![]() So long as there shall exist, by reason of law and custom, a social condemnation, which, in the face of civilization, artificially creates hells on earth, and complicates a destiny that is divine, with human fatality so long as the three problems of the age-the degradation of man by poverty, the ruin of women by starvation, and the dwarfing of childhood by physical and spiritual night-are not solved so long as, in certain regions, social asphyxia shall be possible in other words, and from a yet more extended point of view, so long as ignorance and misery remain on earth, books like this cannot be useless. Flaubert deemed it “infantile” and Baudelaire privately called it “tasteless and inept.” But in the preface, Hugo outlined a social purpose for his book that was greater than literary accomplishment: And the funny thing about the criticism of each successive adaption, is that it tends to focus on the new version’s faithfulness to the original, despite the fact that the novel was criticized at the time for being sentimental – unfaithful to reality itself. ![]() What demolishes the criticism, however, is its emotional forcefulness. It’s always been a big, hulking phenomenon, and it’s always had its critics. The story has traveled far since it was first published in France. ![]() Strictly speaking, Les Misérables is not a Literary Adaption it’s based on the musical, not the Victor Hugo novel. ![]()
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