#lm 5.1.15

[cliozaur]

Gavroche at the barricades

The second illustration is by Petr Pinkisevich

[lmchaptertitlebracket]

V.i.15 Gavroche dehors

Despite all the Denny translations I’ve entered in and evaluated for this blog, he’s managed to astound me again, for he has managed to abbreviate a two-word title. Each other translator has this as “Gavroche Outside”. but Denny? he has ended up with merely “Gavroche".

[syrupsyche]

With Gavroche's last chapter (💔), he begins to take on a lot of similar comparisons to Enjolras, which isn't particularly good seeing how the more beautiful Enjolras becomes, the closer death reaches for him.

One thing I noticed was that like Enjolras, Gavroche was described as "a charming and terrible sight". Does anyone know if the original French words here for 'charming' and 'terrible' align with those used in Enjolras' 3.4.1 description? Because with this translation, I can't help but be reminded of it.

Furthermore, Gavroche is no longer "a child, he was not a man; he was a strange gamin-fairy". Even when he gets shot, he is called a "will-o’-the-wisp of a child". He then dies as if his "grand little soul had taken its flight". Like Enjolras, he becomes less human and more mystical closer and closer to his death. He becomes pixie-ish and spirit-like, in contrast to Enjolras' transformation into heavenly marble. So we see Gavroche slowly losing his human-ness throughout the chapter, before culminating in his death at the end, removing him from the realm of the living altogether.

[thebrickinbrick]

Gavroche Outside

Courfeyrac suddenly caught sight of some one at the base of the barricade, outside in the street, amid the bullets.

Gavroche had taken a bottle basket from the wine-shop, had made his way out through the cut, and was quietly engaged in emptying the full cartridge-boxes of the National Guardsmen who had been killed on the slope of the redoubt, into his basket.

“What are you doing there?” asked Courfeyrac.

Gavroche raised his face:—

“I’m filling my basket, citizen.”

“Don’t you see the grape-shot?”

Gavroche replied:

“Well, it is raining. What then?”

Courfeyrac shouted:—“Come in!”

“Instanter,” said Gavroche.

And with a single bound he plunged into the street.

It will be remembered that Fannicot’s company had left behind it a trail of bodies. Twenty corpses lay scattered here and there on the pavement, through the whole length of the street. Twenty cartouches for Gavroche meant a provision of cartridges for the barricade.

The smoke in the street was like a fog. Whoever has beheld a cloud which has fallen into a mountain gorge between two peaked escarpments can imagine this smoke rendered denser and thicker by two gloomy rows of lofty houses. It rose gradually and was incessantly renewed; hence a twilight which made even the broad daylight turn pale. The combatants could hardly see each other from one end of the street to the other, short as it was.

This obscurity, which had probably been desired and calculated on by the commanders who were to direct the assault on the barricade, was useful to Gavroche.

Beneath the folds of this veil of smoke, and thanks to his small size, he could advance tolerably far into the street without being seen. He rifled the first seven or eight cartridge-boxes without much danger.

He crawled flat on his belly, galloped on all fours, took his basket in his teeth, twisted, glided, undulated, wound from one dead body to another, and emptied the cartridge-box or cartouche as a monkey opens a nut.

They did not dare to shout to him to return from the barricade, which was quite near, for fear of attracting attention to him.

On one body, that of a corporal, he found a powder-flask.

“For thirst,” said he, putting it in his pocket.

By dint of advancing, he reached a point where the fog of the fusillade became transparent. So that the sharpshooters of the line ranged on the outlook behind their paving-stone dike and the sharpshooters of the banlieue massed at the corner of the street suddenly pointed out to each other something moving through the smoke.

At the moment when Gavroche was relieving a sergeant, who was lying near a stone door-post, of his cartridges, a bullet struck the body.

“Fichtre!” ejaculated Gavroche. “They are killing my dead men for me.”

A second bullet struck a spark from the pavement beside him.—A third overturned his basket.

Gavroche looked and saw that this came from the men of the banlieue.

He sprang to his feet, stood erect, with his hair flying in the wind, his hands on his hips, his eyes fixed on the National Guardsmen who were firing, and sang:

“On est laid à Nanterre,

C’est la faute à Voltaire;

Et bête à Palaiseau,

C’est la faute à Rousseau.”

“Men are ugly at Nanterre,

’Tis the fault of Voltaire;

And dull at Palaiseau,

’Tis the fault of Rousseau.”

Then he picked up his basket, replaced the cartridges which had fallen from it, without missing a single one, and, advancing towards the fusillade, set about plundering another cartridge-box. There a fourth bullet missed him, again. Gavroche sang:

“Je ne suis pas notaire,

C’est la faute à Voltaire;

Je suis un petit oiseau,

C’est la faute à Rousseau.”

“I am not a notary,

’Tis the fault of Voltaire;

I’m a little bird,

’Tis the fault of Rousseau.”

A fifth bullet only succeeded in drawing from him a third couplet.

“Joie est mon caractère,

C’est la faute à Voltaire;

Misère est mon trousseau,

C’est la faute à Rousseau.”

“Joy is my character,

’Tis the fault of Voltaire;

Misery is my trousseau,

’Tis the fault of Rousseau.”

Thus it went on for some time.

It was a charming and terrible sight. Gavroche, though shot at, was teasing the fusillade. He had the air of being greatly diverted. It was the sparrow pecking at the sportsmen. To each discharge he retorted with a couplet. They aimed at him constantly, and always missed him. The National Guardsmen and the soldiers laughed as they took aim at him. He lay down, sprang to his feet, hid in the corner of a doorway, then made a bound, disappeared, reappeared, scampered away, returned, replied to the grape-shot with his thumb at his nose, and, all the while, went on pillaging the cartouches, emptying the cartridge-boxes, and filling his basket. The insurgents, panting with anxiety, followed him with their eyes.

The barricade trembled; he sang. He was not a child, he was not a man; he was a strange gamin-fairy. He might have been called the invulnerable dwarf of the fray. The bullets flew after him, he was more nimble than they. He played a fearful game of hide and seek with death; every time that the flat-nosed face of the spectre approached, the urchin administered to it a fillip.

One bullet, however, better aimed or more treacherous than the rest, finally struck the will-o’-the-wisp of a child. Gavroche was seen to stagger, then he sank to the earth.

The whole barricade gave vent to a cry; but there was something of Antæus in that pygmy; for the gamin to touch the pavement is the same as for the giant to touch the earth; Gavroche had fallen only to rise again; he remained in a sitting posture, a long thread of blood streaked his face, he raised both arms in the air, glanced in the direction whence the shot had come, and began to sing:

“Je suis tombé par terre,

C’est la faute à Voltaire;

Le nez dans le ruisseau,

C’est la faute à . . . “

“I have fallen to the earth,

’Tis the fault of Voltaire;

With my nose in the gutter,

’Tis the fault of . . . ”

He did not finish. A second bullet from the same marksman stopped him short. This time he fell face downward on the pavement, and moved no more. This grand little soul had taken its flight.

[amiedelabc]

the official end of brat summer. i am out of office. christmas is cancelled. goodbye

[gavroche-le-moineau]

La mort de Gavroche / Gavroche’s death

Oh it's here, the chapter that breaks my heart to pieces every time. If you haven't heard it before I highly encourage listening to the Original French Concept Album version of Gavroche's death. In my opinion, it is by far the saddest and most impactful version. Below you'll find my translation of the lyrics with annotations. The PDF can be found here: La Mort de Gavroche translation

Gavroche Cette fois, Javert, t’arrêteras plus personne La mort t’a coffré à perpétuité J’espère qu’là-haut, on s’ra pas dans l’même cachot Sur terre déjà, on n’était pas du même combat¹

Gavroche This time, Javert, you’ll no longer be arresting anyone Death has locked you up for good I hope up there, we won’t be in the same dungeon On earth already, we weren’t in the same fight¹

NOTES 1. “du même combat” literally means “of the same fight” but I believe this is using “même combat!” which is an expression of solidarity meaning “we’re on the same side.” I kept the translation in the lyrics more literal since “to be in the same fight” in English can also convey the idea of solidarity.

Courfeyrac Sacré Gavroche, t’as toujours l’mot pour rire² C’est pas la parlotte³ qui te f’ra guérir Marius Ah les salauds, ils ont tiré sur un enfant Ils ont, sans savoir, abattu le printemps Quel dieu cruel s’abreuve du sang des innocents Et combien faudra-t-il pleurer d’combattants?

Courfeyrac Blasted Gavroche, you always have something funny to say² It’s not the gift of the gab³ that will heal you Marius Ah the bastards, they’ve shot at a kid They have, without knowing, shot down spring What cruel god drinks the blood of innocents And how many fighters will we have to cry over?

NOTES 2. “avoir le mot pour rire” is an expression that literally means “always have the word for laughing / a laugh” and is translated as “to make jokes, be funny.”

3. “la parlotte” means “chitchat, chatter, chinwag, talking shop, etc.” I decided to translate it as “the gift of the gab” because that felt like a more appropriate term given the previous line which implies that Gavroche is good at always making jokes.

Gavroche Notre drapeau était par terre Rouge de honte et bleu sali Moi, j’ai bondi blanc⁴ de colère “Allons, enfants de la patrie”⁵

Gavroche Our flag was on the ground Red with shame and dirtied blue Me, I leapt up, white⁴ with anger “Allons, enfants de la patrie”⁵

NOTES 4. “Rouge de honte … blanc de colère” This sequence uses expressions that incorporate the colors of the French flag (blue, white, red). “Rouge de honte” means “red with shame,” as in “blushing with shame” or a “flush of shame” but can also simply be translated as “ashamed.” I haven’t been able to figure out if “bleu sali” is an expression or is simply referring to the dirtied blue of the flag on the ground. “Blanc de colère” is, as in English, “white with anger.”

5. “Allons, enfants de la patrie!” is a reference to the first line of the Marseillaise, the national anthem of France. It means “Let’s go, children of the fatherland/motherland!”

Un mec m’a vu, qui m’a crié : “Qui vive!”⁶ J’ai dit : "Révolution française" Ça lui a pas plu ma franchise M’a mis un pruneau⁷ dans la fraise⁸ C’est comme ça, on gagne pas à chaque fois

A guy saw me, shouted at me “Who lives?”⁶ I said : “The French revolution” That didn’t please him, my frankness, Put a slug⁷ in my face⁸ It’s like that, you don’t win every time

NOTES 6. “Qui vive!” is an expression that literally means “who lives?” but is translated as “who goes there?” Just like the English expression, it has same the context of someone on watch or in a military environment asking an unknown person to identify themselves. However, I chose to keep the literal translation in the lyrics because it ties the pun in the response together. The response is “Révolution française (the French Revolution),” because a common refrain is “Vive la revolution française!” literally, “Live the French revolution!”

7. “pruneau” is argot (slang). The word “pruneau” means “prune” but it was used as slang for a bullet.

8. “fraise” is another argot word. This time the word for “strawberry” means “face / mug.”

Donnez, donnez⁹, ma casquette aux copains C’est tout c’que j’ai et j’en n’ai plus besoin Je suis tombé par terre, C’est la faute à Voltaire¹⁰ Le nez dans le ruisseau, C’est la faute à...

Give, give⁹, my cap to my friends It’s all I have, and I don’t need it anymore I fell to the ground It’s the fault of Voltaire¹⁰ Nose in the gutter, It’s the fault of…

NOTES 9. “Donnez, donnez” is a callback to the refrain used in Gavroche’s introductory song on the Original Concept Album (the equivalent of Look Down).

10. “C’est la faute à Voltaire” – I would have preferred to translate these lines as “It’s Voltaire’s/Rousseau’s fault” but I kept the French wording of “It’s the fault of Voltaire/Rousseau” so that the final line cuts off in the same manner.

As usual, corrections and commentaries are welcome!

[dolphin1812]

This chapter hurts once again. “Patria is my mistress” was really a distraction in preparation for the pain of this chapter.

Gavroche is clever, noticing that these corpses left behind could be a source of resources, and he’s funny, joking even as he runs into gun and cannonfire. His singing is fun, but it also raises the tension: we know the Guard can hear and partially see him. It’s the peak of gamin behavior, in a way, as he mocks authority even when surrounded by the possibility of death, but it’s a tense read. The Guard’s laughter both adds to this darkly comic atmosphere and is horrific, as they seem to treat shooting at a child as a joke. 

And his death hurts so much. 

[everyonewasabird]

Brickclub 5.1.15 “Gavroche outside”

Brickclub is back and it’s the worst. I don’t know how to analyze this chapter. I don’t WANT to analyze this chapter.

There’s a realistic reading here, of: this is why children shouldn’t be in WAR. He’s brave! He’s so brave! And also, twelve-year-olds don’t understand risk and mortality and shouldn’t be in a war zone!

And reading it there’s this sense of “no dammit don’t go out there” and then “okay, they haven’t seen you yet, you’ve got a few cartridges, come back NOW” and then “okay they’ve SEEN you but they’re not hitting you, run back NOW YOU CAN STILL DO IT” and so on.

And he never does.

But, also, that kind of response feels like a wrong direction to me? Much as I want him to Not, criticizing Gavroche feels very off.

Criticizing the adults is exactly right, though. FUCK these suburban National Guard. We’re reminded they’re from the suburbs several times--which matters, because they don’t have any connection to the people of Paris and don’t mind killing them. That’s no excuse at all for making a game of shooting at a child, but... here we are. We’re told they’re laughing as they do it, because of course they’re laughing as they do it.

And, of course, they don’t have to do this. Gavroche getting the insurgents a few more bullets doesn’t change the outcome of all this. They’re shooting because it’s a sport; unlike the other shooting they’ve been doing, Gavroche can’t hurt them back. They’re shooting at a sparrow, and it won’t do them any good to succeed, it’s just a challenge because he’s so inoffensive and so fast and so small.

Symbolically, what IS this chapter though? I’ve never really known. Gavroche has always been Paris, and right now he’s at his most Paris: the spirit of the gamin incarnate, singing his defiance to cruel and repressive authority, slipping through cracks unscathed that it doesn’t seem like he could possibly manage.

But this book always has an uneasy relationship with it’s own magic system; the magic pervades everything, but we always fall back to reality in the end. For a long, long time we manage to follow the magic rules that make Gavroche invulnerable--and then the magic runs out, and we’re stuck in the realistic ending of all this.

This isn’t fully the end of the magic, or even the end of the magic at the barricade--there’s enough left for OFPD, still.

But it’s the end, I suspect, of a lot of it. We lost a lot of magic with Jean Prouvaire’s death; now we lose most of the rest. The scenes that follow this will be far more brutal than the ones that preceded. Symbolic Paris has been crushed, and the last of our innocence is lost.

If hope comes, when it comes, it will a bright spot in a much bleaker world.

[fremedon]

Brickclub 5.1.15, “Gavroche Outside”

God, this chapter.

Hugo’s been very cagey about the ultimate fate of the barricade all this time. We know the insurrection will fail, but every time he’s reported that the insurgents felt they were doomed, he’s taken care to specify that that is the characters’ sense, and not fully endorse it as narrator; and every reference to Saint-Merry has been a double reminder that people did survive Saint-Merry, and that Saint-Merry exists in this world--our barricade is fictional; it’s not bound by the fate of any of the real ones. He’s held out a thread of hope for the fate of the characters.

This is where that thread is cut, abruptly and finally.

We were talking on Discord about the overwhelming, Tolkienian feeling of magic passing out of the world between the successive generations of revolutionaries-- @everyonewasabird mentioned the barricade losing its magic in two places, Prouvaire’s death and here, and becoming more grimly realistic after each of those deaths.

Gavroche, in a way, is killed by that realism. He’s the personification of Paris, quite explicitly. He’s a trickster: Bird has mentioned that his episodes before the barricade are always set in a timeless space, and one where the narrative functions according to the rules of trickster stories--i.e., if you go up against Gavroche, you will lose. The only other character who shares that narrative space is the Bishop.

Gavroche is stealing from authority, to put its goods to the use of the rebellion, and taunting authority’s agents while he does. Not even fifty pages ago, at the very end of Volume IV, we watched him do this with the wheelbarrow: he goaded a National Guard company into firing on itself for ten minutes and walked away unscathed and singing.

At the barricade, he is in the center of his place of power, as the narrator calls out in the reference to Antaeus touching the earth. By every narrative law of the mythic space and age he’s stepped out of, Gavroche should be untouchable.

To see him cut down is like watching a random orc patrol kill Tom Bombadil. It shouldn’t work.

But we’re not in that kind of story anymore. We’re in the story where the indomitable fighting spirit of Paris is slaughtered in the streets by well-fed men from the suburbs, who laugh while they take potshots at a 12-year-old.

[inmarbleimmobility]

god. gavroche was eleven or twelve. he was the same age as my sixth graders. my kids who proudly show me the decorations on their crocs, my kids who ask what my favorite dinosaur is so they can draw it for me, my kids who make up stories about the rubber ducks in my classroom. wish i had more intelligent commentary on that but god it fucks me up.

[lmchaptertitlebracket]

Round 1, Matchup 202: V.i.12 vs V.i.15

[cliozaur]

There are numerous aspects in this somber chapter that perplex me. I understand why Gavroche ventured outside the barricade with a large basket - the insurgents were running low on bullets, and Fannicot's fallen men, with their full cartridge-boxes, were awaiting someone to empty them. I comprehend his initial actions as he embarked on his sortie: cautious, quiet, and crawling, taking advantage of the smoke shrouding the street while the insurgents maintained silence to avoid drawing attention to Gavroche. However, what transpires thereafter eludes my understanding. Why did he not retreat before approaching too close to the enemy line? Why did he not retreat under the cover of the smoke? Why did he choose to stand up when discovered? Was it due to his youthful inability to assess risks? Was it his gamine nature that rendered him unafraid, unable to resist the urge to taunt and confront his adversaries? Or was it a mature realization that he was fated to die that day regardless, even if he returned safely?

In a strange way Hugo brings parallels with Éponine. At one point, he likened her to fantastical creatures, ranging from fairy and angel to goblin, ghoul, and devil. Here, Gavroche, too, is compared to a 'strange gamin-fairy' and an 'invulnerable dwarf.' Both arrived at the barricade with a seemingly suicidal purpose - more explicit in Éponine's case and less overt in Gavroche's.

In an earlier chapter discussing gamins, Hugo mentioned their obliviousness to the existence of Voltaire and Rousseau. Previously, I suggested that Gavroche was aware of them, citing his final song. Yet now I am inclined to think that perhaps he sang the song without fully grasping the significance of the names mentioned. I am not sure.

The little sparrow, the embodiment of Paris, is dead. His song remained unfinished…

[gavroche-le-moineau]

One of the words is the same in French!

From 3.4.1: “Enjolras était un jeune homme charmant, capable d’être terrible.” Translation: "Enjolras was a charming young man, capable of being terrible." The word "terrible" here probably leans in the direction of impressive, tremendous, or terrifying.

From 5.1.15: “Le spectacle était épouvantable et charmant.” Translation: "The sight was terrible and charming." Here the word translated as "terrible" is "épouvantable" which leans much more in the direction of horrendous, dreadful, or appalling. The verb "épouvanter" means to scare, frighten, horrify, terrify, if that gives a sense of context around the word.

It's a good catch! And I love the commentary about Gavroche getting less human as he approaches death. To add to that motif, Éponine is also frequently described in non-human ways that I feel like underline her proximity to and perhaps inevitability of death.

With Gavroche's last chapter (💔), he begins to take on a lot of similar comparisons to Enjolras, which isn't particularly good seeing how the more beautiful Enjolras becomes, the closer death reaches for him.

One thing I noticed was that like Enjolras, Gavroche was described as "a charming and terrible sight". Does anyone know if the original French words here for 'charming' and 'terrible' align with those used in Enjolras' 3.4.1 description? Because with this translation, I can't help but be reminded of it.

Furthermore, Gavroche is no longer "a child, he was not a man; he was a strange gamin-fairy". Even when he gets shot, he is called a "will-o’-the-wisp of a child". He then dies as if his "grand little soul had taken its flight". Like Enjolras, he becomes less human and more mystical closer and closer to his death. He becomes pixie-ish and spirit-like, in contrast to Enjolras' transformation into heavenly marble. So we see Gavroche slowly losing his human-ness throughout the chapter, before culminating in his death at the end, removing him from the realm of the living altogether.