Crossing My Finish Line

----Well, that's it. Happily ever after all around. So, some clerical stuff:

• I highly recommend this book or at least the soundtrack of the musical. It's stuck in my head as I type this.
• The movie was mediocre. I haven't yet actually seen the musical, so I can't say what I think of it.
• If you're going to read the book, at least two sentences per page are in French. You can ignore them, Google for translations or ask your friends what they mean. Never fear, the important stuff is translated in footnotes.
• Like most ridiculously long novels, some stuff is only there because the author got paid by the word. Don't be afraid to skim or skip some chapters entirely.
• And don't be afraid to ignore the words in English you don't know- at least three per page, for me.
• I am now obsessed with the history of France.
• I read the unabridged version, which is a major timesink. Altogether enjoyable, yes, but if you go into a panic attack at the sight of long books, this isn't for you.
• Somehow it reminds me of The Outsiders and Romeo and Juliet. Like The Outsiders, there's lots of fighting, emotions, and gangs, and like Romeo and Juliet, two of the main characters are starstruck lovers and quite dumb.

----That's about it, I guess. This is my last official entry that will be graded. I'm not actually certain if I will maintain the blog after this. It all depends on if I find some good books and have enough time.

----Thanks for listening. Au revoir.

Hypothetical Cast List

Valjean- Finally, a main character who was easy to cast! Jean Valjean would be Viggo Mortensen, best known for being Aragorn from Lord of the Rings. There's no logical explanation except for looking at his photo and comparing it to his dialogue in the book. They just inexplicably match.

Cosette- Hands down, Robin Wright. She was the one who did Jenny in Forrest Gump and Buttercup in The Princess Bride. Her character is one of those pointless people whose only purpose in the story is to be a motivation. That's true, everyone she knows is "motivated" to die or almost die- Fantine, Marius, Valjean, Eponine...

Javert- Mostly because of the awesome clip here (http://vodpod.com/watch/601270-neil-patrick-harris-and-jason-segal-sing-confrontation-from-les-miserables) I think Neil Patrick Harris is an excellent choice for Javert. He nailed the facial expressions and looks perfect.

Fantine- Not just because she's otherwise amazing, Idina Menzel rocks this role because she's tough and pretty. Like most of the other characters here, Fantine is dying, angry, and without hope.

Marius- Ben Barnes. He is best known for his role as Prince Caspian. He's got the face, the eyes, the hair, everything. Actually, Marius and Caspian are quite similar.

Thenardier- Cunning, greedy, and as evil as normal people can get, this one is for Mandy Patinkin (Inigo Montoya, the "you killed my father, prepare to die" guy from The Princess Bride). Mandy Patinkin is good at looking totally rock-bottom desperate, something Thenardier is all the time.

Eponine- Don't jump to conclusions here- Amy Adams. Don't get the mental picture of her in Enchanted, she's like a waking dream in that one, but look at the other pictures of her. Eponine is tough and heartbroken, something Amy Adams does well.

Gavroche-Okay, so there are very few good not-quite-teenaged male actors in the world. In fact, exactly one- Skandar Keynes, who was Edmund Pevensie in the Chronicles of Narnia. He even looks the part- defensive, clever, and resourceful.

Enjolras- This is the guy who sacrificed himself to the firing squad at the barricade: William Moseley, who played Peter in The Chronicles of Narnia. Plus, he has blond hair and seems to glow slightly, which is Enjolras' most distinctive traits.

Epilogue

----So, to wrap up, a review of how each character ends the book:

• Marius- of course, he miraculously recovers and marries Cosette. They live happily ever after.


• Cosette- finally gets to marry her beloved but brainless Marius. She inherits her father's millionaire status as a dowry.


• Thenardier- moves to Panama with his family. He becomes a slave trader in keeping with his character.


• The Bishop- I'm not sure if I said this yet, but he dies in his sleep about seven hundred pages ago.


• Eponine- already died a glorious death. Rest in peace.


• Enjolras- ditto.


• Marius' other college friends- died in the barricade.


• Gavroche- died in the barricade while singing at the top of his lungs.


• Fantine- died a while ago, but she is still revered by Valjean.


• Fauchelevant- died of old age in the convent.


• And Valjean... well, he died peacefully in his home at age eighty. Marius and Cosette are there to say goodbye, but first, he gives them the two silver candlesticks the Bishop gave him so long ago. He never sold them for money as the Bishop suggested but kept them through all the times he moved. Jean Valjean is buried, as per his request, in an isolated, overgrown part of the cemetary, with the following epitaph (translated courtesy of a site called Classic Bookshelf I am somehow unable to link to):
• He sleeps. Although his fate was very strange, he lived. He died when he no longer had his angel [Cosette]. The thing came to pass, simply, of itself, as the night comes when day is gone.

That, my friends, is my favorite book ever. Yes, I finally decided on one!

Javert's Predicament

----Javert, feeling that he owes Valjean for sparing his life earlier, permits the prisoner to drop Marius' almost corpse at the grandfather's house. He also detours to his own house, to say goodbye and pack his things. Then, while he's inside, Javert slips away and stands alone in the night beside the river. The stars are multiplied in the troubled water.
----What to do? Letting Valjean go is a crime against the law; he is a convict breaching parole, after all. But to take him back to jail, that's a crime against his conscience. This man has saved his life on numerous occasions now. Does Valjean's constant goodness cancel out whatever crimes he may have performed in a past life?
----The law or the human? Which is more often right? Which is right... right now?
----Javert the pure, Javert the good, Javert the model citizen, is terrified of breaking the law. Any law, no matter who ordains it. He can't sin against the law he worships and he can't sin against his own conscience which has always been right before. There is no way he can go on.
----Javert was a star, bright, pure, and idolized by many. This star joins the rest in the water but soon slips beneath the black surface. Javert is dead.

THE Most Epic Scenes Ever!!!

----First of all, this gives away most of the rest of the book. Sorry.

----So Marius and his friends are desperately fighting for their lives in the barricade. And I have to give you the play-by-play here just because it's so awesome. Enjolras, the rebels' charismatic leader, has longish blond hair, green eyes, and a passion for his cause, quite like Luke Skywalker actually. But their side is losing and he suddenly grasps that they are doomed. Enjolras orders a retreat, in order to save as many men as possible from the oncoming torrent of enemy soldiers. But it's too late. He is caught, and then the scene becomes one of those classic episodes we nerds, actors, and gamers love- the epic death.
----Enjolras, the underappreciated hero, stands in the corner of an old shop, the only building left intact. When the soldiers break down the door, they see him there in all his resplendence-- behind the billiard table, standing up very straight, with clear eyes and level chin. This is the only soldier who has emerged from the battle without a scratch. Still really only a child, so much potential and beauty is still there, uncorrupted. He delicately lays down his rifle. "Shoot me."
----He refuses the offered blindfold, preferring to stare them down to the last. He knows that death is okay when it makes a point. To die in vain or die to support your cause- that's the real question.
----A breeze abruptly wanders through the broken window, ruffling Enjolras's blond hair. The morning sun shines in too, giving him a halo. An enemy officer remarks in a low voice of the resemblance to Apollo. It's just after dawn. Paris is still asleep. No one knows nor cares about one boy and his heroism.
----The gun's loud report rents the air. Enjolras remains standing, pinned against the wall, but bows his head, shaggy blond hair getting in his eyes. The end has begun.

----Inspector Javert, being chronically unlucky, has been caught by the rebels while attempting to spy on them. They tie him up, but Valjean, volunteering for their cause, offers to execute him for them. He takes the inspector to a dark alley (trite and ominous, right?) but instead of a gun, pulls out a knife. Javert comments on how this is more the convict's style, but Valjean isn't finished. He saws throught the ropes binding Javert and lets him go. WHAT? Valjean just turned Javert loose and gave him his current address? Javert, the one who has doggedly pursued Valjean for the past nine years? Wow. That's all I can say.
----Marius, meanwhile, is showing off just how much he is like Romeo. They're both so brainless! Also, miscommunication was both of their demises.
----Cosette is forced to move to their other house by her father, who still doesn't know of her love for Marius. Devastated, Marius slips into depression and wanders into the barricade. He picks up a gun and starts randomly firing.
----Marius finds himself being shot at, point blank, by an enemy soldier. But... what's this?... a boy jumps in front of him and stops the musket ball with his hand. It tears through, but Marius' life is saved. And then- get this- Marius thinks nothing of it! He's still so obsessed with Cosette that he barely notices his narrow escape and walks away! Um, wow. He's either really dim or really in love. Possibly both.
----Eventually he realizes that "oh, really? Someone saved my life? Gee, who could that have been?" He sees that same boy lying on the pavement and kneels down next to him. Wait, it's Eponine, dressed up as a boy! She's dying of the wounds she sustained for Marius, who, by the way, is so in love with someone else that he barely notices. Eponine, in excruciating pain, is only comforted by Marius' presence. The life finishes slipping out like the wet blood staining her shirt.
----And then... and then...
----Marius leans down, serene amidst the gunfire, and gently kisses her waxy forehead. "This was not infidelity to Cosette; it was a thoughtful and gentle farewell to an unhappy soul."
----After this episode, Marius is completely unprepared when he is knocked unconcious by a beam hitting his head. And I, the reader, am completely unprepared when Jean Valjean swoops in to save the day yet again (although I should be getting used to that by now, he's always conviently in the right place at the right time) and carries Marius over his shoulder four miles through the dank labrynthine sewer system. He's an old man now, in his seventies. Seventies!
----Finally, he makes his way out by bribing Thenardier, who is guarding the entrance and doesn't recognize him. But he does find Javert. Come on, is there no relief?

My Favorite Scene

----The barricade.
----Law students, thirty or forty of them. All running confusedly through the filthy portion of city street about twice the size of the school gym they've barricaded off with heaps of garbage, chairs, old mattresses.
----Most of them have never held a gun before, and now here they are, brandishing borrowed (read: stolen) muskets and sabres with the bravado they think they should have. This is war; they're rebelling against authority, monarchy, the economic system, poverty... every single person in this world is sick and tired of their misery. Something's gotta give, change will come.
----The tension has boiled over. It's ten at night, the stars are bright, and each man, left to his own devices, trapped in this death chamber he himself constructed, is moodily swinging between patriotic passion and selfish regret. But they don't fear death. I don't blame them. We're going to die anyway; if it comes down to furthering a cause I love or moaning about it at home, I know the choice I'll make.
----But it's hard to remember that choice here. Musket balls fly in an impenetrable horizontal plane, explosions rock the ground, cough on the smoke, food ran out 24 hours ago, got no sleep last night. Gun jams under enemy fire, paving stones piled in a heap next to the bodies, hands crusted in someone else's blood, no leadership, our flag is the ragged coat of the first man to die, can't hear myself think, no functional weapons left, attack with broken glass bottles, lost an arm, hurts so bad, whack my head on a falling beam, window shatters, duck for cover, can't find my friends, dirt smeared on his face, curled up in a cellar, don't know anyone's name, a child is singing somewhere, Paris is indifferent to us... me... my family, who won't be able to find me, identify the body, no hope... locked in to the barricade, no escape, they'll breach the wall sooner or later, only a matter of time, two a.m., no sleep, battle still raging, screaming, yelling, running, can't run anymore, lungs crushed...
----That, my friends, is the barricade where Marius is fighting.

Next Generation

----Right. I'm going to skim over vast portions of my book, so jump in and try to keep up.


----Marius has become friends with a group called Les Amis de L'ABC, which means Friends of the ABC, or, a bilingual pun, Friends of the Abased, oppressed. They're a group of law students who are ready for a Revolution.


----Marius falls in love with a beautiful girl, Cosette. Due to her father's vigilance Cosette is forced to move away. Marius (and I'm not sure if this is scary or sweet) follows her around, snooping and asking questions until finally he finds out where she lives. However, he only gets this information with the help of Eponine, the Thernardiers' daughter, who is now grown up and has a crush on Marius. He and Cosette eventually meet up and realize they're soulmates. They sit in the twilight garden, laughing and murmuring to one another. Aaaawww...


----But then we leave their Eden and watch as, little by little, the Paris underworld is revealed. Here live the wretched creatures who once were human but now are filthy misshapen writhing beings who roll in squalor. And there are things more sinister- the worst of the gangs is the Patron-Minette, an unstoppable, famous, infamous group of the most evil beings who are as far from human as you can get. Their leader is... come on, you knew you'd be seeing him again... Thernardier. He tried to attack Valjean, who is operating under a different name now. Unfortunately for him, Thernardier and the rest of his gang go to prison but soon easily escape.


----The last character we've recently met is Gavroche, a street urchin around twelve years old. He's actually the abandoned child of Madame Thenardier who was kicked out when he was young. Anyway, he's out in the pouring rain when he sees two little boys, aged eight and five, who are whining and crying. They got separated from their wealthy mother (a relative of Marius') and have no idea what to do. So Gavroche takes the two boys into his care and they sleep in the hollow belly of an elephant statue. Sleep tight, little boys.

The Part Where We Stop Hating Marius

----So Marius, being a jerk at this point, goes through the motions of mourning and life. Then, finally, he meets the man who saw his father spying on him. He is completely moved, and, having never known anything about his father before, starts reading the chronicles of what happened in the war. With growing pride and adoration for his father, his patriotism grows. Over about a month, Marius becomes a passionate radicalist Republican. He loves his country dearly, and his father even more. But he misses him now.
----Soon Guillenormand, the grandfather, finds out about Marius's conversion. He is outraged because he hates the father and thinks the monarchy was a lot better than this Napoleon zealot. He and Marius end up in a huge screaming confrontation where people's faces turn red, purple, and black, but that's not important. The best part of the whole scene, in my opinion, is Marius's line, which made me stop hating him and bumped him into being my new favorite character. The grandfather says:
--"...What does this mean?"
--Marius coloured slightly, and answered:
--"It means I am my father's son."
--M. Gillenormand checked his laugh, and said harshly:
--"Your father; I am your father."
--[Focus, this is my favorite part!] "My father," resumed Marius with downcast eyes and stern manner, "was a humble and heroic man, who served the republic and France gloriously, who was great in the greatest history that men have ever made, who lived a quarter of a century in the camp, by day under grape and under balls [artillary fire], by night in the snow, in the mud, and in the rain, who captured colours, who received twenty wounds, and who had but one fault; that was in losing too dearly two ingrates, his country and me."
----Aaaawwww! How sweet! But M. Gillenormand is deeply insulted and tells his grandson to "be off." He will send money every so often but never speak of him again.
----Poor Marius hits the road with some money, a few clothes in a bag, and his watch. He doesn't even have his father's note anymore; Gillenormand burned it. Then comes perhaps the most hopeless, accurate line in the book-
--"What was Marius to do?"

Marius Pontmercy

----I may have already mentioned that time in my book doesn't proceed in a nice linear fashion. It's more of a tangled bowl of spaghetti where you double back within people's flashbacks and are never quite sure what year, generation, or even century we are talking about. That said, don't blame me for the out of chronological order posts; I am merely summarizing in the order the author has written.
----Now, after Baron Colonel Pontmercy gave up his baby son to M. Guillenormand, life didn't go so well. The son, Marius, was educated as an apathetic aristocrat. He was nice enough, but snobby, knew nothing of the real world and was rather a spoiled lapdog in his grandfather's home. A decent person.
----One day, he gets a message: his father is dying. Having heard his grandfather's version of the dad, Marius only goes because it is expected. He doesn't care for his dad, has never met him, and thinks he's a scumbag for abandoning him. But when he reaches the house, Colonel Pontmercy is already dead! The son receives a note from his father, written in the last day:
----"For my son.- The emperor made me a baron upon the battlefield of Waterloo. Since the Restoration contests this title which I have bought with my blood, my son will take it and bear it. I need not say that he will be worthy of it. At this same battle of Waterloo, a sergeant saved my life. This man's name is Thenardier. Not long ago, I believe he was keeping a little tavern in a village in the suburbs of Paris, at Chelles or at Montfermeil. If my son meets him, he will do Thenardier all the service he can."
----Marius is completely unmoved by the request of a man he's never seen before who's dead now anyway. He tucks the note into his pocket, but only out of respect for the dead. He forgets his father and goes back to his grandfather.

The Pontmercys

----Scratch the "happy ending" bit. I'm not even halfway through, so we'll be seeing those two again. But until then, we've met a whole new family.
----Monsieur Guillenormand is a grumpy, crotchety, frivolous old man. He manages to be crude and off-color while still having a penchant for fine things. In short, he's a repulsive ninety year old who's filthy rich and always gets his way.
----He has two daughters. The eldest, his favorite, never married and still lives with him. His younger daughter married Monsieur Pontmercy, a soldier. Pontmercy is a war hero general who fought, under the guidance of Emporer Napoleon, to overthrow the crushing monarchy (Marie Antoinette, Reign of Terror, guillotines, all that fun stuff). Anyway, he is so good he was promoted to Baron and Colonel on the same night.
----However, he is hit in the grid of cannon fire and falls unconcious on the ground, buried beneath the other cadavers (yuck!). But in the dead of night, a lone figure crouches on the ground in front of him and gingerly slips his hand in Baron Pontmercy's pocket, looking for valuables. In doing so, he brings Pontmercy back to conciousness, when he surely would have died. Pontmercy, ever the gentleman, is extremely grateful and asks for his accidental rescuer's name. The answer? Thernardier. THAT Thernardier!
----Baron Colonel Pontmercy recovers and returns home, wishing to use his rightfully earned titles, but since he fought on the unpopular team, no one else will acknowledge them. He has a son and names him Marius, but because of a stupid inheritance matter, M. Guillenormand takes the son and excommunicates the father. The Baron's wife, M. Guillenormand's least favorite daughter, dies shortly after having Marius.
----Alone, angry, and confused, Baron Pontmercy retires to a house in the country and spends his days tending the flowers while shutting out flashbacks of heroism long gone on the battlefield. But he has one comfort- sometimes he sneaks out to watch his son at church. No one sees him except for an old man in the balcony. He grows old and sickly. His hair is white, the end is near, and he still has never met his own son!

Happiness

----Yet another excellent ending point. Valjean and Cosette are accepted into the convent, Valjean as a gardener and Cosette as a student in the boarding school. Peace and order are restored; both Valjean and Cosette are on the path to healing. The convent is peaceful and holy, just what he's wanted his whole life. And they all lived happily ever after...

Welcome To The Convent

----Having been cornered in a Paris alley by Javert and his cronies (who have figured out that Valjean is alive), Valjean scales a building with Cosette and lands in the back garden of a convent. The problem is, the nuns in this convent are super discriminated against men, are sticklers for ritual and self-denial, and are so extreme in their beliefs they are almost a cult. (If anyone's read Percy Jackson, these nuns are like the Hunters of Artemis, only older and more extreme.) So Valjean and the illegitimate child aren't welcome.

----But here to save the day is Fauchelevant, an elderly gardener whose life Valjean once saved. He tells the Mother Superior that his brother, aka Valjean, and his niece are coming to help with the garden work, and she reluctantly agrees to let them stay. However, Valjean is stuck in the back garden, and needs to come in through the front door to be believed. He can't sneak through the building, so he and Fauchelevant hatch a plan.

----Cosette will hide in a basket and be delivered by the gardener to a safe place until she is needed. Valjean, being six foot something, is harder, and ends up hiding in an empty coffin during a funeral parade. Fauchelevant distracts the gravedigger, but only after several shovelfuls of earth have already been dug. He opens the coffin; Jean Valjean is pale and his eyes are closed, causing Fauchelevant to launch into a two page monologue about the briefness of life.

----But then he looks down, and... Valjean's eyes are open! " To behold death is terrifying, and to see a sudden restoration is nearly as much so. Fauchelevant became cold and white[...] not knowing whether he had the living or the dead to deal with, stared down at Jean Valjean, who in turn stared at him.
----"I was falling asleep," said Jean Valjean."

----Understatement of the year! Valjean, you scared me!
----Although, I guess I should know better than to panic. Heroes are given epic deaths; no one cares about a character who dies quietly without dialogue or thoughts divulged to the reader. We didn't read his mind, so he wouldn't have died. Still.... yikes!

I Love That Word, Ponder

----"The best of a book is not the thought which it contains, but the thought which it suggests; just as the charm of music dwells not in the tones but in the echoes of our hearts."- Oliver Wendell Holmes.
----I once read in a writer's manual that theme is very rarely stated implicitly, except in fables. You have to think, and reread, and ponder, (I love that word, ponder) to divine the meaning, and even then, it isn't a sharp clean sentence with capitals and punctuation. The meaning of a story is an idea, and a feeling associated with it, like Crime-anger. The "angry" tag accompanying the image of a burglar can be taken several different ways: is the criminal angry? Is the victim angry? Are the passersby angry? Theme, and the meaning of a book, are often vague, cloudy images with feeling tags like you get when awaking from a fast-fading dream. This goes with the quote because the contained thoughts are usually semipermanent, but the implied things which you have to think about are forever. I can't remember any names or even the plot of Fahrenheit 451, but I can still wrap myself in the terror and clear messages which are intensified by passing through the mind. After an idea goes through your own mind, translates into your vernacular, and becomes relevant to you, it's so much more potent that a series of smeary small print.
----This quote is relevant to Les Miserables because honestly, some of the things that happen are totally irrelevant to my life. I will never do time in a French prison for stealing a loaf of bread (knock on wood), and I won't escape into a secluded convent to care for a little girl. But the themes are the same. What the righteous priest told Valjean about redemption and second chances is absolutely, one hundred percent useful to 21st century teens. The sacrifices Valjean made to care for Cosette and Fantine are examples to any father or parent today. It doesn't matter what the characters did or where they went, it matters why. These people we are allowed to see transparently are test cases and experiments for us; they show us why we do what we do and what happens if we do so.

The Thernardiers

----Valjean escapes from prison! Ha! And this time, he's presumed dead, so he won't be pursued.

----Anyway, he still feels like he owes Fantine, so he goes to pick up her daughter, Cosette. When he arrives in Paris at the inn where she lives, he changes into a tramp's outfit. He always pretends to be a tramp, but is way too generous with money. Way to blow your cover!
----Once inside, he meets M. and Mme. Thernardier, who should be addressed independently.
----Monsieur Thernardier is a short, thin, sickly, brilliant, conniving, greedy little man. He reminds me of Vizzini from the Princess Bride. He is deep in debt and charges the inn's patrons for every little thing to try to pay it off.
----Madame Thernardier is an ogre: square, red, beefy, bossy, abusive, and masculine. She lavishes money on her two daughters, Eponine and Azelma, but completely ignores the bawling of her baby son. What a nice woman.
----And finally, Cosette. She's eight years old, but looks no more than six. She is made to do all the chores, Cinderella-style, is dressed in rags, and goes barefoot, even in winter. In short, she's completely miserable.
----Valjean is in the inn, pretending to nibble some bread and cheese while really (and quite obviously) watching Cosette. After paying Madame Thernardier for Cosette to play (yeah!), he watches her pick up a cast-off doll of Eponine's. Of course, Mme. Thernardier is outraged and orders the child to put down the doll and beats her soundly. Without a word, Valjean leaves. All hope seems to be lost.
----Until he walks back in, holding a doll! A beautiful lifelike doll, clothed in a pink linen dress, with real auburn hair and green glass eyes! "Here, this is for you," he says, presenting the ridiculously expensive doll delicately to the incredulous Cosette. He sits back and watches lovingly as she hesitantly begins to play with her new and only friend, who she names Catharine. The Thernardier family is stunned and watches jealously; the doll is worth about half of M. Thernardier's debt. Yes!
----Later, Valjean is wandering the house while everyone else is asleep. He finds Cosette's tiny form sleeping in the even tinier space under the stairs (like all child heroes, Harry Potter for one.) She's so sad, lying there with the spiders, he feels compelled to do something.
----I would also like to add that the last time Valjean watched someone sleep, his life changed dramatically. He was contemplating the bishop and how holy and childlike he looked in sleep. A very old man, gentle and kind, looks even older, gentler, and kinder unconscious. This was when Valjean first became intent on good. He was a good person all his life and didn't go looking for trouble, but after meeting the bishop, he had to be proactively good too. This time, as he watches Cosette, he changes again. He realizes he needs desperately to guard this tiny angel, and that she will in turn help him. He still loves Fantine as a sister, and not just wants, but needs to take care of her child, as a fatherly instinct. It's so sweet, because he's never, ever had love before, and it feels amazing.
----So, to get his peaceful vengeance on the Thernardiers for their inhuman treatment of the butterfly Cosette, Jean Valjean creeps into the main room, where in front of the hearth are three small pairs of shoes, for it is Christmas eve. In France, the children put their shoes out to be filled by Perre Noel as we put out stockings for Santa Claus. In Eponine and Azelma's fancy white shoes are each a silver coin, one franc. Cosette's shoe, however, is empty. Valjean stealthily draws out from the depths of his threadbare jacket a gold louie piece and drops it into her muddy clog. He has just given her the family's income for a month. Ha! Poetic justice strikes again!
----In the morning, Valjean negotiates with M. Thernardier to take Cosette, finally presenting a signed letter from her mother. He takes the oblivious child and they set out, walking in the cold, with Cosette clutching Catharine. We watch them go, two backs shrinking in the distance. The book could even end here; both of them are at peace, and heading towards a new, happy life.
----But if we turn around, back to the Thernardier's grimy window, we see M. Thernardier himself, scowling as they go. He knows more money is there for the taking, more than enough to settle his urgent debts and support the family for life. He takes it upon himself to keep an eye on the pair, who are his key to the gates of Easy Street. Duhn duhn duhn...

* "I didn't MEAN to kill her..."

----Jean Valjean, the esteemed mayor, rushes to Arras, knowing only that the trial for the other Valjean is sometime in the evening. Despite all odds, he arrives.
----He stands in the front of the room, just behind the judge, with all the other government officials. He has been so stressed this past twenty-four hours, his hair has turned from grey to white, matching his complexion of terror. He hasn't eaten or slept since leaving his town, which might have contributed to his reasoning. He had planned, since leaving home, to give himself away and announce his identity as Jean Valjean. But I wonder if he might not have gone through with that plan had he been fully functioning. Anyway, he betrays himself, causes a tremendous ruckus, and tells the judge where to find him before returning home.
----The crazy thing was, all during this first trip, things kept going wrong. The cart wheel broke, the horse was exhausted, the repairman couldn't fix the wagon before morning. And every time, Valjean thinks, "It's okay now. I don't have to go to Arras, this was just a test to see if I actually would. I tried, so I passed the test, and this is just a sign that it's all over." But then something happens to fix it, and Valjean pretends to be happy. He's racing the horse towards his torture.
----Back at home, Fantine thinks Valjean has gone to fetch Cosette. When Valjean visits her, she is thrilled that her daughter is here, but Valjean hasn't given either of them a thought since before he departed. Now she's hours away from death and demanding to see her daughter when....
----Javert walks in. Oh, the irony.
----He's intent on arresting Valjean, who, now that he's outed, knew it was only a matter of time. But Jean doesn't want this drama in front of someone so fragile as Fantine. But Javert barges in anyway, yelling horrible things at Jean, only Fantine thinks he's come to arrest her, since she doesn't know the mayor is an ex-convict. She's so terrified by this that she suddenly starts twitching and convulsing and writhing, paper white, on the hospital bed...
----And she dies believing her beloved long-lost daughter is waiting in the next room.
----Jean is furious that Javert killed her (although in the inspector's defense, she had only hours to go, anyway) and insists on saying a prayer over her before he leaves, threatening the reluctant inspector with a metal bar to get his way. He kneels by the virtually empty bed, kisses the pure in heart criminal woman's waxy hand, and then stands up, ready to accompany Javert back to the place he wanted most to leave.
----Emotion overload. A smile comes through the tears like a sun through rain, projecting a beautiful rainbow.

Now What?

----It's two a.m. Valjean, not the mayor, is awake, pacing his bedroom.
----Should he go to Arras, to the trial of the man accused of bearing Valjean's name? As a repeat offender, Jean would be sentenced to the galleys for life. The galleys, I should mention, are the place he hates most in this world- and Valjean, having met the bishop, doesn't hate easily. That's where he suffered the most abuse, the most pain, the most hopelessness. He doesn't want to go back.
----But leaving the other man to suffer is robbery- the theft of a life. Going himself would mean staying innocent. All he has wanted, since his prison sentence ended, was to be a new man, and he has accomplished that. Everyone but Javert loves him and doesn't want to believe their mayor was once a criminal. He had cleared the old life, left it all behind... and now some old prisoners had to recognize the criminal as Jean Valjean. Come on, is there any fairness here?
----So Valjean waits. The trial isn't for a few more days; he has time to make up his mind. He takes "precautionary measures:" checking maps, asking if there is a horse fast enough to take him. But he doesn't actually do anything.
----Stay or go? Stay or go? Now what?

Javert

----We have met Inspector Javert once before, but he deserves a better introduction. So:
----Javert is the chief of police, obsessed with "justice," except his version of justice goes by the letter of the law, which quite harsh at the time. As Portia from The Merchant of Venice put it, "And earthly powers doth then show likest God's when mercy seasons justice."[emphasis mine]. He is so wrapped up in justice that he forgets to imitate divine justice, which includes quite a bit of mercy. We are only creatures of soil, after all. We cannot be punished as if we know better.
----After the incident with Fantine and Mayor Madeleine, Javert is outraged and humiliated. The mayor had encroached on his domain and embarrassed him. So he writes a letter to the Chief Inspector in Paris.
----In this letter, he outlines a suspicion he has been incubating for years- that Monsieur Madeleine is Jean Valjean. He has seen the way the mayor lifted a full cart off a man, a feat only one man could do- a convict in prison, years ago. The limp, the way of speaking, the timeline- everything matches up.
----But then Javert receives a reply. The Chief Inspector says Jean Valjean has been caught stealing apples and claims his name is Champmathieu, not knowing anything about this "Jean."
----Javert outlines all this to Mayor Madeleine, the real Valjean, who feigns indifference until Javert, only following his policy of perpetual justice, asks to be dismissed. Fired. Relieved of his post. His hypercritical justice before isn't so bad as long as it applies also to himself.
----The mayor refuses, claiming Javert's intended unfounded libel was 'only human.' Finally, Javert agrees to stay in his post until a replacement can be found.
----I love and hate this character. He tries so hard for perfectly exact justice, it's funny. He's obsessed with it, day and night. I can see where he comes from; Law is in place for a reason. But sometimes there comes along someone who is a special case. Fantine's illegal occupation had a motive, just as Valjean's did. They were both selfless crimes. So blindly sentencing is a bad idea.
----But then, how can you know for certain the motives? How can you know if the person regrets their actions and has made a profound commitment to act for good? Things like that are so easy to fake, part of every acting student's curriculum, just some tears and blubbering about eternity and the greater good... (sigh.) Yes. It's better to be Javert than to be taken advantage of.

Fantine

----We're in downtown Paris, several years before. A frazzled young mother, Fantine, is holding a beautiful child by the hand. She passes an inn, where two equally cute children are being cuddled by their mother. Fantine, sick and tired of trying to care for a child, promptly drops her daughter, Cosette, off with the woman- Madame Thernardier. She sends money every so often to care for her, like child support.

----Unknown to Fantine, Cosette is treated like Cinderella. She is made to do all the chores, treated like a slave, blah blah blah.

----Meanwhile, Fantine moves into Jean Valjean's town. (He is acting under a different name, Monsieur Madeleine, to keep from the prejudice against ex-convicts.) She works at the jewelry factory until someone realizes she has had a child out of wedlock, and she is fired. Fantine is bitter towards the mayor, Valjean, because she thinks he is responsible for her financial ruin.

----She goes downtown, racks up a debt, sells her hair and front teeth, and becomes a woman of ill repute all for her darling Cosette, who she hasn't seen in years. The Thernardiers are sending letters asking for more money, falsely claiming that her daughter is sick and needs expensive medicines.

----After a flailing altercation outside a tavern, Fantine is wrongly arrested for assault. The chief of police, Javert, lives to the letter of the law, and although he is fair, allows no mercy. He sentences her to prison for six months, which would probably kill her and Cosette, because the Thernardiers only keep her because of the money she brings. She grovels at his feet, trying to plead her case. All hope seems lost...

----And in a moment of trumpet fanfare and sunshine, in steps Mayor Madeleine, saying he saw the whole thing and politely demanding Fantine's release. Javert is forced to obey but is extremely annoyed, starting a domino reaction to be discussed in a later post. Fantine is infinitely relieved and thrilled. She brings the Mayor's hand to her lips in gratitude... and promptly passes out. That's gotta be embarrassing.

----She is rushed to the hospital (aka Valjean's basement) where she recieves around-the-clock care from some nuns. According to the doctor, her condition is deteriorating rapidly. She has always been frail, but ever since losing Cosette, her health has been bad. Mayor Madeleine (aka Jean Valjean, for those of you who didn't read the previous posts- go back and read them or nothing will make sense!) well, Mayor Madeleine stays constantly at her side, feeling responsible for her ruin- it was his factory that turned her away, after all. Throughout the illness, she keeps asking for Cosette, her darling. Valjean takes him upon himself to be her Make-A-Wish and let the mother see her daughter before she dies.

Jean Valjean

----Welcome to 1790's France. Zoom in on a small village, where a scruffy, shifty looking tramp is stumbling around, banging on doors. No one lets him in, although there are several open rooms. They have seen his yellow passport, meaning he is an ex-convict.
----This man is Jean Valjean. He was born to a poor family and orphaned very young. His older sister adopted him into her large family, but forced to the brink of starvation, Jean took on odd jobs to pay the bills. He eventually stole a loaf of bread- one measly loaf that would only feed about half of the wailing children in the house. He was arrested and sentenced to prison for five years. FIVE YEARS! For a stupid hunk of bread!
----Time passes. Jean's heart hardens. He tries to escape so many times his sentence is extended to nineteen years. His strength is legendary and superhuman.
----Fast forward. Back in the village, a kind woman points the beastly Jean Valjean to the bishop's house, the bishop, the one we read about earlier. He is welcomed into the holy man's house and spends the night.
----But, oops. Jean is still kind of a kleptomaniac and in considerable psychological distress, because he's used to being shunned, so he steals the priest's most prized possessions- silver plates and a pair of silver candlesticks, the only things of value in the entire house.
----And get this! When Valjean is forcefully returned to the bishop the next morning by a pair of police officers, the bishop officially gives the silver to him! These are his only treasures, so he tells Jean to use the money from these to become an honest man.
----Jean certainly does that. He arrives in another city (the name of which, like most places in the book, is undisclosed) and makes a fortune in the jewelry industry. He becomes mayor, is adored by his populace, and basically is kind and amazing. The end, right? Not exactly...

Les Miserables

----Well, time for another book. My choice for now is Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo. Judging by length, (1222 pages, ouch) it's highly unlikely I'll be able to finish this by the end of the project, but whatever. I can always renew it.
----The main reasons I chose this book are because the movie was amazing, and because there's a musical, the soundtrack of which I am listening to as I type this. It's entirely in French, however, so my Francophone friends are going to have to help me.
----Enough talk. I have spent the past twenty pages listening to a detailed account of a priest, Monsieur Bienvenu (whose name means Mr. Welcome, by the way). He appears to be perfect in all regards, giving most of his modest income to the poor, saving the world, and being respected by all at the same time. Actually, he reminds me of Kim's lama because he's so benevolent. He lives with his sister, who is like a very holy ghost, and his housekeeper, who is a moody white-haired grandmother. There. Twenty pages of fine print in one paragraph.
----To be honest, something's better happen soon, or I'm just abandoning this. But I have hope- the movie was good.