My Bit

I finished Les Miserables not too long ago and should have been posting along the way because there were so many quotes and themes that would have been fun to discuss. Nonetheless, here are a few things I managed to write down.



Pg 125: "Touching illusion of the mother; Cosette was still to her a little child to be carried in the arms."

This whole situation with Fantine and her daughter was sad. I couldn't help but scream to her in my head to just make do somehow and keep Cosette with her own mother! As that was impossible, she made tremendous sacrifices and horrible choices all the while thinking it would benefit her little baby girl. Probably trying to block out the reality that her own child was living a life with someone else as a guardian and care taker. And when she thought Cosette was to be returned to her at long last, she could only imagine her as she had last seen her. I don't know.. I guess in any story I insert my own children into these horrible situations and it hurts more than it use to.



Pg 256 "For there are many great deeds done in the small struggles of life. There is a determined though unseen bravery, which defends itself foot to foot in darkness against the fatal invasions of necessity and of baseness. Noble and mysterious triumphs which no eye sees, which no renown rewards, which no flourish of trumpets salutes. Life, misfortune, isolation, abandonment, poverty are battle-fields which have their heroes; obscure heroes, sometimes greater than the illustrious heroes.
Strong and rare natures are thus created; misery, almost always a step-mother, is sometimes a mother; privations gives birth to power of soul and mind; distress is the nurse of self-respect; misfortune is a good breast for great souls."

Ah, yes, this just reminds me of all these sacrifices and hardships we (and all others) go through that may not get publicly recognized, but are what make us better people, "great souls" or even "heroes" in our own little lives.
This is obviously the theme of the whole book. Every character had there own miseries. Jean Valjean's misery brought him a greater purpose in life, and it brought him his only love, Cosette. It is through our misery that we grow strong to overcome misery. How we handle our misery is what makes us who we are. (For me, it makes me cranky and stubborn.. I should work on that.)



And then all through out the book there were little quotes that are probably embroidered on a pillow somewhere. Mr Hugo certainly had a way of observing life and capturing it in words. Here were some I wrote down:

-Pg 196 "All extreme situations have their flashes which sometimes make us blind, sometimes illuminate us.

-Pg 214 "The delight we inspire in others has this enchanting peculiarity that, far from being diminished like every other reflection, it returns to us more radiant than ever.

-Pg 215 "Laughter is sunshine; it chases winter from the human face.

Pg 215 "It cannot be denied that one of virtue's phases ends in pride. Therein is a bridge built by the Evil One."