The Les Misérables Reading Companion

So they look for any sign that they have support beyond the walls of the barricade, even though by now, hope is slim.

It’s a game of timing: will their food and ammunition hold out long enough for enough of the people to rise up to face the army?

But the pressures on a barricaded section of the city are those we’ve already seen: assault from a vastly larger force outside, and limited resources inside.

That’s why they build barricades: to hold a position until more people join their cause.

What insurrectionists hope for in an uprising like this is that more and more people will join them, and they’ll gradually come to occupy enough of the city to be able to make demands.

Reading Les Misérables in 2025, a chapter a day: November 7, Part V, Book 1, Chapter 13, “Lueurs qui passent” 👇

But Hugo doesn’t let us take courage from this on behalf of our insurgents: they’re vastly outnumbered and outarmed. Fannicot and his men will be easily replaced.

And, predictably, it’s not a very competent attack. Individualism is no good in a military situation like this, and Fannicot shows us why.

This least worthy of cultures, then, where armies fight to defend piles of money rather than either the king or the people, is the one attacking the barricade.

Early in his life, Hugo critiqued this as a pale reflection of the noble values of the past, but by the time he wrote Les Misérables, he was more inclined to critique it as unworthy of the future that Enjolras described a few days ago.

One of the biggest changes that the 19th century brought to France, which might go unnoticed to us today as it’s the water we’re swimming in, was an individualistic, capitalistic culture where power came from money, not noble birth.

The topic is MUCH larger than the length of the passage would suggest: the dominant culture in France in this period.

The first part of this short chapter is a bit like a mini digression, here in the middle of the action.

Reading Les Misérables in 2025, a chapter a day: November 6, Part V, Book 1, Chapter 12, “Le désordre partisan de l'ordre” 👇

He helps save the lives of the men behind the barricade, at least for a bit longer, but he also saves the enemy’s rooftop spies – from what anyone else would likely have done.

Unlike Le Cabuc, who took the insurrection as a chance to kill with impunity (or so he thought), Jean Valjean refrains from killing, even when it might have been excused, at least by Enjolras.

And, he uses his powers heroically. A few chapters ago, he was called “a man who saves others,” and that continues here, even as he defends the barricade.

He’s also remarkably strong, has an astounding tolerance for pain, is a social chameleon, has the ingenuity of MacGyver, and is generally super smart.

Jean Valjean really is kinda like a superhero. Impossibly accurate aim with two different unfamiliar 19th-century firearms is only one of his superpowers.

Reading Les Misérables in 2025, a chapter a day: November 5, Part V, Book 1, Chapter 11, “Le coup de fusil qui ne manque rien et qui ne tue personne” 👇

We’ll see how these different responses serve each character. But in this moment, there’s something to be said for her resilience.

Now, we could talk about how she’s pushing away a whole bunch of evidence. But from another point of view, we could say that she’s filling in her information gaps with optimism.

Where Jean Valjean was troubled by his mind’s resistance to seeing reality via the blotter reflected in the mirror, Cosette takes her hope as a certainty.

Where Marius fell into despair at their separation, she sees it as temporary – it MUST be, they love each other so.

Her relationship to recent events is compared more or less explicitly to both Jean Valjean’s and Marius’s, and she, arguably, handles them the best.

But leaving aside all of that, we do see some of her buoyant spirit here: her bouts of sadness don’t last, and she maintains hope that she will see Marius again.

And he imagines Cosette – who has been through some things, and whom he’s described as intrepid and seeing her beauty as a weapon – afraid of her own unclothed reflection in the mirror because of her extreme virginity. 🙄🙄

He spends a page telling you all the things he mustn’t tell you, and that a man (which he is) mustn’t even see or know, about the interior of a young girl’s bedroom and morning routine. 🙄

We’ve noted many an occasion in this book when Hugo is strikingly ahead of his time, and seems to exhibit types of thinking that would not be theorized for decades after him. The way he discusses Cosette here is not one of those.

Reading Les Misérables in 2025, a chapter a day: November 4, Part V, Book 1, Chapter 10, “Aurore” 👇