trail Hugo goes down has a very important point. I can just read the first chapter and feel humbled and challenged by his description of the way the bishop lived his life for God. It is better than most Christian devotionals I have read. Most people think of this as a somber story and indeed in many ways it is, but I am always surprised how much humor is infused into it as well. I have said it to many people and I say it here: every Christian should read this book. It is a perfect fictional example of how Christ can change anyone and of how believers should relate to their fellow man. I have even given it as a wedding present, considering it an excellent guide to living selflessly for another person. I challenge people to read it and see if they are not in some way changed.
A Contrarian View of Les Mis 
Oh,I think that those of you who swoon over this novel, for reasons that I fail to comprehend completely , will not take my comments kindly.
While I grant that Les Miserables holds a reader's attention in spite of himself, I should point out the glaring defects in this work. No, it is not the lengthy digressions. David Foster Wallace is so much more irritating in that regard. Victor Yugo's magnum octopus simply is littered with characters that are pure ideals of good, evil, misfortune, piety, etc. One cannot travel more than fifty pages without encountering some anectdote that has no resemblance to anything that ever happened on earth, outside of a moralist's mind.
Give me the near-hack writing of Balzac or even the long-windedness of Dickens with his sloppy sentimentality at times ruining his comedy. Huge-Go simply took his banal messages to humankind too seriously.
Come to think of it, maybe his pre-modern sociology mixed with romance is what so appeals to the progressive wing of modern romanticists. That and a good score and grandioso staging.
reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
In this story of the trials of the peasant Jean Valjean--a man unjustly imprisoned, baffled by destiny, and hounded by his nemesis, the magnificently realized, ambiguously malevolent police detective Javert--Hugo achieves the sort of rare imaginative resonance that allows a work of art to transcend its genre.
les miserables, miserables
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