The Importance of Love and Compassion In Les Misérables, Hugo asserts that love and compassion are the most important gifts one person can give another and that always displaying these qualities should be the most important goal in life.

What is the main lesson of Les Misérables?

Moral Values in “Les Miserables.” Moral values in the novel “Les Miserables” are love and sincerity, forgiveness, Sacrifice, Justice/Injustice. Fantine earned less and less money from her sewing, and the Thenardiers demanded more and more money to look after Cosette.

What is the main message of Les Misérables?

The main theme of Les Miserables is social injustice. Many of the characters in the novel are victims of injustice who are unable to seek recompense through traditional channels. Jean Valjean, as a former convict, is scorned because of his mistakes.

What is the main purpose of Les Misérables?

Hugo began writing Les Misérables twenty years before its eventual publication in 1862. His goals in writing the novel were as lofty as the reputation it has subsequently acquired; Les Misérables is primarily a great humanitarian work that encourages compassion and hope in the face of adversity and injustice.

What is the moral dilemma of Les Misérables?

The moral dilemma that Valjean is faced with is brought about when the city's inspector of police, Javert, under whom Valjean had been imprisoned in the galleys, unexpectedly reveals to him both that he had suspected him of being Valjean and that he realized he was in error since a person he now believes, as he has ...

Les Mis In 60 Seconds

What message does Les Misérables try to convey to its reader?

Answer. Les Miserables (The Miserable) has relayed many valuable lessons with its sensational attack on poverty, equality, sovereignty, youth, forgiveness, and justice. In this story, it is shown that the youth are skilled and strong enough to make or initiate even the biggest of changes if they are willing to do so.

What main lesson do you take away from Les Misérables is it a convincing one?

It is it themes of hope, love, compassion, forgiveness, sacrifice, humanity and redemption that gives Les Mis this beautiful underlying spirituality. But in terms of the show itself: You learn how one person can make a huge impact of your life.

What does Fantine symbolize?

Answer and Explanation: Fantine represents the downtrodden of France. Her story shows how through no fault of her own, she experiences a series of misfortunes that eventually kill her.

What is the super summary of Les Misérables?

Overview. Les Misérables (in English, The Wretched or The Miserable Ones) is a novel by French author Victor Hugo, published for the first time in 1862. The story follows several characters through early- to mid-19th century France as they seek redemption for their sins and an escape from poverty.

What is the meaning of Les Misérables?

In the English-speaking world, the novel is usually referred to by its original French title. However, several alternatives have been used, including The Miserables, The Wretched, The Miserable Ones, The Poor Ones, The Wretched Poor, The Victims, and The Dispossessed.

Who is the most important character in Les Misérables?

Jean Valjean

He finds fulfillment in loving his adopted daughter and helping people who are in difficult situations, even when it means risking his own life and welfare. Valjean adopts pseudonyms to evade the police and combines a convict's street smarts with his newfound idealism and compassion.

What does "les miserables" mean in English?

In English, the novel's title literally translates to "the miserable ones." However, the meaning in French is more specifically about the disenfranchised, which describes most of the main characters.

What does the Cosette symbolize in Les Misérables?

She represents innocence that Jean Valjean tries desperately to protect from the cruelties of the world. Despite her difficult childhood, Cosette is kind and optimistic. When she falls in love with Marius, the two of them grow to represent hope for the future and an ultimate meaning to Jean Valjean's struggles.

Why did they take Fantine's teeth?

In the acclaimed musical and novel Les Miserables, an unmarried woman named Fantine struggles to support her daughter in 19th century France. Fantine resorts to selling her possessions, her hair, her teeth, and eventually herself in order to send more and more money to the family caring for Cosette.

What does Cosette symbolize?

However, in a novel of symbolism and metaphor, Cosette may also be seen as a symbol of hope in the world of Les Misérables, representing the rise of the oppressed and abused from darkness to a bright future.

Why should we read Les Misérables?

Les Mis is about people who struggle, who succeed, who fail, who love, who want, and the thread that connects them all is the revolutionary fever that surrounds them. Because Les Mis is so expansive and well-written, it affords you a chance to live a life, Jean Valjean's entire adult life, in your imagination.

How do Les Misérables relate to current society?

Social Injustice

Les Misérables presents an inescapable reality for its readers: government corruption can devastate those it oppresses. Victor Hugo highlights Inspector Javert's irrefutably biased perception of justice: that Jean Valjean will never redeem himself and should stay chained to his convict's past.

What does Jean Valjean symbolize?

Hardened by prison and rescued by the kindness of M. Myriel, Valjean is a blank slate, molded by his encounters and circumstances. This ability to change makes him a universal symbol of hope—if he can learn love and charity after suffering so much injustice, anyone can.

Was Valjean in love with Cosette?

Poor old Jean Valjean, of course, loved Cosette only as a father; but, as we noted earlier, into this fatherly love his lonely single status in life had introduced every other kind of love; he loved Cosette as his daughter, and he loved her as his mother, and he loved her as his sister; and, as he had never had either ...

Is Les Miserables a true story?

Answer and Explanation: While some the events in Les Miserables actually happened, the characters in the novel are fictional. The final conflict at the barricades in Les Miserables is based on the Paris Uprising of 1832, a short-lived rebellion that ended after only two days.

What does the yellow passport symbolize in Les Miserables?

The yellow passport is both a symbol of freedom and a societal prison for Jean Valjean. The French presented convicts who had served their sentence with a pass back into the real world. However the color of the passport, noting their criminal background made them social pariahs to employers and townspeople.

Why was Victor Hugo exiled?

When Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III) seized complete power in 1851, establishing an anti-parliamentary constitution, Hugo openly declared him a traitor to France. He moved to Brussels, then Jersey, from which he was expelled for supporting a Jersey newspaper that had criticised Queen Victoria.

Are Les Misérables about the French Revolution?

The films and musicals often play up the revolution portion of Les Misérables, so it's only natural that people associate it with one of France's most widely known historical events. However, Les Misérables is actually set 43 years after the French Revolution took place, during an uprising known as the June Rebellion.

Is Les Misérables a sad story?

While the show could be viewed as simply depressing — it is called “the miserables,” after all — viewers would be remiss in reducing it to just another sad story. Les Misérables is a story full of hope and the promise of a better tomorrow.

Who is the father of Fantine's baby?

Her biological dad, Felix Tholomyès, is a wealthy lawyer who abandons Cosette and Fantine when Cosette is two years old. Felix was a student who had a casual relationship with Fantine, but did not value their union outside of its physical connection.