#lm 3.3.6

[the-wraxall-illustrations]

[dolphin1812]

“ Up to that time, the Republic, the Empire, had been to him only monstrous words. The Republic, a guillotine in the twilight; the Empire, a sword in the night. He had just taken a look at it, and where he had expected to find only a chaos of shadows, he had beheld, with a sort of unprecedented surprise, mingled with fear and joy, stars sparkling, Mirabeau, Vergniaud, Saint-Just, Robespierre, Camille, Desmoulins, Danton, and a sun arise, Napoleon. He did not know where he stood. He recoiled, blinded by the brilliant lights. Little by little, when his astonishment had passed off, he grew accustomed to this radiance, he contemplated these deeds without dizziness, he examined these personages without terror; the Revolution and the Empire presented themselves luminously, in perspective, before his mind’s eye; he beheld each of these groups of events and of men summed up in two tremendous facts: the Republic in the sovereignty of civil right restored to the masses, the Empire in the sovereignty of the French idea imposed on Europe; he beheld the grand figure of the people emerge from the Revolution, and the grand figure of France spring forth from the Empire.”

Is this a pun in Marius’ political crisis

On a serious note, the flip from “darkness” to “light” here - with Napoleon being the brightest - draws on a longstanding association of light with Progress within the novel and outside of it (“enlightenment”). If to Marius (and frankly, to Hugo), the Revolution was a necessary predecessor to Napoleon and Napoleon was needed to shape modern France, then they must be light, not “twilight” and “night.” The image of him being blinded before he learns how to deal with this new information underscores how shocking this revelation was to him, understandably so given his upbringing and the emotional stakes behind his political shift.

A brief note on the issues with how both Marius and Hugo perceive Napoleon and his empire: the “sovereignty of the French idea imposed on Europe” isn’t appealing at all. Hugo has some implicit recognition of that with the choice of “imposed,” but the reverence for the “French idea” in general means that the imperialist part of empire (or France’s colonial history) isn’t really addressed in the text. To Hugo, the issue with Napoleon is the dominance of one man over the people, so the problems with empire beyond authoritarianism aren’t really touched on.

Marius, of course, has no problems with Napoleon now, having veered into complete idolization of him and of his father. While he’s sympathetic on the personal level - he’s never been exposed to this history in a positive light, and it’s not surprising that he’d want to think positively of someone who loved him so much - his mindset is dangerous. Hugo accused Marius of “fanaticism” as a royalist under Gillenormand’s tutelage, and now he accuses him of the same, but for “the sword.” While I’m skeptical of Hugo’s language here after reading the convent digression (he’s calling Marius’ belief a “religion” and saying he’s a “fanatic” in his devotion to it, which calls to mind Hugo’s more offensive opinions on religion), it’s true that Marius is now suddenly dedicating himself to Napoleon’s army and a militaristic view of history without thinking critically. To be fair, he’s never learned to think critically - this is the first time his worldview has been questioned - but his focus on violence and the military is concerning nonetheless. 

Building on the broader theme of community, we also see Marius start to think of his “country” at the same time as he thinks of his father. He still doesn’t actually interact with a broad range of people - Mabeuf is the only person outside of his family that we know he interacts with - but he is conceptualizing a broader form of community. Given that the most community he’s seen so far has been the church and the salon, the latter of which seems heavily fragmented based on titles and individual stories, his attempt to define a broader community for himself - France - is extremely significant. Marius remains alone in many ways, but at least he can imagine connections in a way he couldn’t before, even if only through a nationalist lens.

[cliozaur]

This chapter provides a good opportunity to discuss critical thinking. However, considering Marius' upbringing, it's understandable that he had no chance to develop such skills.  

While he did have a small rebellion against his grandfather, it was so subtle that M. Gillenormand remained unaware of it. The only way to sever the faint bond between Marius and his grandfather was to change Marius' political stance. Furthermore, after long years of loveless life, Marius has become obsessed with his deceased father. He passionately loves and idolizes everything about him (which reminds us of someone, doesn't it?). But where is Marius obtaining this information? We now know for sure that his “friends” were imaginary since he "did not know anyone," so no one could instruct or guide him in his pursuits. Therefore, he turns to the library and reads what is available, such as the official revolutionary, and later Napoleonic newspaper Moniteur. He becomes swept up in the propaganda, as "the first effect was to dazzle him." Marius is a self-taught political enthusiast, albeit a rather uncritical one. Additionally, he is driven by strong and novel emotions, which only intensify his fixation. While he may have learned a thing or two that could potentially be useful: “he beheld each of these groups of events [the Revolution and the Empire] and of men summed up in two tremendous facts: the Republic in the sovereignty of civil right restored to the masses, the Empire in the sovereignty of the French idea imposed on Europe; he beheld the grand figure of the people emerge from the Revolution, and the grand figure of France spring forth from the Empire.” But, of course, most of what he read was an impudent propaganda. No wonder he had an urge to shout “Long live the Emperor!” into the darkness of the night.

Hugo himself identifies Marius' biggest mistake as his failure to recognize the problem with using violence to achieve idealistic goals: “Fanaticism for the sword took possession of him, and complicated in his mind his enthusiasm for the idea. He did not perceive that, along with genius, and pell-mell, he was admitting force, that is to say, that he was installing in two compartments of his idolatry, on the one hand that which is divine, on the other that which is brutal. In many respects, he had set about deceiving himself otherwise. He admitted everything.”

Marius is in the process of discovering and exploring new emotions, going beyond mere love to much stronger variations: “on the one hand he admired, while on the other he adored,” he is also experiencing grief which is much stronger than just a grief: “Marius had a continual sob in his heart,” this feeling of loss of something he had never really had.  Poor Marius why should everything be so complicated for him?

Once again, we observe the generation gap between Marius and his grandfather. While M. Gillenormand belongs to the generation of "the first sexual revolution" and constantly thinks about his grandson's love affairs, Marius (like many characters in this novel) shows no interest in his own sexual life, at least not yet.

We finally see Marius interacting with his aunt: “When his aunt scolded him for it, he was very gentle and alleged his studies, his lectures, the examinations, etc., as a pretext.” At least he is not rude with her.

And now he is wasting his time searching for Thénardier!

[pureanonofficial]

LES MIS LETTERS IN ADAPTATION - The Consequences of Having Met a Warden, LM 3.3.6 (Les Miserables 1925)

Marius was on the high road to adoring his father.

[everyonewasabird]

Brickclub 3.3.6 ‘What it is to have met a churchwarden’

Marius radicalizes by reading the Moniteur, omfg.

The Moniteur was a government newspaper that printed the party line of whoever was in power. Rose has good footnotes explaining how each of the documents Marius reads are outright Napoleonic propaganda.

Marius isn’t Javert, but the two of them might be the only two characters in this book who ever think “Hey, Authority makes a really good point!” Honestly, it feels like a trait belonging to a certain stripe of neurodivergence they both share, and it’s a huge hurdle for each of them to get over that particular misconception. Which: mood. (To be clear, I’m not saying “the two neurodivergent characters in this book believe authority,” I’m saying “like 98% of the cast is neurodivergent, but Marius and Javert are the only two for whom that means believing authority.” :P)

Marius ended up knowing very well this rare, sublime, and gentle man, this rather lamblike lion who had been his father.

George really was a good guy and a brave and accomplished soldier who'd been maligned. Marius welds that with his ideas about Napoleon and stakes his entire identity on Napoleon being as perfect as Napoleon’s propaganda says he was.

God, how IS he going to handle being the one survivor of a barricade of heroic martyrs?

We get more evidence that the center of Marius’s character is shame--even as, despite the similarities in their upbringings, Cosette has nothing like that. For Marius, the tragedy of the parent he never saw again is about his regrets and failure. As if being raised under lies and abuse is all his fault.

Then he falls headlong into his first hyperfixation, and it’s very relatable and also a beautiful description. Too bad it’s Napoleon and Marius is canonically incapable of doing anything by halves. He flings himself headlong into the idea that Great Men are really great, and there’s no stopping him.

We’re retreading the Great Man argument now, but in this more nuanced half of the book, the characters are smaller and more human. I’m looking forward to watching the discussions from Waterloo play out in miniature a few chapters from now.

@fremedon has pointed out the absolute ridiculousness of Marius’s celebrating his quasi-republicanism with a stack of calling cards reading “Baron.” And the sad absurdity that he has no one to give them to.

He’s so ridiculous, and so lost, and so earnest--and so far, it’s actually pretty charming. I get how one could get this lost coming from the angle he’s coming from.

(I know I went off on it last chapter. But having discussed it further with Discord folks, it does seem like we’ve shifted into a more nuanced mode for everyone. We’ll see how Marius reads to me overall this readthrough.)

And there’s this:

A fanatical passion for the sword took hold of him and muddied his enthusiasm for the ideal. He did not realize that, along with the genius, what he admired—indiscriminately—was force; in other words, he was setting up, in the twin compartments of his idolatry, what is divine on one side and, on the other, what is brutal.

It makes a sad kind of sense. Marius doesn’t fully understand the problems with a tyrannical and brutal despot, because growing up in Gillenormand’s house he doesn’t know anything else.

[fremedon]

Brickclub 3.3.5, “The Usefulness of Going to Mass In Becoming a Revolutionary” and 3.3.6, “What Meeting a Churchwarden Can Lead To”

Oh, Marius.

Marius gets radicalized, sort of, by reading actual Napoleonic propaganda and accepting it entirely--which is the entirely predictable result of his realizing how petty and full of shit Gillenormand has been on the subject of his father.

Politics was the only thing Marius had in common with his grandfather, and with that bridge destroyed, there’s nothing--certainly not affection on Marius’s part--tying them together.

Gillenormand, of course, has no inkling any of this is going on and is utterly confident that Marius has a sweetheart. There’s something darkly hilarious in Gillenormand’s certainty that he and Marius are a happy family (because this is how families just are) and that Marius agrees with his view on women, the world, and politics (because those views are objectively correct) and that Marius knows he loves him and would do anything for him (except respect him, allow him to have other family relationships, or refrain from threatening him with physical violence).

But Marius here is like a fundie kid discovering evolution, or sex. He knows now that Gillenormand is wrong about everything, but he has absolutely no ability to to judge sources on their own or to evaluate statements from authority--and his upbringing has certainly not taught him rubrics for separating Bonapartism and Republic, or Napoleon’s good qualities from his bad.

We see here, as @everyonewasabird points out, the easy acceptance of authority that’s going to keep Marius from questioning his received ideas about crime and criminality. And we also see the absolute political naïvete and disengagement that’s going to characterize Marius for the rest of the book--summed up best in this passage:

When by means of these mysterious workings he had shed his old Bourbon and ultra skin entirely, when he had cast off the aristocrat, the Jacobite and the royalist, when he had become thoroughly revolutionary, deeply democratic and almost Republican, he went to an engraver on the Quai des Orfèvres and ordered a hundred calling cards bearing this name: Baron Marius Pontmercy. This was nothing but a very logical consequence of the change that had taken place in him, a change in which everything revolved around his father. Only, as he did not know anyone and could not leave his cards with any porter, he put them in his pocket.

Leaving aside the irony of Marius signifying “casting off the aristocrat” by...embracing his father’s aristocratic title--this is Marius making the mistake he’s going to make in 1830 and just keep making: Thinking of Revolution as an identity and not an act. And a secret identity, at that--something he can solve, once, In His Heart, Where It Matters, and then just... not do anything about. Make calling cards, and not give them to anyone.

Like. You know who is more politically aware and engaged than Marius Pontmercy? Fucking Grantaire. Who is not only aware that his beliefs, or the beliefs he would like to hold, logically entail actions he is not taking, but is being slowly destroyed by the cognitive dissonance!

And, who continues to come week after week to meetings with the people who make him want to change--unlike Marius, who after the Napoleon Incident in a few chapters is going to peace out for three to four years and barely talk politics again to anyone but Cosette.

[wpnull]

CorpTrain 3.3.6 NULLED – LMS WordPress Theme for Online Courses, Schools & Education

https://wpnull.org/en/wpthemes-en/course-builder-a

[gpllife]

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