Les Misérables

by Victor Hugo

Monsieur Myriel had to undergo the fate of every newcomer to a small town where there are plenty of tongues given to wagging and very few minds given to reflection.

‘I’ve forgotten,’ he said. When he sometimes happened to say – and who doesn’t? – ‘Oh! if I were rich!’ it was not with his eye on a pretty girl, as was the case with old Gillenormand, but in contemplation of a rare book.

Although poor, with patience and time and the sacrifices he made, he had the talent to build up a valuable collection of all kinds of rare editions. He never went out without a book under his arm and he often returned with two.

He remained the same, without the anger. He still had the same opinions; only, they had mellowed. Strictly speaking, he no longer had opinions – he had sympathies. To which party did he belong? Humanity. Among humanity he favoured France. Among the nation he favoured the people. Among the people he favoured women. That was mostly where his pity went.

The nineteenth century is poison. Take any young pipsqueak, he grows a goatee beard, thinks he’s a real somebody, and turns his back on his elderly relatives.

It should be strictly forbidden to have political opinions.

He was at that stage in life when the mind of the thinking man consists in nearly equal proportion of profundity and naivety. Given a serious situation, he had everything it takes to be stupid.

In six months the little girl had become a young woman. That was all. Nothing is more frequently encountered than this phenomenon. There is a moment when girls blossom in the twinkling of an eye, and all at once become roses. You left them yesterday as children, you come back today and find them disquieting.

That first glance of a soul as yet unknown to itself is like dawn breaking in the sky. It is the awakening of something resplendent and strange. Nothing can convey the dangerous charm of that unexpected glimmering that all of a sudden vaguely illuminates an enchanting darkness, and that comprises all present innocence and all future passion. It is a sort of undefined tenderness in waiting that accidentally reveals itself. It is a trap that innocence unwittingly lays, in which it catches hearts without intending to, and without knowing it. It is a virgin with a woman’s gaze.

It was indeed serious. Marius was at that delightful and fervent initial stage that marks the beginning of great passions. One look had achieved all this. When explosives have been laid in the mine, when the fire is ready to be lit, nothing is simpler. A look is a kindling spark. And that was it. Marius loved a woman. His destiny was entering on the unknown.

Bodies huddle together in misery, as they do in the cold, but hearts grow apart. There was every indication this woman must have loved this man as much as she was capable of loving, but probably, in the mutual, daily accusations of blame for the dreadful hardship weighing on the whole family, that had been extinguished. She had nothing left for her husband but cinders of affection. Yet, as is often the case, endearments had survived. Her lips spoke the words ‘dearest’, ‘sweetheart’, ‘my pet’ and so forth, while her heart remained silent.