#not from the outside world like javert

[spinosacha]

Javert is damned by realizing that he was wrong, Valjean is damned because he continues to discover he is right

[alicedrawslesmis]

I know I just said I didn't want to just be complaining about everything so I'll try to word this in a more constructive way asdfghjkl

It's hard to be an Eponine fan in a world where the musical -and On My Own specifically- is sooooo mainstream. Because imo as much as On My Own itself is kind of a half-decent, if simplified, encapsulation of Eponine's struggle with her love for Marius if you analise the lyrics in isolation, the musical as a whole, her role in the narrative as the unrequited love diva (I'm also simplifying here. I don't think this is super fair to the anglo musical, but compared to the book there's no question of how they reworked her into a glamorous 80s diva contralto because musical theatre has usually very strict gender roles), did her so dirty. So dirty. And imo often her character is reduced to her pining in fandom as a result. And I don't like that, personally.

I love that girl so much. I love that she is just young enough to still be a child but adult enough to be aware of her social role. She has one foot in the gamin life and one foot in the adult world. I love the tragedy that is the fact that she likes the beauty and pomp of high society girls and wish she could have silk shoes but knowing she can't.

And also being super resigned to her class despite it, she doesn't believe she ever will have any of that. She resents that too, somewhat. The tragedy of her knowing that she couldn't be with Marius because of his social class and her accepting that (angrily? sadly?). I love her self-banishment as his guard dog because of this. I love her drunk sailor voice. I love how manipulative she is and that she isn't Marius's friend at all. He's just her one neighbor who wasn't a total asshole one time. He was, later. But not at first. And she can't be in his head and know he thinks she's kinda despicable because crime because Marius is a judgemental little shithead.

And Eponine isn't an idealist, she's resigned to her position. I understand why she gets paired with grantaire in fics but her canon narrative parallel is Javert, they both believe they are excluded from society from their outcast position and so become the watchdogs for it. Eponine a kind of guardian (in her own words a devil, not an angel) and Javert the same. That's why he's the one person who sees her in the barricade, he's the same as her. Marius saw her but that's only cause he had a use for her in that moment, as soon as she didn't he forgot all about it.

I think also Gavroche, with his ability to be kind of a figure above the narrative, with his gamin skills of being almost omnipresent is something Eponine used to have, but with her age she's starting to lose that. She's starting to grown old enough that she's required to be IN the world and not supercede it. Gavroche is also almost there, if he had been allowed to grow up he would've lost that ability too. They both inhabit this sort of magical surreal world superimposed on our own.

A lot of Les Mis and Notre Dame de Paris can be kinda described as magical realism, I would go so far as calling them urban fantasy. And characters like Babet, Thenardier sometimes, Gavroche, Eponine (and Javert sometimes as well) are inhabiting this magically charged layer. This reality that's imposed Over the real world.

Talking about that One Series Of Wizard Books is a bit passé rn so uh. Doctor Who. Particularly the initial New Who seasons before they got that huge budget. That's a good parallel to what I'm getting at. The real world is still the same but there are certain characters that inhabit this mystical overlayer and are able to transverse from one to the other (Javert can't really because he is stuck forever outside and the second he understands that you CAN'T be an unbiased outsider who only enforces the norm without participating he freaks out and literally dies about it). Eponine is right in the eye of the storm tho. She manipulates reality to get her way, to die with Marius, because that's as close as she can get to being with him. And she manipulates reality to protect him too. Contradictions be damned. She has many contradictory feelings that make her complex and cool and an awesome character whom I love and wish would stop being reduced to the glamurous mysical theatre role with a single black stain on her face and a beautiful actor and a big unrequited love song about a random boy (whose personality was also changed for the musical and I argue is probably the character that was most fucked up by it in the public perception because he's such an weird little self-insert of an even weirder guy. But I get it, the musical is long enough as it is).

Anyway, I wish eponine could be more of a mongrel, a little gremlin. A little rat child that's just beginning to grow into an adult and is self aware of her role in the narrative society. She's a teenage girl which already sucks to go through when you're not constantly starving and cold and being forced by your father to work and do con jobs. Marius is the object she attaches herself to, but it could've been literally anything. Javert did that with the social order, he protects and guards it. She just chose Some Guy instead. Which, we all have that one friend who does that too. Like girl you're too good for him. Come on let's get you sone ice cream. And clean clothes and a roof. Literally anything. Bread.

I think if Eponine had a roof over her head and like, food on the regular she would forget Marius exists. Same as Cosette if she had moved to England. Like he'd be that one intense crush they had as teenagers. Can't say the same for him tho. He would hold onto that for the rest of time.

[homeboundmonsters]

I don't post a lot of analysis here but enjoy this mad scuffling of thoughts on the Tragedy of Javert as the Failed Lover

For me the moment Javert really loses it over Jean Valjean is not at the barricade but when Jean Valjean ‘dies’. In Toulon Jean Valjean belonged to the system, Javert’s eyes could watch him but they were not the only eyes that possessed Valjean with the intensity and scrutiny of the Law. In Montreuil-Sur-Mer Javert spends four years following him, stalking him. His eyes possess Valjean, he tries to offer him up to the law and is abandoned alone in his scrutiny and observation. Yes, Valjean belongs to the townspeople but not Really because they don’t see him like Javert sees him, they don’t have the intimacy of observation that Javert has. In his unaware and abstract way Javert is trying to understand Valjean, not intellectually but biologically: it is the broadness of his shoulders, the strength of his thighs, the gait he walks with; Javert seeks to understand the way his body speaks. For four years Javert is left alone in his desire and the intensity of his desire to penetrate Valjean’s secrets.

Then the rug is pulled out from under him. His understanding of why he consumes this man is ripped away and, all of a sudden, he has to reframe his understanding of why he feels this intensity of emotion, and desire for ‘knowing’, and he cannot understand it. Instead, he wants to run from it: he wants to be dismissed, to flee into mediocrity and the drudgery of agriculture. He can’t bear the burden of his guilt as a spy, but he has been more than a spy he has been a kind of peeping-Tom wanting to see inside of Madeleine and reveal him. This is an affront to Javert, not because he’s homophobic but because Madeleine is a superior: Madeleine is untouchable, a man of better class, better breeding. But mostly because Javert cannot understand his own feelings beyond the idea of them being an intrusion on the Better class of People that he has been determined to serve. He might as well as become aware of himself peeping into a bedroom window. He is a guard dog, he is not meant to experience what goes on in the house, his place is outside. Yet he has sought out the intimate knowledge of this man and in doing so has intruded beyond his status.

But worse for Javert is the world is turned on its axis again and he is proven right. He has NOT sought to go beyond his bounds, instead he has sniffed out a strange dog in the master’s parlour stealing the master’s meal. He is no longer troubled by the uncertainty of his years long passion. The world is set to right so he settles again into the comfort that his understanding of the world and his role in the world is correct. And then, after having Valjean for himself for four solid years, he gives him back to the prison system only… Javert is not there to observe him. Valjean is given over the scrutinising eyes of others and Javert satisfies himself with service to the Law.

So then, why is he so eager to believe that Valjean is still alive? Surely by all rights he should not care that Valjean is dead, Hugo emphasises that Javert shows little interest in the newspaper article. Well, the answer supplies itself when Javert thinks of Valjean is ‘his convict’. His pursuit of Valjean in Paris is defined by the fact that he does not try to share his suspicions, he does not try to share Valjean with anyone. Again and again he foils his own plans to catch the man. There is intimacy again between them, the kind of safe intimacy that comes without touching, only observing. Javert follows him to where he sleeps and secretes himself in a mirror room to Valjean’s: he is seeking again to have an intimate understanding of Valjean biologically; the way and shape in which he lives his life. He seeks evidence of the physical form, even though some part of himself knows it already his mind and eyes hunger for freedom from doubt. Is that not what Valjean always brings him: doubt? Uncertainty. Hunger, the pursuit of intimacy of understanding, the revealing of secrets and the concealed.

He is paralysed by Valjean’s disappearance at Petit-Picpus. He spends a week pacing outside searching for ways in. There is a physical barrier between him and Valjean, here he cannot observe him, here he cannot fabricate the intimacy that is brought on through observation. He is tormented by it. Why? Why does Valjean’s disappearance torment him in a way that the disappearance of Patron Minette? Javert meets Thernadier- a criminal on the run- in the sewers and is disinterested by him. Why because his mind is shaken by Valjean’s act of mercy? It is more than that. Valjean has breached the unspoken rule of their relationship again: there has been a crossing from observation into physicality and that is always destabilising for Javert. He feels safest when he is observing, that is why he is a spy. He likes to go unnoticed. Valjean brings him out into the open, not as a spy but as Javert the man. And for Javert, all these years he has felt that he understood Valjean, that he observed him and knew him as no one else did. That he had penetrated that man’s secrets, his mind, that he understood his desires and goals, and now he finds he knows nothing about him. All of that imagined intimacy is gone, torn from his hands by a man who tells him to shut up and leave already because he knows nothing.

In the carriage Javert battles with his passion, he desires physical intimacy with Valjean: seize and devour, which he can only understand within the framework of arresting him. And yet we know already that since Valjean has reappeared in Paris has been unable to share him, unwilling to give him away. To devour, to bring something into your body and make it a part of you, to process it until it becomes indistinguishable from yourself. These feelings are not new, the desire not to let Valjean go into the hands of others is not new, but for the first time Javert is wrestling with the idea that this means he must turn his back on his Mother and Father: The Law. It is the classic story of the Lover, the Lover must always leave his family to start his own with the object of his affection, but how can Javert do that when his Mother and Father, his ultimate authority, are the very outlining of society themselves? Besides that, he lacks the perceived intimacy that gave him confidence in their interactions before. How can he step out of the safety of his relationship with the Law into the unknown of this man who defies all understanding? Who blinds him, who IS the man who almost brought him to his knees in M-Sur-M? Love is terrifying, but love for someone completely unknowable? Love for someone whose very perspective of the world is so obscure to you that you feel blinded by a glimpse of it? For Javert love has always been self-sacrifice and service. He turned his back on his own people to become a prison guard, he served as a policeman suffering contempt and poverty; so, he loves Valjean how he understands love to be: he sacrifices himself. That at least makes sense to him when nothing else does.

But my point is, as rambling and incoherent as this has been, that Javert has loved Jean Valjean, and wanted to Love Jean Valjean for a long time and not known it. How can a person know Love when they have never experienced it? Not just romantic love, but familial, the love of friendship, the love of a pet. This man has been so abstracted from society by his birth and ethnicity that he never even understood to recognise love from the outsider’s view: he has never even looked on love as a concept. Why torment yourself with what you can’t have? But despite everything, Javert does love and he does love as someone should: self-sacrificingly, with constancy, with patience, with a desire to understand, with a desire to protect and preserve. Javert is the Failed Lover archetype, once upon a time he could have been Marius: watching and falling in love by glances, understanding, scaling walls to communicate and develop intimacy. But Javert, and Jean Valjean in turn, were always doomed to be on the outside, out in the cold.

[for-the-love-of-javert]

Question for Javert Fans

Do you think it’s likely that part of the reason Javert committed suicide was because he felt guilty about the students at the barricade dying when he could have put a stop to it, or at least helped to?

I think this is one of many reasons besides the disruption of his single minded world view, his likely lifelong battle with depression and anxiety stemming from his childhood and perhaps some deeper personal regret that he hadn’t had much of a life outside of his career as a man of the law and justice.

While I think (I haven’t got to this point in the book yet so this is an assumption of sorts) he thought the students where idiots for putting themselves in that position and wasting their lives he probably had a rush of negative emotions on seeing them dead and started wrestling with his conscience over it. Then Valjean’s final act of mercy in saving Marius pushed his sanity to its final breaking point.

I know I’m reading very deep into this and I can’t help it. Like a dog with a bone I chew on this part of Javert’s story for a while then I stash it away in my mind until I find it again when I’m not looking for it then I chew on it a bit more.

[secretmellowblog]

Oh! Ask game! #20, Ideal Best Friend, for Valjean, Cosette, and Javert each?:D

(for this ask game) Thanks for the ask!! Ideal friend for Jean Valjean: Literally anyone, he needs more friends XD. But specifically I think Mabeuf, Myriel, and Combeferre would be great options.

Jean Valjean is very shy and nonconfrontational, and I think he'd be able to bond well with quiet thoughtful people who could garden or read with him. Mabeuf's poverty would also be an excuse for them to interact-- if he tried to break into Mabeuf's house to give him money, and Mabeuf caught him in the act, it could lead to a whole beautiful friendship adventure. It would be a fix-it for both of them-- Jean Valjean's money saving Mabeuf, and the friendship saving them both! I think Combeferre is a good medium between "someone who is thoughtful and bookish enough not to frighten Jean Valjean" and "someone who could validate his anger and help inspire him to find solidarity." Especially because they do have a lot of similar feelings around violence and pacifism that could build some common ground between them. It would also be great for Jean Valjean to bond with anyone else who had ever been to the galleys with him, like Boulatruelle or one of his old chainmates. Ideal friend for Cosette: Anyone, she needs more friends. But specifically I think Courfeyrac! Someone bright and social and bubbly, like she is, who could introduce her to a wide social world outside of what she knows. I also think she could bond a lot with Eponine, largely because it would allow her to explore the parts of her past that everyone else is so determined to hide from her at all costs. Ideal friend for Javert: anyone. he needs one (1) friend. I don't think pre-seine Javert could ever have "friends" because it's just not what he does. But I do think Post-Seine Javert could really hit it off with Sister Simplice, and they could bond over breaking their vows of "honesty" for Jean Valjean. In addition to that. Post-Seine Javert is in a weird emotional state because he's an authoritarian who's lost his faith in one authority, and is now desperately searching for Something Else to obey. He'd be desperate to find someone else to be his new Overlord. But who would be the best "new overlord" for him? My answer is, whoever is the funniest worst person to put in that role. I think an "ideal" friend for Javert would be some extremely normal regular guy who does not want to be Javert's Authoritarian Overlord and is just perplexed by it all. Like--Javert trying to make Theodule his new authoritarian overlord would be great. And those are my hot takes!

[b-dubs-valdubs]

the amazing supercool @bogusbyron and i have just finished collaborating on a fic :3!!!!!!! check it out on ao3, or under the cut!!!

AO3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56217544

Title: Valvert Kiss Proposition That I Got Far Too Carried Away With, or, awesomecool collab

Word Count: 2,575

Relationships: Javert/Valjean

Tags: Canon Era, On The Barricade, Choking, (non sexual but you can read it however you like), Rough Kissing, Homoeroticism, Hate Kissing, is that a thing?, Javert Was Probably Into That, Valjean Is Conflicted, Brick-Adjacent Dialogue, Musical-Adjacent Events, Angst, Hurt No Comfort, i guess

Summary: When emotions are running high at the Barricade, people ahve a tendency to lash out mindlessly.

~~~

Javert made no move to acknowledge the sound of the door opening behind him — he had not the last few times, and he would not this time, either. The students frequently came and went, picking up the supplies they had stashed in the tavern, not acknowledging their prisoner. Occasionally he could feel a glare burning into the back of his head, but most of the time he knew they were far too distracted with the matters outside to worry themselves with the old spy they had tied to the table.

It was the same when he heard several of them file in and begin discussing their plans and revising what resources they still had left; the integrity of their barricades across the city, with the rebellion still lighting the streets with musket-fire and smoke, like a thick bonfire.

Javert listened. He knew he would not be likely to make it out alive, but what else had he to do in the meantime? If, by some gargantuan miracle, he did escape, the information might be useful; so he listened.

There wasn’t much to be said, but it sounded like Javert should not hold out much hope. It was likely he would be shot in the coming days after the barricade fell.

Twenty-six men was all they had, with eight surplus muskets. He almost felt sorry for their meagre effort, maybe even somewhat impressed — but they were his jailors and would be his executors, he had only disdain to spare them.

In fact, they discussed his execution, and it seemed he was to be put down like a dog. He had hoped his death would have been more dignified, but at heart he had expected this from the beginning, and he had accepted it. He closed his eyes and took a quiet breath.

It hitched when he heard the voice of Jean Valjean from the crowd. Blood rushed to his ears, the world around him beginning to spin — he kept his eyes shut tight. When his hearing returned, he heard Valjean make a request. To blow out that man’s brains myself.

It was then that Javert lifted his head and looked over, and saw the man standing amidst the group of students, looking expectantly at their commander.

“I think that would be fitting,” Javert said, solemn and level.

The commander, Enjolras, allowed it. Valjean took his place at the end of the table with a pistol in hand as the sound of trumpets pealed through the air outside. Everyone stood to attention, as they had planned.

A boy’s voice which was vaguely familiar cried out from on the barricade, and they all rushed from the room at Enjolras’ command. “You’re no better off than I am. I’ll be seeing you soon!” Javert called out.

Now, he found himself alone with Jean Valjean, who made quick work of untying him from the table and gestured for him to stand, to which Javert obeyed. Javert wore an unpleasant expression, the kind that creased his nose in a smile which more resembled a sneer, his steely eyes fixed on the other man as he stood up straight for the first time since his capture, vertebrae cracking slightly at the motion.

Valjean did not return such an expression, or any at all, only took Javert by martingale at his chest and tugged roughly, thus beginning their slow trek outside and across the barricade. Valjean took quick glances at the students, all stood at the ready atop their wooden battlements, muskets in hand. They reached a spot where it was low enough to be clambered over, where Valjean did not let go of the other man’s bindings as he awkwardly clambered over it, before following him shortly.

Once they were far enough into the alleyway as to not be seen by the schoolboys, Valjean halted suddenly. Javert stumbled a little but otherwise kept quiet, still smirking in the bare face of death. Valjean laid his palm flat against Javert’s chest, pushing him up against the nearby brick wall, watching as Javert rested the back of his head against it as if resigning himself to his fate: the resolute, stony inspector forced to yield and yet still triumphant in that he was right — that Jean Valjean would take his life in an act of brutal revenge and let him bleed out at the foot of the wall amongst the grot, that Valjean was still the violent convict he had always known. His face remained perfectly neutral, eyeing Valjean with an expression that sought to bore into his mind, a slight smirk playing upon his lips. He was still yet a sentinel, and knew that even in death — as brutal and undignified as one could be — he would remain righteous, the star hanging over the wretched to judge and condemn.

Valjean saw him; regarded him coolly. He watched how Javert was still under his gaze, yet had a form of energy about him, like a pot of water about to boil over.

“Go on,” Javert hissed, baring his fangs in a grimace, “Take your revenge - you’ve been hungering for this since Toulon. I know it.”

Not an ounce of expression was betrayed as Valjean reached for the pocket-knife on his person, the glint of the blade catching the dying moonlight in its cold, silver sheen.

In any man, the sight of the blade — of a knife such as this one — could only promise a drawn-out, painful death; it was to have your throat slit, choking and hacking on blood as it overwhelms the air in your lungs, forcing it out through your mouths in little gasps, and be left until the blood loss takes hold and brings you into the embrace of the Reaper. Javert was apparently not such a man to quiver at that notion. He only grinned more fiercely, his thin lip stretching over his gums in a snarl of victory.

“Ah, of course,” he gloated, goading Valjean, puffing out his chest, bound as he was, “A knife for a cut-throat criminal. It’s more fitting.”

Valjean’s palm pressed firmer against Javert’s chest, as if he were a lion pinning his prey in place on the ground. His brown eyes, the hue of intoxicating nectar, caught Javert’s own — superseding the coldness in Javert’s own gaze. Under his gaze, Javert seemed to retreat somewhat, leaning back against the wall; he held this distant contact as his chest expanded into the soft pressure of Valjean’s palm, inspiring a breath unusually slow and deep. As quickly as it had intensified, the pressure then released, and Valjean retreated a step.

“Turn around,” he ordered.

Javert obeyed, flashing a self-satisfied expression at Valjean as he did so. Valjean paid him no heed, reaching for Javert’s bound wrists and watching as the serrated knife-edge sawed through the bonds.

As the fraying ropes fell away, with their proximity Valjean noticed the muscles in Javert’s back tensing, and could hear the sharp intake of breath. Both men remained still.

Eventually, Valjean spoke the three words that had been told to him only as lies; ”You are free.”

Javert turned back to regard him. Gone was his smug expression, replaced only with fearful awe and trepidation. “I don’t understand,” he uttered, scarcely above a whisper, like one might murmur to themselves, entranced.

“Clear out,” Valjean muttered, his face close to Javert’s as if conspiring amongst themselves. At this distance, he could feel every faltered breath of Javert’s fan out over his upper lip, huffing from his nose sporadically.

A flash of rage crossed Javert’s face. “Take care, Valjean!” he exclaimed, paying no heed to the established noise level, his tone teetering on the edge of hysterical.

Valjean gripped the noose around Javert’s neck, pulling him closer until their noses almost touched — able to see each twitch of Javert’s eyelid as he held Valjean’s impassive gaze, his teeth bared like a cornered animal. Valjean studied him (acutely aware that Javert could hear each tremble of his lungs as he struggled to calm his breathing) only to slip the loop of rope over his head, freeing him of that as well, before reiterating: “Clear out of here, you are free.”

An unreadable expression crossed Javert’s face before the tiger pounced at Valjean, fisting his paws into Valjean’s shirt. “I know you, Jean Valjean. I am warning you: you attempt to exchange my freedom for yours? There will be no such transaction with me. I am not you — I cannot be bought with promises of freedom, I will not steal my life unlawfully such as you have done, I will never be you, Jean Valjean. Do you understand me, Jean Valjean? I know you — yes! — I know you, I can see your motives plain. You plan to buy me — well! Javert cannot be bought. You will still answer to the Law for what you have done, do you hear me, 24601?” He spat those numbers like he was spitting grit from his bread.

With a slight flicker across his eyes, Valjean lashed forward with his large hands and they found their way around Javert’s thick neck, the force of the attack knocking him backwards and his back collided with the wall once more. Javert spluttered, his eyes wide and crazed, as he clawed Valjean's arms before settling their clasp on his wrists. For a moment Valjean worried that he had seriously hurt Javert when a glassy sort of look waned over his eyes, before fixing themselves back to glare at Valjean. His scowl became a look of submission, clearly realising the strength Valjean held over him as he felt the flexing muscle of the arms he was clutching onto for dear life.

When Javert’s knees began buckling clumsily from underneath him, Valjean knew he had the upper hand. He had the upper hand from the start, Javert had been his prisoner, at his mercy, his life in his hand - but that is exactly what Javert had wanted, and he had been determined to keep it that way. Though he huffed under Valjean’s grasp at his throat, it was not tight enough to be a serious threat. The look in Javert’s eye told him he knew it. Valjean meant only to intimidate.

For a moment, before he spoke again, he watched the scene in front of him with a kind of awe; their faces were still close, now almost level with each other, Javert’s ragged and desperate breaths disturbed the loose hairs that had fallen into Valjean’s face in the tousle. Javert’s eyes, which were often squinted in that haunting leer of his, bulged from his head as the skin around them flushed. Valjean let his eyes wander to a trail of spit which had broken from his lips and ran down his chin.

If their situation were not so dire, Valjean might have pushed closer. He blinked hard, choosing not to get distracted at this moment. Instead, he uttered; “You’re wrong, Javert. I am only a man. Nothing more, nothing less. It is not my right to end your life.”

Javert continued to stare at Valjean with that oddly open gaze, his mouth falling open in little gasps and grunts. Then, the grip around his throat lessened, and he found himself being relinquished. He teetered on unsteady legs for a moment, falling into the weight of Valjean’s chest as his knees refused to support his weight.

That strange, glassy expression was still worn even as Valjean righted him again, holding him under the arms until Javert could stand on steady footing again.

“If I make it out of here alive,” Valjean sighed, feeling as if his next words could overturn his very life, “I reside at number seven, Rue de l’Homme Armé, under the name of Fauchelevent.”

The very confession was like a seal, like the coffin lid closing over the living corpse of Jean Valjean. His life would be no more; all that mattered was Cosette’s happiness, and after he had rescued her true love, he would have no space in her life — her happiness would no longer be dependent on him after today. It was for the best. It was the love that she deserved, rather than that of an old convict.

He nailed his own coffin door shut, blocking each hole with a strange form of grief, allowing no air for his escape.

His lungs could hardly intake breath as he regarded Javert; it would not be the last time.

“Go.”

For a moment, Javert did not move, still hunched slightly and breathing deeply, his heavy arms hanging at his side. His gaze was fixed on Valjean’s, his icy blue eyes piercing him with a contempt which shuddered and faltered like the decaying foundation of a building. Then, as his chest expanded with an inhale, he stiffened, letting the military posture return. His slack jaw snapped shut and set, his brow furrowed and he scowled. He said nothing. He stared at the space above Valjean’s head rather than at him.

Valjean found that Javert’s hands had suddenly made their way to the sides of his head, and before he could have asked about it, thought about it or even looked at the other man to read his expression: his face was far too close to have done so, and felt the heat of another mouth on his, rough lips on rough lips, almost bowled over by the force at which Javert had launched himself at Valjean.

He couldn’t help the shocked noise that escaped him. Javert was kissing him, roughly, though it was hardly a kiss, all teeth and lips, no tongue like passionate lovers shared in their private rendezvous. It was more like a predatorial bite.

What surprised Valjean most is the fact he found he didn’t really want to pull back from the embrace at all.

Javert gripped the other man’s head tightly from either side, fingers digging into his hair, the heel of his palm pressing uncomfortably against his cheekbone. It was harsh. It wasn’t affectionate by any means, perhaps desperate. But the tear that fell from Javert’s eye onto Valjean’s cheek did not go unnoticed.

It was over as soon as it had happened, like it had never happened at all. Javert shoved Valjean’s shoulder fiercely as he turned on his heel without a backward glance.

Valjean stood, in stunned silence, watching Javert’s figure retreat through the alley and turn the corner, out of sight. With shaking hands, he brought two fingers to his face to touch gently upon his lips, still slightly slick with spit. His breath hitched, as if enchanted, and stuttered out, breathing over his fingers that still remained pressed against his lips, passing a chill over the wet spot left by Javert’s own mouth.

Valjean shuddered, wiping it away with the back of his hand resolutely, before hefting the musket aloft and firing into the air.

He wondered if Javert had heard the bang that had resounded as he made his way back to the tavern.

“It is done,” he announced.

Yet it did not feel finished: not for Valjean, nor Javert, as Valjean’s thoughts could only fixate on the tingling sensation he still found on his lower lip where Javert’s teeth had collided, frowning to himself slightly.

His mind fell back to the alleyway, when he watched Javert writhe under his hand. He was thankful for the call of the students from the barricades as the National Guard began an attack once more.

[la-confrontation]

Very Vague Analysis of "Javert t'es amoureux" interpreted by Jean Vallée

I wrote a shitpost about it some days ago and @aftershocked 's comment made me want to develop on it, about why the lyrics are supposed to convey a metatextual message about the actor playing Javert (here, Jean Vallée). + Thoughts on why I think it's incredibly funny that they chose to make Javert a hopeless romantic and we all went 'ah! he is gay!' (as we should). I apologize if I'm just stating the obvious btw I'm not the smartest person in the room. Also, I read this before and I thought it was a good translation and I will use some of their previous interpretation, so credits to: https://www.kellycatalfamo.com/blog/2017/9/3/javert-tes-amoureux (thank you again, aftershocked, because i never saw this post before you mentioned it!).

1 — Javert is Jean Vallée.

No kidding, Jean Vallée is the first one to interpret Javert in Boublil's and Schönberg's musical in 1980. But then it does make sense for Vallée to write a song about himself as Javert, as he is transcended by his love for the character and the role (we'll get back to that).

There is definitely a play with the use of "Je" and "Tu". Who is je in this song? It's not obvious from the start. The first line might suggest the speaker is Javert directly ("Moi, le lecteur invétéré du Code Civil et du Code Pénal") yet this Je is accusing Javert, the Tu, in the chorus, which leave a doubt of the identity of this speaker. (You could definitely argue that it would not be out-of-character for Javert to talk to himself, on the contrary. Lol.)

Moreover, kellycatalfamo mentions that Javert actively reading is ooc, and this is also an element that makes me think that Vallée is mainly the one talking in the song, making the character he's supposed to play doing things he would not do otherwise : "What I took from this is that Vallée is not simply describing Javert reading the advice column in bed -- a VERY non-Javert-like activity -- but describing Javert suddenly realizing this uncharacteristic thing he's doing ... and continuing to do it".

According to me, Jean Vallée is trying to be Javert, to incarnate Javert, but he fails, and loses his balance and skills as he tries to act like the character again (reading the Code Civil, keeping his cool, seeing the world only in black and white, etc.).

2 — Vallée is trying to get back into his role.

So, in kellycatalfamo's translation, the original french lyrics is "redeviens moins si vieux" in the second chorus, but I'm sure it's a mistake and the lyric is actually "redeviens moins sérieux" (= "become less serious again"). Vallée castigates himself because he slipped out of his role, talking to both himself and the Javert he tries to make out of himself (use of the imperative).

"C'est impossible, venez à mon secours et rendez-moi inaccessible" = There is an urgent need to get back into his role, for Vallée, and suddenly, he is not Javert anymore and asks help to the other actors around him. He wants to be unattainable, in the sense Javert is (as a fictional character existing only on paper) but also from his own feelings, attacking him from the outside, the real world (the théâtre being traditionally a closed space, existing on its own and according to its own rules and codes).

"Ce roman policier, cette série noire, qui t'a incarcéré le cœur" = The roman policier in France was mostly invented by Balzac, huge inspiration for Romantics like Hugo, so perhaps it isn't as much of a reach to assume that, here, Vallée is referencing to the novel Les Misérables and the effects it had on his "heart". If we're seeing it like that, then he means that he is submerged, overwhelmed, by his own love for the original material—Javert is thus in love by proxy, through his interpret's own adoration for the text.

"Je veux rentrer dans mon théâtre, continuer d'être misérable par contrat et par devoir" = oooh again, Jean-Pierre Virgil is so smart! At this point, Javert completely disappear behind his interpret. The theater, locus where he, Javert, exists on his own; locus where Vallée, amorous, desperately wants to come back. Moreover, the double sense of this line: Javert continues to be miserable because of his characteristic sense of duty and justice, contracted he is to the law like a dog to its master; but it could also be about Vallée's contract with Hossein, Boublil, Schönberg, as a profesional actor, and the sense of artistic duty he feels to do Javert's character right on the scene. (Again, where does Vallée start, where does Javert finish...)

"Je crois qu'on est hier alors qu'on est déjà ce soir" = The most strange lyric to me so far. I picture Vallée standing on the théâtre's scene, taken aback because he thought he still had time to revise his lines, but he doesn't, because he's already performing and he has to get back in the role. I think this line shows how he is losing his self within the text, whether or not it's the novel or the script, and his love for the role.

"Pardonnez monsieur Victor, si je sors du bouquin, je n'en peux plus, mon amour est trop fort" = Finally, the most obvious lol, I should've start there I'm sorry. It's written on the thin here. Vallée is completely out of his role and expresses his love for the original material to the author—and yet! It could also be Javert himself, coming out the book. In french, "sortir de" can also mean "to slip out of something", metaphorically speaking.

3 — Javert in the Brick.

Finally, to some extent, I think it is also a song about Javert Déraillé. My guess is that Jean-Pierre Virgil and Jean Vallée wanted to make Javert sympathetic to the public, give him some romantic sensibility, and since the musical's motif is a lot centered around love, it makes sense. Although, I don't think they realize the way they portrayed Javert as a homosexual, because, if not Jean Valjean, who else Javert might be in love with LOL. My favorite lyrics that might imply Valvert are "Toi qui ne voulais regarder la télé pas autrement qu'en noir ou blanc, voilà que tu trouves qu'il manque de couleurs" > to me, this is an obvious reference to how Jean Valjean completely destroys Javert's vision of the world. Also, a reference to the french lyrics in Javert's Soliloquy: "noir ou blanc, hors-la-loi ou dedans; noir ou blanc, c'est Javert ou Valjean".

Anyways, I love how Vallée insults Javert in the song, as if aware that being in love is uncharacteristic of him, yet is happening ("pauvre vieux con de flic" and "bravo le clown" never fail to make me laugh. I always call Javert a clown because of this song lol).

Hm. I am enthusiastically open to discussion and I apologize if I wrote a way too long post about something everyone in the fandom already knew about. I just love this song so much.

[sefflparticle]

Yet another blog talking about old ass episodes of this old ass space show? You got it, baby!

Hello, everybody! I have been a fan of LotGH for years, but I’ve been inspired by @logh-icebergs and @javert to do my own episodic read of the OVA series. Much like Icebergs, I do favor the LD editions, because many of the emotional beats in earlier seasons are lost in the redraws. So forgive me if my screenshots are low[er] in quality. Much like Icebergs and Nat, I also do favor queer readings on certain dynamics within the series.

Keep note that Bewcock quote in my blog description, as it serves doubly to delineate the in-series pop argument of 'democracy' v. 'autocracy', and when we get around to discussing certain friends in space. Queer readings cannot be ungendered from the power dynamics of the [hyper]masculine militaristic subcultures in series. Can you be a good friend if you are also subject, or if everyone around you is your vassal? Can you be recognized as more than a friend if you are subject to people re-writing your story after your demise?

Often, people on all markers of the ~ political spectrum ~ attempt to shoehorn this series as being a perfect analogy for their own real-world politics, taking scenes out of their respective contexts. And this occurs for a number of reasons. For some, this series is their first ~political~ anime. For others, this is their first anime outside of battle shounen that aired in North American/European/Latin American markets they're familiar with.

Whatever reason people do such things, this is part of my raison d'etre for starting this blog. Of course, I think the real world resurgence of fascism is deeply troubling, especially thinking of digifascists who take this show as reaffirming their ideas.

It's less evident in the OVA, especially considering that the same actor voices them all, but we are given multiple historical perspectives writing on these characters after the fact.

This blog will attempt to argue that LotGH is a classical epic that tackles myth-making, and how legends are crafted. The legend of Reinhard von Musel, turned Lohengramm, runs parallel to the legend of Yang Wen-li. These characters are both enmeshed in the politics and pathos of their own narratives, and in active conversation with the legends that have been created about them after their demise. Somehow. Haha.

Its anachronisms are intentional, typical to how narratives set in a far-off future linger in the past [that is also our present]. To a certain extent, we are all Julian Mintz in that flagship headed back to Earth, watching the docuseries that is the Legend of the Galactic Heroes OVA. But we are also not Julian Mintz, because Julian is also a character in this sprawling mythos whos heroic worship of his mentor Yang Wenli colors our perception of him.

Yoshiki Tanaka once said everyone has their own Legend of the Galactic Heroes.

And this blog is an attempt at one mere interpretation of legend.

[psalm22-6]

Source: The Jewish News of Northern California, 2 October 1992

I thought this was a very cool profile and an interesting perspective. I love the research she did on the gamins. 

Understudy says Jews will see themselves in Le Miz by Paul Freeman The theatrical epic Les Miserables tells the story of Jean Valjean, a noble, good-hearted man unjustly persecuted for a minor crime. To sate his extreme hunger, Valjean steals a loaf of bread only to find himself mistreated for the rest of his life. According to cast member Pauline Frommer, Jean Valjean's ordeal should strike a chord among Jews. 

“The persecution is not really about the loaf of bread," says Frommer, “but about who he is." 

Similarly, she says, "We, as Jews, are persecuted not out of anything we actually do, but because of who we are. That's the story of Jean Valjean, who is imploring Javert, 'Look at me as a human being! Don't look at me as a criminal!'"

[. . .] Frommer attributes the show's popularity to its spiritual quality. "It touches on what's best in human beings, revealing our aspirations towards creating new worlds," she says. "It brings out a longing in people to go out and create a revolution, to try to make things better. At the end of the show, it says that to love another person is to see the face of God. That's very powerful." 

Frommer understudies two roles — Eponine and Cosette. One requires a soprano voice, the other an alto. Fortunately, Frommer has a three-octave range. She also has to adjust to the differences between the personalities of the two characters. Cosette is gentle, while Eponine has rougher edges. 

Very often, Frommer doesn't know until only a few hours before the curtain that she will have to perform one of these featured roles. "That makes it exciting every time I go on," she says. "There's always an adrenaline rush. I can never get totally comfortable with a character. That's a big advantage, I think." 

When Frommer isn't called upon to play one of those roles, she focuses her energies on her work within the ensemble. "I play a boy for most of the show," she says. "To prepare, I watched the little boys in the cast, seeing what kind of tricks they liked to play on people. I also read [author Victor] Hugo's novel and learned about the contradictions of these little gamins. They're both playful and serious. They steal and eat from garbage cans, but they love the theater and want to know more about the culture of Paris." 

Growing up, Frommer had the unusual opportunity to experience a number of other cultures firsthand. Her father, after all, is the famed travel writer Arthur Frommer, who wrote the Europe on $5 a Day series of books. According to his daughter, Dad researched the hotels and restaurants, while his wife at the time, actress and acting instructor Hope Arthur, gathered information about museums. 

"I started traveling when I was 4-months-old," the 25-year-old Frommer says. "My parents would push me into drawers at night, because they didn't carry a crib. Every summer since then, until I was 14 and started going to camp, we would go to Europe to update the book.

"It gave me a great appreciation for how different, and yet, how alike we all are," she says. 

Arthur Frommer, who recently wrote a new book titled The New World of Travel and hosts a cable TV show of the same name, made Jewish historical sites an important part of the family's European visits. 

"In Spain we visited many synagogues," his daughter recounts. "We went to Israel when I was 11. My parents got off the plane and kissed the ground. I remember very clearly the Wailing Wall, which had a profound effect on me. It also meant a lot to me to realize that I was in a Jewish state, where I was in the majority, not the minority." 

In all her worldly travels, Frommer claims never to have encountered anti-Semitism, though on tour with Les Miserables she occasionally has felt that her Jewishness made her an outsider. 

"Usually, there are a lot of Jews in theater," she says. "In Les Miz, there's only one other Jewish member in the cast. In Kansas, my dresser told me I was the first Jewish person she had ever really known. But it wasn't a negative thing. She was curious about me. 

"Being from New York City, I grew up around many Jews. On Yom Kippur, the whole school got the day off. So it was strange for me to be seen as being so different. At the end of the week, the dresser gave me a pin that said, 'Oy vey.'"

Despite her Jewish upbringing, Frommer claims always to find herself cast in non-Jewish parts. "It's funny. In camp, I was in Fiddler on the Roof. I played the Russian sergeant. I'm always cast as the shiksa. They always cast the blonde in the non-Jewish roles," laughs Frommer, who plans to audition for movie roles when the tour hits Los Angeles. 

Nonetheless, Frommer remains hopeful. 

"Who knows," she says, "maybe someday I'll get the part I've always wanted, my dream role  — Anne Frank."

[dolphin1812]

Now that we’re (somewhat) back to Valjean, Hugo automatically makes sure we know his thoughts on one of the main themes of the book: poverty (and budgeting. He likes telling us everyone’s budgets).

“This vessel, battered as it was,—for the sea had handled it roughly,—produced a fine effect as it entered the roads. It flew some colors which procured for it the regulation salute of eleven guns, which it returned, shot for shot; total, twenty-two. It has been calculated that what with salvos, royal and military politenesses, courteous exchanges of uproar, signals of etiquette, formalities of roadsteads and citadels, sunrises and sunsets, saluted every day by all fortresses and all ships of war, openings and closings of ports, etc., the civilized world, discharged all over the earth, in the course of four and twenty hours, one hundred and fifty thousand useless shots. At six francs the shot, that comes to nine hundred thousand francs a day, three hundred millions a year, which vanish in smoke. This is a mere detail. All this time the poor were dying of hunger.”

Unlike with individual characters, we don’t know how much money the state has here. It’s not important. What is important is that rather than choosing to spend money on the poor, the state invests in spectacle, even for “battered” vessels like this one. The Restoration is, above all else, a façade; it hasn’t brought about a return to the old order because it can’t erase all of the changes brought about by the Revolution and Napoleon, but it also does nothing to address the problems in French society, instead covering them up, ignoring them, or distracting from them with as much pomp as it can manage. The “Spanish War” highlights this; it might be a financial war for the monarchy, but those fighting were trained under Napoleon, and it was revolting to the people because of the democratic beliefs instilled by the Revolution.

This isn’t analytical, but this passage is really beautiful:

“There comes an hour, nevertheless, when the gale breaks that sixty-foot yard like a straw, when the wind bends that mast four hundred feet tall, when that anchor, which weighs tens of thousands, is twisted in the jaws of the waves like a fisherman’s hook in the jaws of a pike, when those monstrous cannons utter plaintive and futile roars, which the hurricane bears forth into the void and into night, when all that power and all that majesty are engulfed in a power and majesty which are superior.”

Hugo is excellent at portraying the terrifying power of water (especially the sea), and this passage really highlights this strength.

The description of the incident aboard the Orion continues to display this talent, but it also parallels an earlier incident: the rescue of Fauchelevent. Like back then, there’s a crowd of onlookers who can’t/won’t help the dangling man, with his situation worsening until Valjean intervenes with a spectacular feat of strength. Like with Fauchelevent, he’s applauded, but it marks an end for him as well. With Fauchelevent, he sacrificed his freedom by revealing himself to Javert; here, his fall marks the end of 9430. Even the reveals are similar, with the name “Jean Valjean” appearing after we’ve seen this person act for some time. Once again, we see him as an outsider, ending even further from the scene that we began (a newspaper article vs the ship). He may be the main character, but we only know so much about him.

[oldbooksandnewmusic]

Dam, I just realised, Javert wasn’t actually wrong. That’s a loaded statement; he was wrong about a lot of things, let me explain.

The core beliefs that javert holds as a character are that:

a. People are fundamentally righteous or evil; change is impossible. This is why he so easily condemns criminals and trusts nuns completely - it’s also why he continues to see Valjean as a bad person that would kill without a second thought despite literally everything Valjean says or does proving that’s false.

b. He was born outside of society so the life of an irreproachable police spy is the only one he could ever posses. He says as much in the brick, his only options where to ‘rebel against’ society or ‘uphold it’.

Now the first belief is proven false by his interactions and eventual understanding of Valjean; it is of course false that people can’t change. The second point though, is true.

It’s not true though because Valjean also went to prison (where javert was born) and he managed to do something better with his life! I hear you say.

Now I’d agree with you, in the movie and musical versions, Valjean (somewhat) proves wrong both of these beliefs by being so good. The problem is in the brick being born in prison isn’t the only thing separating javert from ‘society’. Javert was the son of a thief and a Romani woman.

This is the difference. Its easy to miss as in most versions of the story this aspect of javert isn’t mentioned or is only mentioned in passing. Instead we’re simply left to assume javert could have probably lived a different life and this was yet another thing he was wrong about.

Well even if he couldn’t live in ‘society’ it doesn’t mean he had to become a police spy, hurting people just like him! He could have got different job!

Could he have? He didn’t want to end up in prison, a place society would be trying it’s hardest to send him at every opportunity - just look at how many times Valjean (a saintly (mostly) law-abiding French man) ends up in prison or being pursued by the police. If he was anything else it would only take one person to not like him and accuse him of stealing then off to prison it was. Even in the post in the police he had was tenuous - Javert wasn’t just a police spy he was an irreproachable police spy; he had to be. The only way a man like him could live in a world that was against him was to work for it: to be crushed under its heel content to prop it up regardless.

Reading his character like this just makes it all the more tragic. For example his belief that people are fundamentally good or bad could stem from this - he had to believe it was so or he’d have to face the fact that he’d caused so much suffering in attempting to live is life the only ‘honest’ way he could. It brings to mind the quote “It’s very easy to be kind, the difficult thing is to be just.” Which javert says as he’s begging to be fired, many have called out the hypocrisy in this line by Javert a character that is never shown being kind - but isn’t that quiet telling in of itself.

Being just is something javert struggles with - considers it difficult - he notices the injustices in the system but to him they can’t be injustice because if they are then maybe spending his whole life trying to be ‘good’ in the eyes of society was actually wrong. Maybe the only choice he ever had wasn’t a choice at all. Javert was trapped from day one through no fault of his own. He must have realised in the end that the only just thing he could have done - was rebell, and for a man that grew up during the reign of terror, that must have been soul destroying.

* disclaimer * I'm in no way excusing the horrible things that he did but I am saying if society was better javert may have not become such a bad guy.

[songandflame]

[ COMFORT ]: the sender, noticing a visibly upset receiver, solemnly moves to their side, and places a hand on their shoulder in an effort to comfort them. (From Valjean!)

The Shoulder Touch || @reverdies (thank you!)

It didn't help that her entire body ached. It hurt like that before in the infirmary, but at least then the aching was born from illness and fever. This was shamefully self-inflicted.

He wouldn't know; shielded away from the outside world behind convent walls, safely tucked away in a small, secure gardener's cottage. Or perhaps he would know. Even behind walls he seemed to know the news and events of the outside world. She knew Javert drove him to that. He was a fox and Javert, the bloodhound.

At times Valjean visited. True, Fantine could have committed to a godly life, but the stringent rules and regulations of Petit-Picpus were unattainable in Fantine's eyes. So pious were those women, they confessed before each other. If they learned of Fantine's past, would confession even be enough in their eyes? The only reason Fantine allowed Cosette's entry into the boarding school was for the safety and education they could provide.

Fantine had made herself scarce here. She couldn't bear being around the other occupants of this small, cramped apartment. It was easier to breathe outside, even between claustrophobic alleyways that were akin to those she had serviced in Montreuil.

It had been nearly six months since the arrival of Cosette's sister. So used to the nurse's coming and going, Fantine had not stirred with the familiar creaking of floorboards.

So caught up in her thoughts, she only realised who it was as she flinched away from his touch.

Her reflection in the window was becoming like it was before she had sold her teeth and hair. If she didn't open her mouth, she could fool herself into thinking it hadn't happened at all.

The men she met at local inns didn't seem to mind all that much. Though she supposed she wasn't forced to look at herself there. She wanted the warmth of brandy and one thing often led to another; soon, she had the warmth of a stranger too. Their panting against her ear, their sweat mingling with her own. Despite the existence of two children, she remained wildlessly reckless— what was there to care about now?

The damage was already done.

Louise, that was her name— the woman who, for all intents and purposes, was Annelise's mother. Most mornings she would greet Fantine as she slinked back home. Of course she knew; one did not become so disheveled simply by drinking.

The panic came with her late cycle.

That's how he had found her. She would not tell the nurse, but it did not mean she was not distraught.

After her initial reaction, Fantine relaxed somewhat back into the simple wooden chair. The nurse had gone and so had the child. For a rare moment, Fantine could breathe here once more. But of course, it was snatched away by creeping anxiety.

She would have to ask for his financial aid.

"If you knew what I was considering, you would hate me."

[everyonewasabird]

Brickclub 5.7.2 “The Obscurities that a Revelation May Contain”

For the last several chapters, we’ve been living in a bubble--that is, Marius has been living in a bubble--where the world is respectable and moneyed and built around the structure of the traditional family, and all the misérables are out of sight and out of mind, visible only in passing as masked specters you glimpse out of the window of your fancy carriage.

Valjean changing that snapped Marius out of his happy fog so hard that Marius suddenly realized “huh, I guess I AM a person who spends a lot of his life in a fog.” Which is impressive, I guess.

All in all, this is.. several steps back, a couple forward, several dozen more back again. Marius leads with kneejerk bourgeois horror at being bound by marriage to having a Convict in his family, then he’s aware enough to sort of notice the incredible amount of integrity and conscience that it must mean for Valjean to both have confessed and given him the inheritance, and then he ends with concluding Valjean was obviously at the barricade to murder Javert, because nothing Marius does would be complete without coming to several wildly wrong conclusions. I get that it’s sort of a sensible inference... but it’s also very much a trait of Marius’s to get hold of the wrong end of the stick absolutely every time.

And of course he consults nobody, and nobody talks about anything. And of course nothing ever shakes him from the assumption that he’s morally superior to Valjean and Valjean deserves to have the worst things assumed about him, because he really, really didn’t listen at those Amis meetings before he stopped attending.

Jean Valjean had labored over Cosette. To some extent, he had formed that soul. That was incontestable. Well, what then? The workman was horrible; but the work admirable. God per­ forms His miracles as He sees fit. He had constructed this enchanting Cosette, and he had employed Jean Val­jean for the work. It had pleased Him to choose this strange collaborator. What reckoning have we to ask of Him? Is this the first time the dunghill has helped the spring to make the rose?

Reminder that Marius could say more or less the exact same thing about the convict-woven tapestries he’s probably literally sitting under while he ponders this. God, in Marius’s construction here, is taking the role of the prison guard, because Marius has never, ever, ever learned to think outside “police = good, convict bad, carceral system = justice.” Marius is acting as a warning for the reader: if you don’t reconstruct your thinking about the things this book has been talking about, if you act in accordance with the premises you were raised with, you are going to end up becoming this fucking guy.

Which is a pretty solid statement about privilege in general, I suppose.

And the text makes it even more explicit in a moment:

Although a democrat, Marius still adhered upon penal questions to the inexorable system, and in regard to those whom the law smites, he shared all the ideas of the law. He had not yet, let us say, adopted all the ideas of progress. He had not yet come to distinguish between what is written by man and what is written by God, between law and right. He had not examined and weighed the right that man assumes to dispose of the irrevocable and the irreparable. He had not revolted from the word vengeance. He thought it natural that certain infractions of the written law should be followed by eter­nal penalties, and he accepted social damnation as grow­ing out of civilization.

We’re quoting the preface here and saying “yeah, lol, Marius hasn’t got anywhere near as far as the preface of this book yet.”

Hugo assures us that he’s on his way there, but given that I’ve seen like zero progress for him in the last thousand pages or so, PLEASE Hugo could you show-don’t-tell something to make me believe you about Marius? Even a little bit?

I guess this is a book about human transformation and all that, but man. Marius is going to have to transform so fucking hard for this to turn around, and I’m not sure I’m remotely okay with him keeping his absolute control over Cosette while he takes the next twenty or thirty years to sort out the basics.

And finally, we see the legacy of his grandfather’s raising of him, in how he was both too afraid to ask a single question lest he find out something more horrific than he was already thinking (some lawyer he’s gonna turn out to be), and in how he calls himself “weak” for having taken pity on Valjean in the end. He ends in a reactionary internal rant about his repulsion towards having Valjean in the house, and how pointless it is, and how he’s duty bound to keep his word but his higher duty is to protect Cosette from this guy...

I know, I know this is obviously meant to be part of his character arc, I know it’s meant to frustrate the reader who sympathizes with Valjean, I know it’s meant to call out the anti-convict prejudice of the era that’s not that much less prevalent now.

But god, just. Fuck this guy. Fuck this guy so much.

[sins-of-the-sea]

//If you ever wonder why I am so heavy-handed with allegories, metaphors, and history lessons with how I write the character backstories, analyses like what Anon said about Inspector Javert is why. Without context of history, of COURSE we will lose any connections of humanity we have today with what was happening then. It’s so easy to blame people for being pieces of shit when we forget the environment they were living in either forces them to be that way to survive or thrive, or have not been exposed to a world outside of their environment in order to have perspectives more open than what they’re stuck in.

This isn’t to say you should be more compassionate to genuine horrible people who are horrible because of willful ignorance. Consider how Cristopher Columbus even at his place and during his time was contentious and despised before he became popular in the American public education system. Nor am I telling you to do more research. Cappn and I are already laying out the groundwork of history for you in the Devil’s Eye stories, which is WHY Ira et Avaritia and Atzlut v Taavah use framing devices (Midsummer Misery and My Brother’s Keeper) to help lay out the context of the environment in the backstories.

Just keep in mind of how attitudes of a certain time period (especially in another country) may be different from today. What makes sense today may not make sense back then, and vice versa. Have more respect for the lived experiences of the people before us. Again: we won’t be where we are today if it weren’t for the people who came before us. For good and for bad.

[brooklynislandgirl]

From my beloved @mouthoftheocean Optional tag: Music-fiends, you know who you are. 1.   a song you can listen to on repeat Red Right Hand || Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds Whatever It Takes || Imagine Dragons 2.   a song from one of your favorite albums Alive || Pearl Jam - 10 Levon || Elton John - Madman Across the Water 3.   a song you loved when you were a teenager or kid Mr Brownstone || Guns N Roses Me and Bobby McGee || Janis Joplin The End || The Doors 4.   a song that makes you feel strong The Warrior Song - Leviathan || Sean Householder Wolf Totem || The Hu 5.   a song that makes you sad Indian Sunset || Elton John The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald || Gordon Lightfoot Pirate’s Plea || The Musical Blades 6.   a song that cheers you up Can’t Stop || Red Hot Chili Peppers Mwahahahah || Ookla the Mok Survivor Evolved || Neebs Gaming ft. JT Music {{RIP Thick44}} 7.   a song that reminds you of your friend(s) Lux Aeterna || Clint Mansell Throw Your Arms Around Me || Hunters and Collectors Sugar in the Hold || The Jolly Rogers Friends in Low Places || Garth Brooks 9.   a song that reminds you of yourself Texas Longhorn || Django Walker Closer to the Heart || Rush A Pirate Looks At Forty || Jimmy Buffet 10.  a song that brings back good memories Get the Funk Out || Extreme Amarillo By Morning || George Strait Sex Type Thing || Stone Temple Pilots {feel free to ask why} 11.  a song that grew on you Smooth Criminal || Alien Ant Farm {cover} On a Boat || The Lonely Island 12.  a song from a musical Music of the Night || Michael Crawford - Phantom of the Opera Right Hand Man || Jonathan Young and Caleb Hyles - Hamilton You’ll Be Back || Jonathan Young - Hamilton Falcon in the Dive || Terry Mann - The Scarlet Pimpernel Into the Fire || Douglas Sills and Original Broadway Cast - The Scarlet Pimpernel Madame Guillotine || Original Broadway Cast - The Scarlet Pimpernel Stars || Phillip Quast as Javert - Les Miserables 13.  a song with a great music video Sweep the Leg || No More Kings Jack Sparrow || The Lonely Island 14.  a song that’s better as a cover Temple of Love || Johnny Hollow The Plagues || Jonathan Young and Caleb Hyles -Prince of Egypt Old Town Road || Richaad EB and Jonathan Young 15.  a song that’s better acoustic Down in a Hole || Alice in Chains Radioactive || Daughtry {cover} 16.  a song with great lyrics Anybody Listening? || Queensryche Comfortably Numb || Pink Floyd 17.  a song for summer Santeria || Sublime When the Sun Goes Down || Kenny Chesney Toes || Zac Brown Band 18.  a song for heartache Snuff || Corey Taylor {Slipknot} Fuck You || Cee Lo Green and Daryl Hall

19.  a song for car rides Life is a High Way || Rascal Flatts Free Fallin’ || Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers Calypso || John Denver 20.  a song for the rain Featherstone || Paper Kites What Kind of Love || Childish Gambino Nocturne #20 in C Sharp Minor || Chopin 21.  a song for dancing Can’t Dance || Cooper Allen Rodeo || Garth Brooks What I Love About Sundays || Craig Morgan 22.  a song for making out Hole-Hearted || Extreme More than Whiskey in Mind || Christian Kane Bad Romance || Lady Gaga 23.  a song for a lover Hallelujah || Jeff Buckley A Thousand Years || Christina Perri I’ll Be || Edwin McCain 24.  a song from before you were born White Rabbit || Jefferson Airplane Killer Queen || Queen 25.  a song from a band that’s no longer together Blow Up The Outside World || Soundgarden Big Empty || Stone Temple Pilots 26.  a song you’ve seen live Operation LIVEcrime || Queensryche {{yes the whole album/show}} 27.  a song you want to see live Hollywood Pirate || The Musical Blades House Rules || Christian Kane 28.  a song by a band you don’t usually like   Bang Bang || Jessie J, Ariana Grande, Nicki Minaj 29.  a song you recommend Montero || Lil Nas X

[secretmellowblog]

 Jean Valjean and Javert’s last confrontation begins with the two of them both being unable to open the same gate, because it’s locked with the same type of padlocks used in prisons. Jean Valjean can’t get out of the sewers, and Javert can’t get in, because neither of them can get past a barred prison door.

It’s like a metaphor for the way that the trauma/stigma of prison continues to affect both of their lives— the way that figurative prison bars can suddenly appear anywhere in society, when they least expect it, and create a barrier against them.

The first thing we’re told about the sewer gate is that it’s constructed like a prison door:

The (sewer) ended like the interior of a funnel; a faulty construction, imitated from the wickets of penitentiaries, logical in a prison, illogical in a sewer (...) the grating, which, to all appearance, rarely swung on its rusty hinges, was clamped to its stone jamb by a thick lock, which, red with rust, seemed like an enormous brick. The keyhole could be seen, and the robust latch, deeply sunk in the iron staple. The door was plainly double-locked. It was one of those prison locks which old Paris was so fond of lavishing.

Thenardier can slip in and out of the sewers as he pleases because he has a ‘government key”, but Jean Valjean and Javert just can’t.

Jean Valjean reaches the sewer grate and desperately tries to shake the bars loose:

Jean Valjean laid Marius down along the wall, on the dry portion of the vaulting, then he went to the grating and clenched both fists round the bars; the shock which he gave it was frenzied, but it did not move. The grating did not stir. Jean Valjean seized the bars one after the other, in the hope that he might be able to tear away the least solid, and to make of it a lever wherewith to raise the door or to break the lock. Not a bar stirred.

Javert reaches the gate and attempts to open it by gazing at it angrily but when “this gaze does not suffice” he, like Valjean, grabs the bars and tries to shake it open:

The man folded his arms and stared at the grating with an air of reproach. As this gaze did not suffice, he tried to thrust it aside; he shook it, it resisted solidly.

(Javert then waits outside the gate steaming in impotent fury for what we later find out was six hours.)

Valjean has a breakdown over how “he’s only succeeded in escaping into a prison.” Escape is impossible for him because the threat of prison is always there, is omnipresent— which is something we’ve seen throughout the entire novel.

Meanwhile Javert has a miniature breakdown over how Thenardier had gotten his hands on “a government key”— which feels to me like he’s so tired of dealing with moral ambiguity. He doesn’t want any more evidence that authorities might be Bad/ ineffective/ corrupt. He is furious about the implications of a criminal owning a government key and does not want to think about it:

This evidence suddenly burst upon the mind of the man who was trying to move the grating, and evoked from him this indignant ejaculation: “That is too much! A government key!” Then, immediately regaining his composure, he expressed a whole world of interior ideas by this outburst of monosyllables accented almost ironically: “Come! Come! Come! Come!”

Side note: I used to think Javert didn’t show any signs of being affected by the barricade until he met Valjean again; but now I think he’s clearly off-kilter even before that.

It feels so obviously symbolic of how much the trauma of prison is still affecting both of their lives? Neither of them are capable of escaping the system that abused them. Prison is evil, and it continues to be evil to them long after they’ve “made it out.” Its effects are present everywhere. There is nothing they can do to truly escape it.

After all these years— after Jean Valjean spends years hiding everything about his identity to become a “perfect bourgeois gentleman,” and after Javert spends decades as a police inspector who mindlessly violently obeys authority — they’re both still rendered powerless by a prison door locked in their face.