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The Toilers of the Sea
A new translation by Scot James Hogarth for the first unabridged English edition of the novel, which tells the story of a reculsive fisherman from the Channel Islands who must free a ship that has run aground in order to win the hand of the woman he loves, a shipowner's daughter.
480 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1866
About the author
Victor Hugo
6,576 books12k followersAfter Napoleon III seized power in 1851, French writer Victor Marie Hugo went into exile and in 1870 returned to France; his novels include
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
(1831) and
Les Misérables
(1862).
This poet, playwright, novelist, dramatist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, and perhaps the most influential, important exponent of the Romantic movement in France, campaigned for human rights. People in France regard him as one of greatest poets of that country and know him better abroad.
This poet, playwright, novelist, dramatist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, and perhaps the most influential, important exponent of the Romantic movement in France, campaigned for human rights. People in France regard him as one of greatest poets of that country and know him better abroad.
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August 20, 2019***CAUTION*** This review contains full frontal male nudity
Er...wow?
Victor Hugo is maybe the best of the worst novelists or the worst of the best, the grandfather of fat awful airport novels, at once magnificent, and risible. To explain it differently, imagine a person ignorant of religion, and then imagine dragging them round the grandest cathedrals, then imagine shoving them into a library and tell them to read until they found the books that inspired those buildings - they would come back to you with the novels of Victor Hugo . Everything is big, expansive, both extravagantly detailed and beyond the limits of reality. Characters are hewn from a block of pure myth dragged down from the mountains of epic. Everything is many times larger than life. Seriously speaking there are no characters in this book, only caricatures, or perhaps pure titans brought from the world of Homer, Hesiod, or Gilgamesh into the 1820s when this novel is set, one is pure malice, another strength and daring, another cunning and mighty, the only woman in the story is charm personified she has no other personality .
I will not discuss the plot. Partly because the blurb on the back cover gives away 80% of it, only withholding the ending, but more, because the plot could be fairly detailed on a postcard, in bullet points, indeed if you imagine such a postcard in the style of one of my reviews, with spoiler text between every word and within each spoiler, further nested spoilers so that the postcard fully expanded is 430 pages of text then you've got a fair picture of what the novel is like. For example at one point one of the principal titans enters into a life and death struggle with an octopus, he is stark naked, tired, hungry and thirsty, the octopus is evil and has grasped his bare right arm, seductively stroked his chest and is about to...when Hugo breaks off the narrative for several relaxed chapters to discuss sea monsters and octopi, which are evil because they are ugly,and ugly in Hugo's opinion because they are evil . In the pen of a different writer this would be terrible, but Hugo pretty much makes it work, arguably the digressions and non-pertinent material on Guernsey life, particularly the folklore are the best bits, although according to the endnotes Hugo didn't find the native folklore big enough and had to invent some worthy of his fiction.
Anyway the plot is an irrelevance. What we have is an epic struggle, M A N versus N A T U R E, in the fight of the centuries, nature is, one notes, very big, and since ordinary man is nothing to nature, therefore Hugo needs Titans as suitable protagonists. The plot merely exists to provide loose reason for the titans to come into proximity with one another and to strip off their clothes to wrestle naked with nature in his preface Hugo wrote : Religion, society, nature: such are the three struggles in which man is engaged. These three struggles are, at the same time, his three needs...In Notre-Dame de Paris the author denounced the first of these; in Les Miserables he drew attention to the second; in this book he points to the third (p xxvi).
A curious thing is that Hugo is quite detached, even cerebral in his approach given to philosophising and generalising about life, fate and zoology (gorillas, I learnt, are like tigers). When at one point he writes that we had been with one of his titans in his anxiety, I swore - as the titan's emotional life as displayed by Hugo was flatter than a very flat thing: we know that he is obsessively in love and criminally stalking the titan who is charm personified, and he weeps once for his dead mother, and is scared of women in the style of Christy Mahon in Playboy of the Western World, otherwise nothing. Alone, exhausted, working, hungry, and fighting naked with a naked Octopus, nothing, no inner life at all.
Actually though the whole Man versus Nature theme transcends the traditional novel, he anticipates or is an early exemplar of symbolism, leaping there from Romanticism, the brief shorts of realism slipping off him as he flies through the air. As symbolist text then the major theme maybe isn't man wrestling naked to the death with nature but the relationship between and within the principles of similarity and dissimilarity. Therefore to spoil the ending
He is an impressively bold and confident writer, one hundred pages in to the book, my impression was that he hadn't even begun his narrative, he was still telling me how fantastic his titans were. And sometimes he plainly runs with delight in his own invention way beyond what the narrative needs, as in his invention of the three boys out after bird's eggs who over-heard a significant conversation. Hugo can't resist having one of the boys as a pure and ultimate quintessence of boyhood,(yes, you can sod off Peter Pan!) Victor Hugo's boy abandons his own family to get a job and sleep on a pile of straw in the workshop, but he is also so pure a boy that he doesn't conform to work place discipline like some wage-slave, no, he gives himself days off to go hunting for bird eggs and investigate haunted houses when ever he pleases . Hugo is also droll and makes witty asides as he comments on the life and habits of people and while he philosophises generally which make it a pleasant and easy read.
Symbolically the life and death struggle between the naked man who is terrified of women, held in a deadly embrace by a creature with a single orifice, with only a stiff unbending tool to defend himself with, makes a curious degree of sense like things come together in successful union, while the combination of opposites causes death, this paradigm will ultimately in Hugo's vision be changed by (drum roll, please)T E C H N O L O G Y machines will not conquer nature so much as allow the fruitful union of opposites - steam power is the fertile, productive child of the marriage of water and fire. So Hugo's near final vision of spring time as the wet dream of nature (pp424-5) is not as bizarre as it may sound but beautifully integral to the symbolism of the whole.
I imagine this novel is best read in French, this translation reads fine, but one of Hugo's delights is particularities of the Norman-French patois of Guernsey, which doesn't have quite the same impact in translation into a uniform English. Hugo wrote this novel and interestingly Les Miserables while in exile from Second Empire France. Hugo lived in Hauteville House on Guernsey, his mistress was ensconced up the road, close but not too close, from memory I think his writing room was next to this one and had, in addition to the views, a standing desk for writing. I'm pretty sure that the downstairs rooms have carpet on the ceiling , add to that, that he was conducting seances and perhaps you can feel the unlocking of the imagination taking place in his skull at the time, gazing out at the sea, convincing the credulous that he was in contact with the dead, isolated from France but locked into a Francophone world.
Er...wow?
Victor Hugo is maybe the best of the worst novelists or the worst of the best, the grandfather of fat awful airport novels, at once magnificent, and risible. To explain it differently, imagine a person ignorant of religion, and then imagine dragging them round the grandest cathedrals, then imagine shoving them into a library and tell them to read until they found the books that inspired those buildings - they would come back to you with the novels of Victor Hugo . Everything is big, expansive, both extravagantly detailed and beyond the limits of reality. Characters are hewn from a block of pure myth dragged down from the mountains of epic. Everything is many times larger than life. Seriously speaking there are no characters in this book, only caricatures, or perhaps pure titans brought from the world of Homer, Hesiod, or Gilgamesh into the 1820s when this novel is set, one is pure malice, another strength and daring, another cunning and mighty, the only woman in the story is charm personified she has no other personality .
I will not discuss the plot. Partly because the blurb on the back cover gives away 80% of it, only withholding the ending, but more, because the plot could be fairly detailed on a postcard, in bullet points, indeed if you imagine such a postcard in the style of one of my reviews, with spoiler text between every word and within each spoiler, further nested spoilers so that the postcard fully expanded is 430 pages of text then you've got a fair picture of what the novel is like. For example at one point one of the principal titans enters into a life and death struggle with an octopus, he is stark naked, tired, hungry and thirsty, the octopus is evil and has grasped his bare right arm, seductively stroked his chest and is about to...when Hugo breaks off the narrative for several relaxed chapters to discuss sea monsters and octopi, which are evil because they are ugly,and ugly in Hugo's opinion because they are evil . In the pen of a different writer this would be terrible, but Hugo pretty much makes it work, arguably the digressions and non-pertinent material on Guernsey life, particularly the folklore are the best bits, although according to the endnotes Hugo didn't find the native folklore big enough and had to invent some worthy of his fiction.
Anyway the plot is an irrelevance. What we have is an epic struggle, M A N versus N A T U R E, in the fight of the centuries, nature is, one notes, very big, and since ordinary man is nothing to nature, therefore Hugo needs Titans as suitable protagonists. The plot merely exists to provide loose reason for the titans to come into proximity with one another and to strip off their clothes to wrestle naked with nature in his preface Hugo wrote : Religion, society, nature: such are the three struggles in which man is engaged. These three struggles are, at the same time, his three needs...In Notre-Dame de Paris the author denounced the first of these; in Les Miserables he drew attention to the second; in this book he points to the third (p xxvi).
A curious thing is that Hugo is quite detached, even cerebral in his approach given to philosophising and generalising about life, fate and zoology (gorillas, I learnt, are like tigers). When at one point he writes that we had been with one of his titans in his anxiety, I swore - as the titan's emotional life as displayed by Hugo was flatter than a very flat thing: we know that he is obsessively in love and criminally stalking the titan who is charm personified, and he weeps once for his dead mother, and is scared of women in the style of Christy Mahon in Playboy of the Western World, otherwise nothing. Alone, exhausted, working, hungry, and fighting naked with a naked Octopus, nothing, no inner life at all.
Actually though the whole Man versus Nature theme transcends the traditional novel, he anticipates or is an early exemplar of symbolism, leaping there from Romanticism, the brief shorts of realism slipping off him as he flies through the air. As symbolist text then the major theme maybe isn't man wrestling naked to the death with nature but the relationship between and within the principles of similarity and dissimilarity. Therefore to spoil the ending
He is an impressively bold and confident writer, one hundred pages in to the book, my impression was that he hadn't even begun his narrative, he was still telling me how fantastic his titans were. And sometimes he plainly runs with delight in his own invention way beyond what the narrative needs, as in his invention of the three boys out after bird's eggs who over-heard a significant conversation. Hugo can't resist having one of the boys as a pure and ultimate quintessence of boyhood,(yes, you can sod off Peter Pan!) Victor Hugo's boy abandons his own family to get a job and sleep on a pile of straw in the workshop, but he is also so pure a boy that he doesn't conform to work place discipline like some wage-slave, no, he gives himself days off to go hunting for bird eggs and investigate haunted houses when ever he pleases . Hugo is also droll and makes witty asides as he comments on the life and habits of people and while he philosophises generally which make it a pleasant and easy read.
Symbolically the life and death struggle between the naked man who is terrified of women, held in a deadly embrace by a creature with a single orifice, with only a stiff unbending tool to defend himself with, makes a curious degree of sense like things come together in successful union, while the combination of opposites causes death, this paradigm will ultimately in Hugo's vision be changed by (drum roll, please)T E C H N O L O G Y machines will not conquer nature so much as allow the fruitful union of opposites - steam power is the fertile, productive child of the marriage of water and fire. So Hugo's near final vision of spring time as the wet dream of nature (pp424-5) is not as bizarre as it may sound but beautifully integral to the symbolism of the whole.
I imagine this novel is best read in French, this translation reads fine, but one of Hugo's delights is particularities of the Norman-French patois of Guernsey, which doesn't have quite the same impact in translation into a uniform English. Hugo wrote this novel and interestingly Les Miserables while in exile from Second Empire France. Hugo lived in Hauteville House on Guernsey, his mistress was ensconced up the road, close but not too close, from memory I think his writing room was next to this one and had, in addition to the views, a standing desk for writing. I'm pretty sure that the downstairs rooms have carpet on the ceiling , add to that, that he was conducting seances and perhaps you can feel the unlocking of the imagination taking place in his skull at the time, gazing out at the sea, convincing the credulous that he was in contact with the dead, isolated from France but locked into a Francophone world.
October 21, 2010
Of the three Victor Hugo novels most readily available in the U.S., The Toilers of the Sea is the least well-known and the one that Hollywood and Broadway have not transformed into pop culture hits. Set in the Channel Islands, where Hugo was exiled for a time, it recounts the heroic story of a local man who risks all the little he has, including his life, to rescue the engines of a shipwrecked steamer and win the hand of the steamer’s owner’s niece. Because it is Hugo there is much description and explanatory text of the channel, the islands, the weather, tides, sailing and the newly invented steamboats, the history and culture of these partly English, partly French islands, the making of revolvers, and the various sea creatures that play a role in the novel’s plot. These supportive essay-like chapters are almost always interesting, though they sometimes result is some funny transitions when Hugo begins a chapter that resumes his narrative as if the conversation he was picking up again was separated from its start by a few pages, not ninety.
A friend of mine says that Hugo may be the smartest writer he has ever read and I think he might be right. If not the smartest, he is the most curious and generous in sharing what his curiosity nets in clear and precise prose. But the narrative (perhaps half the book, maybe a hair less) is compelling, an insightful examination of human nature with characters of great depth if somewhat monolithic nature (Gilliatt, Lethierry, his niece, the young minister are good; Rantaine and a few others are not just rogues but pure evil). Hugo is fascinated by extremes and the pressures and dilemmas they create for others. Despite the black and white nature of the characters, consequences are complex and have less than predictable results, which makes the reading rewarding.
So does Hugo’s prose: “The scar of human work can be seen on the work of God.” “The dream world is the aquarium of the night.” “Facts are a rising tide.” “The human heart is a practiced spy.” “Nothing is more inept than integrity under threat from the law.” “Any number is zero when compared to infinity.” There are countless examples of such sharp, fertile observations. And the sustained descriptions are equally startling in their clarity and power. Hugo is one of the elite of the masters of world literature.
A friend of mine says that Hugo may be the smartest writer he has ever read and I think he might be right. If not the smartest, he is the most curious and generous in sharing what his curiosity nets in clear and precise prose. But the narrative (perhaps half the book, maybe a hair less) is compelling, an insightful examination of human nature with characters of great depth if somewhat monolithic nature (Gilliatt, Lethierry, his niece, the young minister are good; Rantaine and a few others are not just rogues but pure evil). Hugo is fascinated by extremes and the pressures and dilemmas they create for others. Despite the black and white nature of the characters, consequences are complex and have less than predictable results, which makes the reading rewarding.
So does Hugo’s prose: “The scar of human work can be seen on the work of God.” “The dream world is the aquarium of the night.” “Facts are a rising tide.” “The human heart is a practiced spy.” “Nothing is more inept than integrity under threat from the law.” “Any number is zero when compared to infinity.” There are countless examples of such sharp, fertile observations. And the sustained descriptions are equally startling in their clarity and power. Hugo is one of the elite of the masters of world literature.
February 26, 2023
PRIMA LETTURA: Da sempre, con alterne vicende, l'uomo è avvezzo a lottare contro la natura. Ancor di più ad affrontare due delle forze più potenti e incontrastabili esistenti al mondo, spesso benevolmente unite a favorire i propri eletti, altrettanto spesso congiunte a vanificarne i sogni: amore e destino. Il tema della fatalità, vero e proprio leitmotiv letterario di Hugo e delle sue storie, ricompare in questa storia d'amore singolare e struggente, che in un crescendo solitario e sognante ci conduce sino a contemplare (a mio parere) uno dei finali romantici più toccanti mai scritto.
SECONDA LETTURA: Hugo disse di aver scritto Notre Dame per mostrare la lotta dell'uomo contro la religione, I miserabili la lotta contro la società e questo libro la lotta contro la natura. C'è una fatalità che pesa in ciascuna di esse, un destino immutabile che costringe a combattere, ma che di rado vede la vittoria dell'uomo e delle sue speranze. Hugo è maestro nel tracciare quest'eterna lotta: i suoi personaggi nel renderci parte attiva in essa.
SECONDA LETTURA: Hugo disse di aver scritto Notre Dame per mostrare la lotta dell'uomo contro la religione, I miserabili la lotta contro la società e questo libro la lotta contro la natura. C'è una fatalità che pesa in ciascuna di esse, un destino immutabile che costringe a combattere, ma che di rado vede la vittoria dell'uomo e delle sue speranze. Hugo è maestro nel tracciare quest'eterna lotta: i suoi personaggi nel renderci parte attiva in essa.
August 6, 2020
Some books are hard to rate. The ending is stupendous! Victor Hugo has a particular writing style, you spot it a mile away. If you have read his other books, you know what is in store.
I did not like all parts of this book. I am giving it four stars because it beautifully captures the power of nature, its immensity and beauty. Alongside is drawn the puniness and insignificance of man. This is the overall impression the book left on me . The elegance by which the message is conveyed is why I have given the book four stars.
Nevertheless, I struggled through parts of the text. The writing is descriptive. There are tons and tons of details. In sections you feel as though you will drown in them. There is also a bit too much philosophizing. Or, let me put it this way, when Victor Hugo wants to get a point across, he takes his idea and expresses it in many different ways in the hope that one will hit home for you. He makes abundant use of metaphors. He peppers his writing with examples--taken from history and diverse facts about people, places and customs. At times the writing becomes heavy. You yawn and it almost puts you to sleep. At other times it’s lyrical, beautiful, splendid.
This story circles around the life of an island community. The Channel Island of Guernsey, forty kilometers north of the French coast, is the setting. Exiled from France, Victor Hugo lived there, on the hills of St. Peter Port, for fifteen years, from 1855 to 1870. It is to the island that he dedicates the book.
The events take place over about a sixth month period from 1819 to the spring of 1820. Victor Hugo has taken ordinary, everyday island events and created a drama and a tale of adventure. I don’t usually read either, but there is something special about the writing…..in those sections when you are not yawning.
Paul Adams and Alisson Veldhuis narrate the audiobook at Librivox. It is available free here: https://librivox.org/toilers-of-the-s... Alisson Velshuis reads a small amount, the preface and eight of the book‘s forty-three sections! I like her narration but absolutely detest Paul Adams’, so I simply cannot say that the Librivox narration is good. I think Adams dramatizes way too much. Others enjoy dramatized performances, but I don’t. Furthermore, after every chapter he gives the address to his internet site. I am not going to tell you the name of his site because I refuse to advertise for him. His pronunciation of words is not consistent, and his French is off. You can tell by his theatrics that he is full of himself. In parts I cringed in agony as I listened. Unfortunately, Audible does not offer this book. It is a strain to evaluate the written content of a book when you dislike the audio narration, but as usual, I have done so here. I do not think it is fair to let a bad audiobook narrator influence one’s rating of a book.
The version of the book read at Librivox is translated to English by W. Moy Thomas.
*******************
*The Toilers of the Sea 4 stars
*Les Misérables 3 stars
*The Hunchback of Notre-Dame 2 stars
I did not like all parts of this book. I am giving it four stars because it beautifully captures the power of nature, its immensity and beauty. Alongside is drawn the puniness and insignificance of man. This is the overall impression the book left on me . The elegance by which the message is conveyed is why I have given the book four stars.
Nevertheless, I struggled through parts of the text. The writing is descriptive. There are tons and tons of details. In sections you feel as though you will drown in them. There is also a bit too much philosophizing. Or, let me put it this way, when Victor Hugo wants to get a point across, he takes his idea and expresses it in many different ways in the hope that one will hit home for you. He makes abundant use of metaphors. He peppers his writing with examples--taken from history and diverse facts about people, places and customs. At times the writing becomes heavy. You yawn and it almost puts you to sleep. At other times it’s lyrical, beautiful, splendid.
This story circles around the life of an island community. The Channel Island of Guernsey, forty kilometers north of the French coast, is the setting. Exiled from France, Victor Hugo lived there, on the hills of St. Peter Port, for fifteen years, from 1855 to 1870. It is to the island that he dedicates the book.
The events take place over about a sixth month period from 1819 to the spring of 1820. Victor Hugo has taken ordinary, everyday island events and created a drama and a tale of adventure. I don’t usually read either, but there is something special about the writing…..in those sections when you are not yawning.
Paul Adams and Alisson Veldhuis narrate the audiobook at Librivox. It is available free here: https://librivox.org/toilers-of-the-s... Alisson Velshuis reads a small amount, the preface and eight of the book‘s forty-three sections! I like her narration but absolutely detest Paul Adams’, so I simply cannot say that the Librivox narration is good. I think Adams dramatizes way too much. Others enjoy dramatized performances, but I don’t. Furthermore, after every chapter he gives the address to his internet site. I am not going to tell you the name of his site because I refuse to advertise for him. His pronunciation of words is not consistent, and his French is off. You can tell by his theatrics that he is full of himself. In parts I cringed in agony as I listened. Unfortunately, Audible does not offer this book. It is a strain to evaluate the written content of a book when you dislike the audio narration, but as usual, I have done so here. I do not think it is fair to let a bad audiobook narrator influence one’s rating of a book.
The version of the book read at Librivox is translated to English by W. Moy Thomas.
*******************
*The Toilers of the Sea 4 stars
*Les Misérables 3 stars
*The Hunchback of Notre-Dame 2 stars
January 18, 2018
بالنسبة لي هي أفضل ما كتب فيكتور هيغو، أفضل حتى من البؤساء، بحث فيها هيغو بالنفس البشرية وأظهر نبوغا في التحليل النفسي لدواخل ونوازع اللاشعور. كما أن حبكتها أحكم من حبكة البؤساء وأكثر تشويقا.
أنصح بقراءتها.
أنصح بقراءتها.
August 29, 2021
Horror enthusiasts will recognize with both surprise and delight all of the elements of the genre utilized with incredible skill and effect by the legendary Victor Hugo in this outstanding novel. This was by far the best book I've read thus far for the year.
Yes, I argue that in almost every way, "Les Travailleurs de la mer" is literary horror. For Hugo, the sea is the veil of the infinite and all the cosmic horrors it represents. In its depths are snapping jaws, antennae, and glassy eyes searching for prey, growing larger and more ravenous with each meal. The vastness of the waters serve as a natural limitation to human influence and growth. The toilers of the sea, fishermen and sailors who live on it's shores, live on the boundary of the infinite. Their work is to tempt the gods, to dare break free of the prison imposed by nature on man by the sea. This book is a psychological portrait of the bravery and folly of such souls, set on the island of Guernsey in the English Channel just off the coast of France at the rise of the industrial revolution, when new technologies are magical amulets to cross the forbidden boundaries to bring enlightenment and prosperity to the land of man.
The Channel Islands are a magical place, a melding of ethnicities isolated on wind-swept shores for centuries, imprisoned by the currents and all the dangers within: fog, squalls, and rocky islets hungry for the hulls of passing ships. By the turn of the 19th Century, their isolation has led to the development of their own languages and cultures, and their proximity on all sides to the infinite has led to their world being constantly invaded and controlled by unknown forces, the supernatural, the demonic dimensions, and the gods of the Roman Empire. Every empty house is potentially haunted. Fairies dance in the gardens at twilight. Witches and werewolves fraternize and conduct secret business in the woods at dark. Devils and hobgoblins can be found under tree stumps and swinging from branches like monkeys. And almost any unusual behavior from a neighbor could be a sign that they in fact practice the dark arts.
But the invention of the steam engine has dispelled some of the darkness. An old seaman has purchased a steam vessel named The Durande, and though the ship was originally considered to be a tool of the Devil by the populace, it brought new freedoms to the island, thus allowing the old captain to advance in class in ways he could never have done under the old feudal system. But when the Durande is wrecked on a chain of haunted rocks five fathoms from shore, all hope seems to be lost. Enter Gilliat, a strange loner suspected of being a sorcerer, who has secretly been in love with the captain's adopted daughter, Deruchette, who sets out to retrieve the valuable engine from it's watery prison where it is guarded by a giant octopus.
Thus we have a classic epic quest, as complete as any work of fantasy, adorned with all the transfiguration of the horror tropes, to win the heart of a woman. It is no surprise that the name "Deruchette" is a diminutive of "Durande."
I found the novel to be quite suspenseful and engaging once the action got going, and even during the slow burn leading up to the climax, I was completely immersed in this strange supernatural world and alien culture of the 19th Century Channel Islands. Some have criticized the book for being too slow, padded with endless digressions about things like nautical terminology and linguistic comparisons, to pedantic reveries over local folklore, to minute descriptions of watercraft, etc. However, even the most seemingly innocuous of descriptions seem to play a role in the narrative, and so one must pay close attention at all times. In the mundane, Hugo plants foreshadowing or unexpected plot devices that will later impact the arc of the characters. The end result is a rich tapestry that illustrates the butterfly effect of chance and fate, and helps build on the otherworldly atmosphere of cosmic forces in an otherwise straightforward nautical adventure story about the impact of technology on a society.
And speaking of digressions in which to focus your attention, there is Part II, Book 2. Students of the horror genre, especially cosmic horror, will want to highlight almost every word of this section and study it. I, for one, will be revisiting these words again and again. Hugo's contemplation of the azure depths of his greatest character, the Sea, the very foundations of all of great horror, sci-fi, and fantasy. I will provide you with some snippets, but you really must read the entire passage for yourself:
"The inaccessible joined to the inexplicable, such is the universe. From the contemplation of the universe is evolved a sublime phenomenon: the soul growing vast through its sense of wonder. A reverent fear is peculiar to man; the beasts know no such fear.
"His intelligence becomes conscious in this august terror of its own power and its own weakness.
"Darkness has unity, hence arises horror; at the same time it is complex, and hence terror. Its unity weighs on the spirit and destroys all desire of resistance. Its complexity causes us to look around on all sides; apparently we have reason to fear sudden happenings. We yield and yet are on guard. We are in presence of the whole, hence submission; and of the many, hence defiance."
But there are just so many other levels in which to read this book, and you don't have to be an academic to see these multiple layers and appreciate them. That is another reason I find this book so stimulating. This is a true work of high art for everyone and worthy of your time and study. I don't understand why this one seems to enjoy less readership than others of Hugo's bibliography.
If you like adventure on the waves, stories about smugglers and salty sea dogs, classical epic romances, cosmic horror akin to Langan's "The Fisherman," folklore and fairy tales, or historical novels about the birth of nations, all told with Hugo's genius psychological insight, beautiful allegory, and biting wit, then this book receives my highest recommendation.
SCORE: Five slimy tentacles!
Yes, I argue that in almost every way, "Les Travailleurs de la mer" is literary horror. For Hugo, the sea is the veil of the infinite and all the cosmic horrors it represents. In its depths are snapping jaws, antennae, and glassy eyes searching for prey, growing larger and more ravenous with each meal. The vastness of the waters serve as a natural limitation to human influence and growth. The toilers of the sea, fishermen and sailors who live on it's shores, live on the boundary of the infinite. Their work is to tempt the gods, to dare break free of the prison imposed by nature on man by the sea. This book is a psychological portrait of the bravery and folly of such souls, set on the island of Guernsey in the English Channel just off the coast of France at the rise of the industrial revolution, when new technologies are magical amulets to cross the forbidden boundaries to bring enlightenment and prosperity to the land of man.
The Channel Islands are a magical place, a melding of ethnicities isolated on wind-swept shores for centuries, imprisoned by the currents and all the dangers within: fog, squalls, and rocky islets hungry for the hulls of passing ships. By the turn of the 19th Century, their isolation has led to the development of their own languages and cultures, and their proximity on all sides to the infinite has led to their world being constantly invaded and controlled by unknown forces, the supernatural, the demonic dimensions, and the gods of the Roman Empire. Every empty house is potentially haunted. Fairies dance in the gardens at twilight. Witches and werewolves fraternize and conduct secret business in the woods at dark. Devils and hobgoblins can be found under tree stumps and swinging from branches like monkeys. And almost any unusual behavior from a neighbor could be a sign that they in fact practice the dark arts.
But the invention of the steam engine has dispelled some of the darkness. An old seaman has purchased a steam vessel named The Durande, and though the ship was originally considered to be a tool of the Devil by the populace, it brought new freedoms to the island, thus allowing the old captain to advance in class in ways he could never have done under the old feudal system. But when the Durande is wrecked on a chain of haunted rocks five fathoms from shore, all hope seems to be lost. Enter Gilliat, a strange loner suspected of being a sorcerer, who has secretly been in love with the captain's adopted daughter, Deruchette, who sets out to retrieve the valuable engine from it's watery prison where it is guarded by a giant octopus.
Thus we have a classic epic quest, as complete as any work of fantasy, adorned with all the transfiguration of the horror tropes, to win the heart of a woman. It is no surprise that the name "Deruchette" is a diminutive of "Durande."
I found the novel to be quite suspenseful and engaging once the action got going, and even during the slow burn leading up to the climax, I was completely immersed in this strange supernatural world and alien culture of the 19th Century Channel Islands. Some have criticized the book for being too slow, padded with endless digressions about things like nautical terminology and linguistic comparisons, to pedantic reveries over local folklore, to minute descriptions of watercraft, etc. However, even the most seemingly innocuous of descriptions seem to play a role in the narrative, and so one must pay close attention at all times. In the mundane, Hugo plants foreshadowing or unexpected plot devices that will later impact the arc of the characters. The end result is a rich tapestry that illustrates the butterfly effect of chance and fate, and helps build on the otherworldly atmosphere of cosmic forces in an otherwise straightforward nautical adventure story about the impact of technology on a society.
And speaking of digressions in which to focus your attention, there is Part II, Book 2. Students of the horror genre, especially cosmic horror, will want to highlight almost every word of this section and study it. I, for one, will be revisiting these words again and again. Hugo's contemplation of the azure depths of his greatest character, the Sea, the very foundations of all of great horror, sci-fi, and fantasy. I will provide you with some snippets, but you really must read the entire passage for yourself:
"The inaccessible joined to the inexplicable, such is the universe. From the contemplation of the universe is evolved a sublime phenomenon: the soul growing vast through its sense of wonder. A reverent fear is peculiar to man; the beasts know no such fear.
"His intelligence becomes conscious in this august terror of its own power and its own weakness.
"Darkness has unity, hence arises horror; at the same time it is complex, and hence terror. Its unity weighs on the spirit and destroys all desire of resistance. Its complexity causes us to look around on all sides; apparently we have reason to fear sudden happenings. We yield and yet are on guard. We are in presence of the whole, hence submission; and of the many, hence defiance."
But there are just so many other levels in which to read this book, and you don't have to be an academic to see these multiple layers and appreciate them. That is another reason I find this book so stimulating. This is a true work of high art for everyone and worthy of your time and study. I don't understand why this one seems to enjoy less readership than others of Hugo's bibliography.
If you like adventure on the waves, stories about smugglers and salty sea dogs, classical epic romances, cosmic horror akin to Langan's "The Fisherman," folklore and fairy tales, or historical novels about the birth of nations, all told with Hugo's genius psychological insight, beautiful allegory, and biting wit, then this book receives my highest recommendation.
SCORE: Five slimy tentacles!
September 24, 2017
"Os teimosos são os sublimes. Quem é apenas bravo tem só um assomo, quem é apenas valente tem só um temperamento, quem é apenas corajoso tem só uma virtude; o obstinado na verdade tem a grandeza. Quase todo o segredo dos grandes corações está nesta palavra: perseverando. A perseverança está para a coragem como a roda para a alavanca; é a renovação perpétua do ponto de apoio."
— Victor Hugo, Os Trabalhadores do Mar
— Victor Hugo, The Wave Or My Destiny
Cansei-me no alto mar a desencalhar o navio, a proteger-me de tempestades, a lutar com monstros. Mas aguentei tudo porque estava com Gilliatt...
Estrelas por páginas:
para as primeiras 187: 4;
para as seguintes 138: 3;
para as penúltimas 67: 5;
para as últimas 8: 1000000.
— Victor Hugo, Os Trabalhadores do Mar
— Victor Hugo, The Wave Or My Destiny
Cansei-me no alto mar a desencalhar o navio, a proteger-me de tempestades, a lutar com monstros. Mas aguentei tudo porque estava com Gilliatt...
Estrelas por páginas:
para as primeiras 187: 4;
para as seguintes 138: 3;
para as penúltimas 67: 5;
para as últimas 8: 1000000.
December 2, 2018
Nunca em todos os meus anos de leitura me deparei com um personagem mais carismático mais encantador que Gilliatt. Quem já leu o livro sabe do que estou falando, e quem ler vai saber e se encantar.
Esse livro é uma verdadeira obra-prima . No começo o livro é um pouco confuso pois as histórias dos personagens são contadas separadamente, mas na parte final as peças vão se juntando e então aparece o encantamento e a admiração por esse fenômeno chamado Gilliatt .!!
Esse livro é uma verdadeira obra-prima . No começo o livro é um pouco confuso pois as histórias dos personagens são contadas separadamente, mas na parte final as peças vão se juntando e então aparece o encantamento e a admiração por esse fenômeno chamado Gilliatt .!!
August 18, 2022
عاصفة وقلب
من أعظم ماكتبه أمير الأدب الفرنسي فيكتور هوجو .
رواية تفتح نوافذ القلب لتطل على أعمق مناطق الإحساس والمشاعر بجغرافيتها وتاريخها.
يجول بك في مناطق المشاعر المزحمة ثم يعود، بك إلى فردوس الوحدة وجحيم الأمل .
أقول كما قال اندرييه جييد عندما سئل عن أعظم شعراء فرنسا فأجاب
" ياألهي ... إنه فيكتور هوجو ومن غيره ؟ "
"هناك لحظات تكون فيها النفس جاثية على ركبتيها" أحد هذه اللحظات موجود هنا.
من أعظم ماكتبه أمير الأدب الفرنسي فيكتور هوجو .
رواية تفتح نوافذ القلب لتطل على أعمق مناطق الإحساس والمشاعر بجغرافيتها وتاريخها.
يجول بك في مناطق المشاعر المزحمة ثم يعود، بك إلى فردوس الوحدة وجحيم الأمل .
أقول كما قال اندرييه جييد عندما سئل عن أعظم شعراء فرنسا فأجاب
" ياألهي ... إنه فيكتور هوجو ومن غيره ؟ "
"هناك لحظات تكون فيها النفس جاثية على ركبتيها" أحد هذه اللحظات موجود هنا.
Currently reading
July 9, 2019تقریباً به وسط کتاب رسیدم ولی هنوز این کتاب جذبم نکرده و همچنان دارم سعی میکنم به ویکتورهوگو ایمان داشته باشم که حداقل یه پاراگرافش نجات بده این کتاب از کسالت..
March 11, 2024
"مذهب"، "جامعه" و "طبیعت" سه زمینه نبرد آدمی است و این سه نبرد سه نیازمندی او هم هست. آدمی باید ایمانی داشته باشد، پرستشگاه از این نیاز برپا می شود، باید بیافریند، شهر از این احتیاج بنیان می گیرد، باید زندگی کند، ارابه و کشتی از این نیاز پدیدار می شود. لیکن این سه راه حل متضمن سه پیکار است و دشواری اسرارآمیز زندگی از این هر سه.
آدمی با مانعی به صورت خرافه، مانعی به صورت تعصب، و مانعی به صورت محیط مالوف سروکار دارد. شئامتی سه گانه: شئامت اصول جامد، شئامت قوانین و شئامت اشیا بر ما چیره است. مولف در "نتردام دوپاری" نخستین، در بینوایان دومین و در این کتاب سومین شئامت را باز نموده است.
شئامتی بزرگتر، شئامت درونی، یعنی دل آدمی نیز همراه این سه شئامت حاکم بر سرنوشت اوست.
هوتویل هاوس مارس 1866
آدمی با مانعی به صورت خرافه، مانعی به صورت تعصب، و مانعی به صورت محیط مالوف سروکار دارد. شئامتی سه گانه: شئامت اصول جامد، شئامت قوانین و شئامت اشیا بر ما چیره است. مولف در "نتردام دوپاری" نخستین، در بینوایان دومین و در این کتاب سومین شئامت را باز نموده است.
شئامتی بزرگتر، شئامت درونی، یعنی دل آدمی نیز همراه این سه شئامت حاکم بر سرنوشت اوست.
هوتویل هاوس مارس 1866
August 31, 2021
Ustanın bilgi hazinesi tartışılamaz derecede mükemmel, fakat hikayeden hiç zevk alamadım, bu yüzden de kitap uzun zaman boyunca elimde kaldı. Victor abimizin kalemine yanlış bir kitapla başladığımı düşünüyorum, belki ilerki yıllarda tekrar bir şans verebilirim.
June 1, 2017
Not many people read Victor Hugo any more, and that is a shame. No one could write prose that is more emphatic and dramatic. No matter that it espouses 19th century values: At the same time it is like a precursor of existentialism.
Gilliatt, the hero, is a Channel Island sailor who knows he sea as few people do. He is in love with Dérouchette Lethierry, whose father runs a steam ferry connecting Guernsey Island with the Breton port of St-Malo. When this ferry is deliberately sunk by its captain, Gilliatt undertakes to salvage the still workable engine and return it so that Lethierry could mount it on another vessel. He spends two months on an isolated rock in the English Channel trying to raise the engine and put it on his own little ship.
The Toilers of the Sea is a study in evil (the captain who wrecks the ferry) and heroism (Gilliatt). The ending is so operatic, yet somehow it works.
Gilliatt, the hero, is a Channel Island sailor who knows he sea as few people do. He is in love with Dérouchette Lethierry, whose father runs a steam ferry connecting Guernsey Island with the Breton port of St-Malo. When this ferry is deliberately sunk by its captain, Gilliatt undertakes to salvage the still workable engine and return it so that Lethierry could mount it on another vessel. He spends two months on an isolated rock in the English Channel trying to raise the engine and put it on his own little ship.
The Toilers of the Sea is a study in evil (the captain who wrecks the ferry) and heroism (Gilliatt). The ending is so operatic, yet somehow it works.
March 17, 2013
I know many people will disagree with me here, but this particular book was an aggressively tedious read. The story started off very well and held my interest tightly, unfortunately it soon was a struggle to care about the story as the narrative became extraneously descriptive. The tempo of this tale is incredible slow, as the author carries on describing the entire history of every little thing that appears in the story; I would say this book is twenty percent story and eighty percent needless tangents. Feel free to just read a summary of the book as the story its self is not worth reading all the mind numbing minutia.
June 6, 2010
رواية تقع في 3 اقسام و في كل قسم يوجد عدد من الكتب .
لا أنكر أنّي بالبداية وقعت في لخبطة من طريقة هيقو بتقسيم الكتاب وتركيزه على كل شخصية بشكل منفرد ، حتى أني ظننت أنها مجموعة قصص عن بحّارين مختلفين ، لكن سرعان ماتتقاطع الأحداث وتترابط حكايا الشخصيات .
الرواية مليئة بالدهشة . فيها من الحب الكافي بتحدي الصخور والبحر الهائج والجوع والعطش . وفيها من التضحية مايجعلك تسمع صوت العواصف وتتذوق طعم الملح وتحس بالبرد .
تتألم لألم جيليات ، وتحس عظمة الطبيعة .
أحببتها ، وأظنها من الروايات الي ستبقى بذاكرتي طويلاً
لا أنكر أنّي بالبداية وقعت في لخبطة من طريقة هيقو بتقسيم الكتاب وتركيزه على كل شخصية بشكل منفرد ، حتى أني ظننت أنها مجموعة قصص عن بحّارين مختلفين ، لكن سرعان ماتتقاطع الأحداث وتترابط حكايا الشخصيات .
الرواية مليئة بالدهشة . فيها من الحب الكافي بتحدي الصخور والبحر الهائج والجوع والعطش . وفيها من التضحية مايجعلك تسمع صوت العواصف وتتذوق طعم الملح وتحس بالبرد .
تتألم لألم جيليات ، وتحس عظمة الطبيعة .
أحببتها ، وأظنها من الروايات الي ستبقى بذاكرتي طويلاً
September 12, 2010
Most beautiful thing I'm yet to read.
January 18, 2013
Imagine the perfect recipe, the perfect blend of elements. In many respects "The Toilers of the Sea" is that perfect blend. One part epic drama, one part satiric wit, one part ethnographic study of Guernsey Island in the mid 1800s, one part battle between man and nature, one part spiritual allegory, and the topping is two parts elegant prose. Yes, yes, it is a lot to take on, but Victor Hugo did it oh so well. How many authors can make long drawn out descriptive passages gripping?
Hugo's prose is marvelous and his insight into human nature seems the result of astute, keen observation. This book, written during his exile on Guernsey Island, represents a veritable compendium of observation. His writing makes me want to hop a flight to Guernsey yesterday! I have witnessed storms such as Hugo describes and it sent shivers up my spine as he recaptured the sense of foreboding in the air just before a massive storm breaks!
Drawbacks, unfortunately, they exist. Dialogue? Relationship between individuals? I get the sense that Hugo was aching with solitude and projected that into this novel. Character development is done really well, except that the characters rarely interact until the very end of the tale, and then quite superficially. If, as existentialists say, we are ultimately alone and judged by our actions, then this allegory is perfection itself!
I loved it......
Hugo's prose is marvelous and his insight into human nature seems the result of astute, keen observation. This book, written during his exile on Guernsey Island, represents a veritable compendium of observation. His writing makes me want to hop a flight to Guernsey yesterday! I have witnessed storms such as Hugo describes and it sent shivers up my spine as he recaptured the sense of foreboding in the air just before a massive storm breaks!
Drawbacks, unfortunately, they exist. Dialogue? Relationship between individuals? I get the sense that Hugo was aching with solitude and projected that into this novel. Character development is done really well, except that the characters rarely interact until the very end of the tale, and then quite superficially. If, as existentialists say, we are ultimately alone and judged by our actions, then this allegory is perfection itself!
I loved it......
June 14, 2016
You know an author's legacy is going to the shitter when his or her most famous novels get translated into Disney cartoons and garish musicals. But what's worse is that the rest of your output gets duly ignored. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that "Toilers" might be Hugo's greatest work. It's definitely superior to "Notre Dame" and it gives "Les Miserables" a run for its money.
Sublime and supreme, this is the ultimate tale of man against the world. Remember that English 101 crap about man vs nature? Forget all that. This is about humanity in nature, humanity as a conquering and chaotic devilry of a force, unbeatable only on its own terms, even God's. There's so much going on in this novel that charms, even the Melvillian interruptions for discussion of sea life and off-the-cuff discussions of semi-related topics to the main story are welcome.
The plot? A lonely seaman goes to rescue a shipwreck crammed between two rocks on a deadly reef. Oh yeah, there's a girl. And a killer octopus. And crime. And murder. And the indomitable, simple idea that "It must be done". Hugo's genius not only lies in his telling of Gilliatt's tale, it's also in what he decides to leave out of the bulk of the novel: what everyone else is doing. But by the time you get to the harrowing final page, it'll all make sense.
One of the greats!
Sublime and supreme, this is the ultimate tale of man against the world. Remember that English 101 crap about man vs nature? Forget all that. This is about humanity in nature, humanity as a conquering and chaotic devilry of a force, unbeatable only on its own terms, even God's. There's so much going on in this novel that charms, even the Melvillian interruptions for discussion of sea life and off-the-cuff discussions of semi-related topics to the main story are welcome.
The plot? A lonely seaman goes to rescue a shipwreck crammed between two rocks on a deadly reef. Oh yeah, there's a girl. And a killer octopus. And crime. And murder. And the indomitable, simple idea that "It must be done". Hugo's genius not only lies in his telling of Gilliatt's tale, it's also in what he decides to leave out of the bulk of the novel: what everyone else is doing. But by the time you get to the harrowing final page, it'll all make sense.
One of the greats!
April 16, 2020
Victor Hugo’nun din, toplum ve doğa üçlemesini doğayı içeren kitabı Deniz İşçileri ile tamamlamış bulunmaktayım.
Hugo her kitabında zamanı, mekanı, dönemin yapısını en ince ayrıntısına kadar verir okuyucuya ve bunu öyle bir yapar ki anlatılan her şey yanı başınızda oluyor gibi, sanki o sokaklarda geziyormuş gibi hissedersiniz. Ama şunu çok net söyleyebilirim ki Deniz İşçileri bu konuda Hugo’nun bütün hünerlerini sergilediği kitabı olmuş. Böyle bir gözlem yeteneği yok gerçekten.
Hugo sürgün için gittiği ve sürgün kararı iptal edildikten sonra bile 15 yılını geçirdiği Guernsey Adasını anlatıyor kitabında, sanırım denizciliği de en ince ayrıntısına kadar burada gözlemliyor.
Kurgusal kısımda sevdiği kadın için hırçın dalgalar arasında kalmış bir gemiden bir makinayı tek başına kurtarmaya çalışan Gilliatt’ın mücadelesini okuyoruz.
Arka planda ise yine ne çok şeyden bahsediyor Hugo. En çok dikkatimi çeken de kitabın bir çok noktasında Hugo’nun yaratılışçı olduğunun izlerini görmem oldu. Bu kitap sanki diğer kitaplarına göre kendisinden daha çok izler bıraktığı bir kitap olmuş.
Zaman zaman denizcilikle ilgili olan kısımlarda kitaptan kopmuş olsamda Hugo’nun kitaplarını okuduğum için son derece memnunum. Ve şunu da belirtmek isterim ki büyük küçük fark etmez ahtapot gördüğüm yerde kaçacağım. Bunun için teşekkürler Hugo.
Hugo her kitabında zamanı, mekanı, dönemin yapısını en ince ayrıntısına kadar verir okuyucuya ve bunu öyle bir yapar ki anlatılan her şey yanı başınızda oluyor gibi, sanki o sokaklarda geziyormuş gibi hissedersiniz. Ama şunu çok net söyleyebilirim ki Deniz İşçileri bu konuda Hugo’nun bütün hünerlerini sergilediği kitabı olmuş. Böyle bir gözlem yeteneği yok gerçekten.
Hugo sürgün için gittiği ve sürgün kararı iptal edildikten sonra bile 15 yılını geçirdiği Guernsey Adasını anlatıyor kitabında, sanırım denizciliği de en ince ayrıntısına kadar burada gözlemliyor.
Kurgusal kısımda sevdiği kadın için hırçın dalgalar arasında kalmış bir gemiden bir makinayı tek başına kurtarmaya çalışan Gilliatt’ın mücadelesini okuyoruz.
Arka planda ise yine ne çok şeyden bahsediyor Hugo. En çok dikkatimi çeken de kitabın bir çok noktasında Hugo’nun yaratılışçı olduğunun izlerini görmem oldu. Bu kitap sanki diğer kitaplarına göre kendisinden daha çok izler bıraktığı bir kitap olmuş.
Zaman zaman denizcilikle ilgili olan kısımlarda kitaptan kopmuş olsamda Hugo’nun kitaplarını okuduğum için son derece memnunum. Ve şunu da belirtmek isterim ki büyük küçük fark etmez ahtapot gördüğüm yerde kaçacağım. Bunun için teşekkürler Hugo.
June 15, 2016
I consider Victor Hugo the apotheosis of a romantic writer, in whose fictional universe love, honor and commitment are the most worthy and noble of all human choices, though often made at great cost. This cost is usually tragic in his novels, but revealing, not flaws in the universe, but the relative insignificance of all calamities, even death, beside such choices.
The conflict of Toilers of the Sea puts the love, honor and commitment of its hero, Gilliatt, in the starkest possible relief -- so much so that it finally strains the credulity of the reader. But this is really only a flaw from the perspective of superficial realism. From such a standpoint,
The conflict of Toilers of the Sea puts the love, honor and commitment of its hero, Gilliatt, in the starkest possible relief -- so much so that it finally strains the credulity of the reader. But this is really only a flaw from the perspective of superficial realism. From such a standpoint,
May 28, 2012
تجسيد رائع للصمت القاتل ... أنت الوحيد أيها القارئ من يعلم بحب جيليات لداروشات ...
قرأت أغلب روايات فيكتور هوغو وتبقى عمال البحر "الأروع" ... أنصح الجميع بقراءتها
قرأت أغلب روايات فيكتور هوغو وتبقى عمال البحر "الأروع" ... أنصح الجميع بقراءتها
July 31, 2021
UPDATE: I notice that Hugo's "Hunchback" and "Les Miserables" appear in lots of 'greatest-novels-ever' list. But both "Toilers" and "The Man Who Laughs" (Hugo's masterpiece to me) are far better, tighter novels, and a lot more fun! Are people confusing Disney films and Hugh Jackman musicals with great novels or something? Just typing out loud.
ORIGINAL REVIEW:
Like early Clive Cussler? Then this is a must-read literary classic for you: a singular hero, Gilliatt (versus Dirk Pitt, his sidekick Giordino, tons of high tech equipment, and Numa backup teams the world over in Cussler's world) must salvage the engines of ship which is wrecked, upright, between two massive rock towers springing from the ocean depths using the technology of the mid-19th century.. How he does it is amazing enough: why he does it and what happens afterward is icing on the cake. Of the four Hugo novels I've read, this is my favorite. Just one flaw: Hugo utilizes a heartbreakingly beautiful final which is just too similar to the end of his (also very good) "The Man Who Laughs". As the end of the novel approaches, I was thinking, "Oh no, please no, not again, where's a box of tissue..." That said, still, "Toilers of the Sea" just might be the greatest "Man Vs. Nature" in all of fiction literature. And even if you know the ending, there will be tears.
ORIGINAL REVIEW:
Like early Clive Cussler? Then this is a must-read literary classic for you: a singular hero, Gilliatt (versus Dirk Pitt, his sidekick Giordino, tons of high tech equipment, and Numa backup teams the world over in Cussler's world) must salvage the engines of ship which is wrecked, upright, between two massive rock towers springing from the ocean depths using the technology of the mid-19th century.. How he does it is amazing enough: why he does it and what happens afterward is icing on the cake. Of the four Hugo novels I've read, this is my favorite. Just one flaw: Hugo utilizes a heartbreakingly beautiful final which is just too similar to the end of his (also very good) "The Man Who Laughs". As the end of the novel approaches, I was thinking, "Oh no, please no, not again, where's a box of tissue..." That said, still, "Toilers of the Sea" just might be the greatest "Man Vs. Nature" in all of fiction literature. And even if you know the ending, there will be tears.
April 11, 2020
رواية جيدة أنهكها الإغراق في التفصيل من غير لازمة.
هيغو يستفيض في وصف الإعصار ومسبباته، والموج وتبدلاته، والصخور وتاريخها، استفاضة من يلقي درساً في جغرافية البحار أو من يدرّب المستمع ليكون بحاراً.. بدلاً من أن يحكي ل�� عما يعتمل في نفس من يواجه ذلك الإعصار، ومن يحاول مهادنة ذاك الموج.
فكرة الرواية جميلة وجذابة، وقدرة الكاتب على التصوير هائلة، لكن الخطأ كان في زاوية الكاميرا.
يجدر بالذكر أن الخاتمة كانت رهيبة ومن الروعة بحيث لن أنساها أبداً.
هيغو يستفيض في وصف الإعصار ومسبباته، والموج وتبدلاته، والصخور وتاريخها، استفاضة من يلقي درساً في جغرافية البحار أو من يدرّب المستمع ليكون بحاراً.. بدلاً من أن يحكي ل�� عما يعتمل في نفس من يواجه ذلك الإعصار، ومن يحاول مهادنة ذاك الموج.
فكرة الرواية جميلة وجذابة، وقدرة الكاتب على التصوير هائلة، لكن الخطأ كان في زاوية الكاميرا.
يجدر بالذكر أن الخاتمة كانت رهيبة ومن الروعة بحيث لن أنساها أبداً.
December 16, 2012
You hear that? The earth just shook a little because Ernest Hemingway, after vomiting on himself, shook his fist in disgust as one more reader found The Toilers of the Sea.
Victor Hugo, the modern era's poet philosopher, ponders Man's relationship with nature. He musters every ounce of his romantic emotion and universal sooth-saying while still dictating precise details regarding the actions, jargon and sciences of the cultural entity in the Norman archipelago. But, of course, a social dissentor like Hugo can't ignore the naggging urge to satirically bash superstitious nonsense and ignorant judgements rampant through the towns on Guernsey and Jersey. Neither can he ignore another ever-present urge to execute long-winded diatribes about his setting. Alas, as with Hemingway, one endures tortures in order to experience the feeling of ethereal satisfaction upon closing their book.
Because Hugo wrote The Toilers of the Sea while in exile on the Channel, I thought his ideas about the conflict between man and nature might resemble the social conflicts between man and society. As I progressed through the book, I felt Hugo's hand paternally patting my shoulder as if to say, "It would have been a nice idea, but let's go a little deeper." And deeper we went.
My perspective on Man's role and place within nature broadened immensely as I read about Gilliatt's struggles in the Douvre reef as he attempts to save the engines from the successful sea merchants innovative steam ship, the Durande. Symbolically, of course, the steam ship, like any other industrial development, stands as an afront to nature and, as Hugo so sarcastically insinuats, to God. In saving the engines from a ruined Durande, held captive in the Douvre rocks, battered by nature, Man asserts his dominance over nature, even when it volleys its harshest artilery at him.
But something actually bothers me about Hugo's story. I found his personification of nature, his description of the sea and her power, embittered with human emotions like a formidable foe on a battlefield, excessive and tiresome. Hemingway high-five. Yet this distaste, to my surprise, led me down a path which Hugo may or may not have intended. At first, I noticed how Gilliatt derived meaning for his own life and struggles from viewing nature as a personified entity. Do men really struggle against nature, or themselves? Perhaps this perspective on nature derives from an emotional or conditional projection of ones own existence, therefore injecting value into one's ego. We view nature as an adversary because it bolsters our sense of cosmic importance, much like actual wars, which we wage oftentimes for principle, would solidy our place in a civilization and add credence to our ways of life.
But then I wondered how Gilliatt could curse nature but subsist on its bounty for survival simultaneously. Why chastise a rock as a malicious adversary, part of a sea trying to destroy him, then watch that same sea indifferently smash and batter that same rock? Then I finally wondered why, at the end of it all, Gilliatt did not display any pride, any triumphant celebrations. What did he learn? What does he know now that I do not?
Hugo revealed his philosophy on Man's relationship with nature - not against nature, not versus nature. As in so many other cases, especially with God, Man thinks of his foe only when he notices it blocking his own profit or prosperity. We think of ourselves at odds with nature only when the storm comes. We feel a peace, a happiness, even, I daresay, a unity with nature when Spring comes, the flowers bloom, the scented breeze sooths and the trees shade. Can we exist united with nature in these cases but then sever the treaty when the storm comes? Or ought we to be like the rock and endure the pleasant and the storm in the same fashion? Similary, Mess Lethierry, the Durande's owner who rises to immense profits and, after the shipwreck, dives into deep depressions and social ruin, must weather the calm and the storm. His daughter, who must marry one man while loving another, must endure such a calamity as she endured the bliss of riches and innocence before coming of age.
But, again, what did Gilliatt learn? Why did he not return home as a triumphant war hero, happy in his newfound valued ego? Hugo will not tell us, but one might infer it from Gilliatt's actions - another Hemingway high-five. Without disclosing the final events of the novel, consider whether man himself exists as a benign part of the natural cycle. Man need not fight nature, except in his own ignorant egoism, but at a high level of understanding knows that, like nature, he is responsible to bring the calm, raise the flowers and provide the shade for others while enduring the destructive powers which the same nature brings. Man can end the storms in others' lives. He can endure the violence of the tempest and act out the beauty of Eden. He needs not stop one any more than the other. He exists as a part of the cycle, ready to pass on as easily as promote the well-being of his fellow man.
Man ebbs and flows with nature no matter the contrary efforts and arguments for which he toils. He enjoys the ethereal quality of creation while respecting the power of destruction - embracing life and death both in their might and beauty. He cannot alter either and in fighting one he severs himself from the other in an ignorant display of fical egoism, benefitting only to himself, and loses before his adversary ever breaks a sweat.
Victor Hugo, the modern era's poet philosopher, ponders Man's relationship with nature. He musters every ounce of his romantic emotion and universal sooth-saying while still dictating precise details regarding the actions, jargon and sciences of the cultural entity in the Norman archipelago. But, of course, a social dissentor like Hugo can't ignore the naggging urge to satirically bash superstitious nonsense and ignorant judgements rampant through the towns on Guernsey and Jersey. Neither can he ignore another ever-present urge to execute long-winded diatribes about his setting. Alas, as with Hemingway, one endures tortures in order to experience the feeling of ethereal satisfaction upon closing their book.
Because Hugo wrote The Toilers of the Sea while in exile on the Channel, I thought his ideas about the conflict between man and nature might resemble the social conflicts between man and society. As I progressed through the book, I felt Hugo's hand paternally patting my shoulder as if to say, "It would have been a nice idea, but let's go a little deeper." And deeper we went.
My perspective on Man's role and place within nature broadened immensely as I read about Gilliatt's struggles in the Douvre reef as he attempts to save the engines from the successful sea merchants innovative steam ship, the Durande. Symbolically, of course, the steam ship, like any other industrial development, stands as an afront to nature and, as Hugo so sarcastically insinuats, to God. In saving the engines from a ruined Durande, held captive in the Douvre rocks, battered by nature, Man asserts his dominance over nature, even when it volleys its harshest artilery at him.
But something actually bothers me about Hugo's story. I found his personification of nature, his description of the sea and her power, embittered with human emotions like a formidable foe on a battlefield, excessive and tiresome. Hemingway high-five. Yet this distaste, to my surprise, led me down a path which Hugo may or may not have intended. At first, I noticed how Gilliatt derived meaning for his own life and struggles from viewing nature as a personified entity. Do men really struggle against nature, or themselves? Perhaps this perspective on nature derives from an emotional or conditional projection of ones own existence, therefore injecting value into one's ego. We view nature as an adversary because it bolsters our sense of cosmic importance, much like actual wars, which we wage oftentimes for principle, would solidy our place in a civilization and add credence to our ways of life.
But then I wondered how Gilliatt could curse nature but subsist on its bounty for survival simultaneously. Why chastise a rock as a malicious adversary, part of a sea trying to destroy him, then watch that same sea indifferently smash and batter that same rock? Then I finally wondered why, at the end of it all, Gilliatt did not display any pride, any triumphant celebrations. What did he learn? What does he know now that I do not?
Hugo revealed his philosophy on Man's relationship with nature - not against nature, not versus nature. As in so many other cases, especially with God, Man thinks of his foe only when he notices it blocking his own profit or prosperity. We think of ourselves at odds with nature only when the storm comes. We feel a peace, a happiness, even, I daresay, a unity with nature when Spring comes, the flowers bloom, the scented breeze sooths and the trees shade. Can we exist united with nature in these cases but then sever the treaty when the storm comes? Or ought we to be like the rock and endure the pleasant and the storm in the same fashion? Similary, Mess Lethierry, the Durande's owner who rises to immense profits and, after the shipwreck, dives into deep depressions and social ruin, must weather the calm and the storm. His daughter, who must marry one man while loving another, must endure such a calamity as she endured the bliss of riches and innocence before coming of age.
But, again, what did Gilliatt learn? Why did he not return home as a triumphant war hero, happy in his newfound valued ego? Hugo will not tell us, but one might infer it from Gilliatt's actions - another Hemingway high-five. Without disclosing the final events of the novel, consider whether man himself exists as a benign part of the natural cycle. Man need not fight nature, except in his own ignorant egoism, but at a high level of understanding knows that, like nature, he is responsible to bring the calm, raise the flowers and provide the shade for others while enduring the destructive powers which the same nature brings. Man can end the storms in others' lives. He can endure the violence of the tempest and act out the beauty of Eden. He needs not stop one any more than the other. He exists as a part of the cycle, ready to pass on as easily as promote the well-being of his fellow man.
Man ebbs and flows with nature no matter the contrary efforts and arguments for which he toils. He enjoys the ethereal quality of creation while respecting the power of destruction - embracing life and death both in their might and beauty. He cannot alter either and in fighting one he severs himself from the other in an ignorant display of fical egoism, benefitting only to himself, and loses before his adversary ever breaks a sweat.
April 28, 2018
Romanul, scris la apogeul carierei marelui romantic francez (1866), este dedicat de autor locuitorilor insulei Guernsey, unde aceasta a fost exilat la mijlocul secolului al XIX-lea: "Închin această carte insulei ospitalității și libertății, acestui colț din bătrânul pământ normand, unde trăiește un mic popor de nobili oameni ai marii - asprei și blandei stânci Guernsey, astăzi azilul meu și, poate, și mormântul".
În fapt, Guernsey-ul era pe atunci, că astăzi, de altfel, dependent din punct de vedere politic de Coroana Regatului Unit, însă fără a face parte din acesta și nici din UE. Astăzi despre Guernsey și Jersey se știe doar că au fost singurele insule din Canalul Mânecii pe care naziștii au reușit să le ocupe și că sunt veritabile paradisuri fiscale europene (motiv pentru care nu fac parte nici din UE).
În sine, deși romanul abundă în termeni tehnici despre vapoare, porturi și alte asemenea, lectura acestuia este de-a dreptul relaxantă. În fapt, parcurgând jumătate din el, nici nu ai spune că este scris de Hugo: romantismul lipsește cu desăvârșire. Abia ulterior se conturează drama unor personaje care, deși caracterizate de platitudine dintru început, reușesc, imboldite de arta literară a lui Hugo, să se dezrobească de cotidian și să se manifeste liber.
Aici se poate dibui și una dintre intențiile autorului: în fiecare om, chiar caracterizat și catalogat drept plat la o privire sinoptică, se poate discerne spiritul său de sacrificiu, ceea ce face ca noi toți să fim, cel puțin în ungherele cele mai ascunse ale sufletului nostru, uneori nici de noi cunoscute, adevărați Avraami în fața lui dumnezeu. Avem nevoie doar de acel dumnezeu, de acea ființă sau de acea împrejurare care, cu toată carapacea noastră, să ne... pătrundă.
E drept că astfel se pot contura "deznadejdile puse față în față", cum este intitulat unul dintre capitolele romanului, dar nu întotdeauna "mormântul cel mare" reprezintă o înfrângere, căci deseori nu denotă altceva decât izbăvirea unui suflet nobil asupra tuturor, asupra micimii întregii lumi, fiind "acceptarea funerară a unei noi împliniri", previzibile.
"Dacă nu s-ar aprinde nimic îndărătul pleoapei, înseamnă că niciun gând nu încolțește în minte, înseamnă că niciun sentiment de dragoste nu clocotește în inima. Acela care iubește, acela are și voință, iar voință înflăcărează privirea omului. [...] Aproape toată taină sufletelor mari stă în aceste cuvinte: <> - Să perseverezi!"
"Istovirea forțelor nu istovește însă și voință. Voința și nu credința constituie forța principală. Credința despre care se spune că ar fi în stare să mute munții din loc nu reprezintă nimic față de ceea ce poate înfăptui voință".
În fapt, Guernsey-ul era pe atunci, că astăzi, de altfel, dependent din punct de vedere politic de Coroana Regatului Unit, însă fără a face parte din acesta și nici din UE. Astăzi despre Guernsey și Jersey se știe doar că au fost singurele insule din Canalul Mânecii pe care naziștii au reușit să le ocupe și că sunt veritabile paradisuri fiscale europene (motiv pentru care nu fac parte nici din UE).
În sine, deși romanul abundă în termeni tehnici despre vapoare, porturi și alte asemenea, lectura acestuia este de-a dreptul relaxantă. În fapt, parcurgând jumătate din el, nici nu ai spune că este scris de Hugo: romantismul lipsește cu desăvârșire. Abia ulterior se conturează drama unor personaje care, deși caracterizate de platitudine dintru început, reușesc, imboldite de arta literară a lui Hugo, să se dezrobească de cotidian și să se manifeste liber.
Aici se poate dibui și una dintre intențiile autorului: în fiecare om, chiar caracterizat și catalogat drept plat la o privire sinoptică, se poate discerne spiritul său de sacrificiu, ceea ce face ca noi toți să fim, cel puțin în ungherele cele mai ascunse ale sufletului nostru, uneori nici de noi cunoscute, adevărați Avraami în fața lui dumnezeu. Avem nevoie doar de acel dumnezeu, de acea ființă sau de acea împrejurare care, cu toată carapacea noastră, să ne... pătrundă.
E drept că astfel se pot contura "deznadejdile puse față în față", cum este intitulat unul dintre capitolele romanului, dar nu întotdeauna "mormântul cel mare" reprezintă o înfrângere, căci deseori nu denotă altceva decât izbăvirea unui suflet nobil asupra tuturor, asupra micimii întregii lumi, fiind "acceptarea funerară a unei noi împliniri", previzibile.
"Dacă nu s-ar aprinde nimic îndărătul pleoapei, înseamnă că niciun gând nu încolțește în minte, înseamnă că niciun sentiment de dragoste nu clocotește în inima. Acela care iubește, acela are și voință, iar voință înflăcărează privirea omului. [...] Aproape toată taină sufletelor mari stă în aceste cuvinte: <> - Să perseverezi!"
"Istovirea forțelor nu istovește însă și voință. Voința și nu credința constituie forța principală. Credința despre care se spune că ar fi în stare să mute munții din loc nu reprezintă nimic față de ceea ce poate înfăptui voință".
June 16, 2021
,,Homo homini monstrum=omul este monstru pentru alt om"
,,E ciudata ușurința cu care cred ticăloșii că succesul este ceva ce li se cuvine"
,,E ciudata ușurința cu care cred ticăloșii că succesul este ceva ce li se cuvine"
December 28, 2012
PREFACE
Religion, Society, and Nature! these are the three struggles of man. They constitute at the same time his three needs. He has need of a faith; hence the temple. He must create; hence the city. He must live; hence the plough and the ship. But these three solutions comprise three perpetual conflicts. The mysterious difficulty of life results from all three. Man strives with obstacles under the form of superstition, under the form of prejudice, and under the form of the elements. A triple ἁναγκη weighs upon us. There is the fatality of dogmas, the oppression of human laws, the inexorability of nature. In Notre Dame de Paris the author denounced the first; in the Misérables he exemplified the second; in this book he indicates the third. With these three fatalities mingles that inward fatality—the supreme ἁναγκη, the human heart.
Page 134:
The Channel Islands are like England, an aristocratic region. Castes exist there still. The castes have their peculiar ideas, which are, in fact, their protection. These notions of caste are everywhere similar; in Hindostan, as in Germany, nobility is won by the sword; lost by soiling the hands with labour: but preserved by idleness. To do nothing, is to live nobly; whoever abstains from work is honoured. A trade is fatal. In France, in old times, there was no exception to this rule, except in the case of glass manufacturers. Emptying bottles being then one of the glories of gentlemen, making them was probably, for that reason, not considered dishonourable. In the Channel archipelago, as in Great Britain, he who would remain noble must contrive to be rich. A working man cannot possibly be a gentleman. If he has ever been one, he is so no longer. Yonder sailor, perhaps, descends from the Knights Bannerets, but is nothing but a sailor.
Page 236:
It is the self-willed ones who are sublime. He who is only brave, has but a passing fit, he who is only valiant has temperament and nothing more, he who is courageous has but one virtue. He who persists in the truth is the grand character.[Pg 236] The secret of great hearts may be summed up in the word: Perseverando. Perseverance is to courage what the wheel is to the lever; it is the continual renewing of the centre of support. Let the desired goal be on earth or in heaven, only make for the goal. Everything is in that; in the first case one is a Columbus, in the second a god. Not to allow conscience to argue or the will to fail—this is the way to suffering and glory. In the world of ethics to fall does not exclude the possibility of soaring, rather does it give impetus to flight. The mediocrities allow themselves to be dissuaded by the specious obstacles—the great ones never. To perish is their perhaps, to conquer their conviction. You may propose many good reasons to the martyr why he should not allow himself to be stoned to death. Disdain of every reasonable objection begets that sublime victory of the vanquished which we call martyrdom.
Page 238:
The pressure of darkness acts in inverse proportion upon different kinds of natures. In the presence of night man feels his own incompleteness. He perceives the dark void and is sensible of infirmity. It is like the vacancy of blindness. Face to face with night, man bends, kneels, prostrates himself, crouches on the earth, crawls towards a cave, or seeks for wings. Almost always he shrinks from that vague presence of the Infinite Unknown. He asks himself what it is; he trembles and bows the head. Sometimes he desires to go to it.
This curiosity is evidently forbidden to the spirit of man; for all around him the roads which bridge that gulf are broken up or gone. No arch exists for him to span the Infinite. But there is attraction in forbidden knowledge, as in the edge of the abyss. Where the footstep cannot tread, the eye may reach; where the eye can penetrate no further, the mind may soar. There is no man, however feeble or insufficient his resources, who does not essay. According to his nature he questions or recoils before that mystery. With some it has the effect of repressing; with others it enlarges the soul. The spectacle is sombre, indefinite.
Another great masterpiece by Victor Hugo, one of the greatest French writers.
The English version of this book can be found at Gutenberg Project.
Religion, Society, and Nature! these are the three struggles of man. They constitute at the same time his three needs. He has need of a faith; hence the temple. He must create; hence the city. He must live; hence the plough and the ship. But these three solutions comprise three perpetual conflicts. The mysterious difficulty of life results from all three. Man strives with obstacles under the form of superstition, under the form of prejudice, and under the form of the elements. A triple ἁναγκη weighs upon us. There is the fatality of dogmas, the oppression of human laws, the inexorability of nature. In Notre Dame de Paris the author denounced the first; in the Misérables he exemplified the second; in this book he indicates the third. With these three fatalities mingles that inward fatality—the supreme ἁναγκη, the human heart.
Page 134:
The Channel Islands are like England, an aristocratic region. Castes exist there still. The castes have their peculiar ideas, which are, in fact, their protection. These notions of caste are everywhere similar; in Hindostan, as in Germany, nobility is won by the sword; lost by soiling the hands with labour: but preserved by idleness. To do nothing, is to live nobly; whoever abstains from work is honoured. A trade is fatal. In France, in old times, there was no exception to this rule, except in the case of glass manufacturers. Emptying bottles being then one of the glories of gentlemen, making them was probably, for that reason, not considered dishonourable. In the Channel archipelago, as in Great Britain, he who would remain noble must contrive to be rich. A working man cannot possibly be a gentleman. If he has ever been one, he is so no longer. Yonder sailor, perhaps, descends from the Knights Bannerets, but is nothing but a sailor.
Page 236:
It is the self-willed ones who are sublime. He who is only brave, has but a passing fit, he who is only valiant has temperament and nothing more, he who is courageous has but one virtue. He who persists in the truth is the grand character.[Pg 236] The secret of great hearts may be summed up in the word: Perseverando. Perseverance is to courage what the wheel is to the lever; it is the continual renewing of the centre of support. Let the desired goal be on earth or in heaven, only make for the goal. Everything is in that; in the first case one is a Columbus, in the second a god. Not to allow conscience to argue or the will to fail—this is the way to suffering and glory. In the world of ethics to fall does not exclude the possibility of soaring, rather does it give impetus to flight. The mediocrities allow themselves to be dissuaded by the specious obstacles—the great ones never. To perish is their perhaps, to conquer their conviction. You may propose many good reasons to the martyr why he should not allow himself to be stoned to death. Disdain of every reasonable objection begets that sublime victory of the vanquished which we call martyrdom.
Page 238:
The pressure of darkness acts in inverse proportion upon different kinds of natures. In the presence of night man feels his own incompleteness. He perceives the dark void and is sensible of infirmity. It is like the vacancy of blindness. Face to face with night, man bends, kneels, prostrates himself, crouches on the earth, crawls towards a cave, or seeks for wings. Almost always he shrinks from that vague presence of the Infinite Unknown. He asks himself what it is; he trembles and bows the head. Sometimes he desires to go to it.
This curiosity is evidently forbidden to the spirit of man; for all around him the roads which bridge that gulf are broken up or gone. No arch exists for him to span the Infinite. But there is attraction in forbidden knowledge, as in the edge of the abyss. Where the footstep cannot tread, the eye may reach; where the eye can penetrate no further, the mind may soar. There is no man, however feeble or insufficient his resources, who does not essay. According to his nature he questions or recoils before that mystery. With some it has the effect of repressing; with others it enlarges the soul. The spectacle is sombre, indefinite.
Another great masterpiece by Victor Hugo, one of the greatest French writers.
The English version of this book can be found at Gutenberg Project.
April 22, 2020
Bu kitaba methiyeler düzebilirim. Denizin bu kadar net anlatıldığı çok az kitap okudum. Karanlığını, aydınlığını, cömertliğini, ihtişamını, zorluğunu, zorluğun ardına sakladığı güzelliğini, görkemini, öfkesini...
July 9, 2016
Victor! Già nel titolo c'è tutta la tua grandezza: quella pluralità che rende epica l'opera, perché l'epica non dev’essere confinata alla guerra; il lavoro può essere epico, e tu lo spieghi con forza, poesia, spessore e intensità tali da togliere il respiro.
Dall’isola di Guernesey, tua terra d’esilio, ispirazione e libertà hai glorificato il lavoro. Il lavoro degli uomini, del mare, del vento. Il lavoro incessante delle forze naturali, instancabile, perpetuo, spesso violento.
Gilliat resiste a ogni sofferenza con volontà granitica. “La volontà inebria. Ci si può inebriare della propria anima. E quel genere di ubriachezza si chiama eroismo”. L’eroe Gilliat ha la forza di domare la natura, l’uomo Gilliat cede alle ferite dell’anima che affida al moto del mare. Mare, grembo della vita. Mare, madre accogliente che culla e dona pace. Talvota eterna.
Ti ho figurato scrivere, come tuo uso, in piedi, al leggio collocato di fronte alla finestra affacciata sull’oceano che nei giorni limpidi mostra, laggiù, all’orizzonte, la costa francese.
Grazie, Victor. Grazie!
Dall’isola di Guernesey, tua terra d’esilio, ispirazione e libertà hai glorificato il lavoro. Il lavoro degli uomini, del mare, del vento. Il lavoro incessante delle forze naturali, instancabile, perpetuo, spesso violento.
Gilliat resiste a ogni sofferenza con volontà granitica. “La volontà inebria. Ci si può inebriare della propria anima. E quel genere di ubriachezza si chiama eroismo”. L’eroe Gilliat ha la forza di domare la natura, l’uomo Gilliat cede alle ferite dell’anima che affida al moto del mare. Mare, grembo della vita. Mare, madre accogliente che culla e dona pace. Talvota eterna.
Ti ho figurato scrivere, come tuo uso, in piedi, al leggio collocato di fronte alla finestra affacciata sull’oceano che nei giorni limpidi mostra, laggiù, all’orizzonte, la costa francese.
Grazie, Victor. Grazie!
May 23, 2018
While I was in Guernsey, I read this lesser known Victor Hugo book. I may be biased since I read it while wandering through the island where this book is set and where Hugo lived when he wrote it, but I absolutely loved this book! Because I was exploring the island as I read Hugo’s descriptions, I had the most vivid pictures in my head. I pressed Guernsey wildflowers into the pages of my antique copy as I carried it around with me. Gilliatt is a beautiful character, and the ending is heartbreaking and on par with a great Hardy tragedy. Of course Hugo can be a little wordy with descriptions, but in this case, I enjoyed every bit of it! I felt like I discovered a treasure in this book.
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