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77-583: According to the Swiss ethnologist Albert Samuel Gatschet , the name Chillon derives from the Waldensian dialect and means "flat stone, slab, platform". The name Castrum Quilonis , attested from 1195, would, therefore, mean "castle built on a rock platform. The castle of Chillon is built on the island of Chillon, an oval limestone rock advancing in Lake Geneva between Montreux and Villeneuve with

154-590: A crucifix or priest. In his will, he made the same stipulation about his own death and funeral. Yet he believed in life after death and prayed every single morning and night, convinced as he wrote in The Man Who Laughs that "Thanksgiving has wings and flies to its right destination. Your prayer knows its way better than you do." Hugo's rationalism can be found in poems such as Torquemada (1869, about religious fanaticism ), The Pope (1878, anti-clerical ), Religions and Religion (1880, denying

231-456: A Catholic and professed respect for Church hierarchy and authority. From there he became a non-practising Catholic and increasingly expressed anti-Catholic and anti-clerical views. He frequented spiritism during his exile (where he participated also in many séances conducted by Madame Delphine de Girardin ) and in later years settled into a rationalist deism similar to that espoused by Voltaire . A census-taker asked Hugo in 1872 if he

308-596: A Condemned Man published in 1829 analyses the pangs of a man awaiting execution; several entries in Things Seen ( Choses vues ), the diary he kept between 1830 and 1885, convey his firm condemnation of what he regarded as a barbaric sentence; on 15 September 1848, seven months after the Revolution of 1848 , he delivered a speech before the Assembly and concluded, "You have overthrown the throne. ... Now overthrow

385-411: A Swiss scientist is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This biography of a United States linguist is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This article about an ethnologist is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo, vicomte Hugo ( French: [viktɔʁ maʁi yɡo] ; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885)

462-606: A bad example no longer.... The United States must renounce slavery, or they must renounce liberty." In 1859, he wrote a letter asking the United States government, for the sake of their own reputation in the future, to spare abolitionist John Brown's life, Hugo justified Brown's actions by these words: "Assuredly, if insurrection is ever a sacred duty, it must be when it is directed against Slavery." Hugo agreed to diffuse and sell one of his best known drawings, "Le Pendu", an homage to John Brown, so one could "keep alive in souls

539-554: A banquet to celebrate the abolition of slavery, in the presence of the French abolitionist writer and parliamentarian Victor Schœlcher, Hugo declared that the Mediterranean Sea formed a natural divide between "ultimate civilisation and ... utter barbarism." Hugo declared that "God offers Africa to Europe. Take it" and "in the nineteenth century the white man made a man out of the black, in the twentieth century Europe will make

616-474: A comrade of General Hugo's during the campaign in Vendee. In October 1807, the family rejoined Leopold, now Colonel Hugo, Governor of the province of Avellino . There, Hugo was taught mathematics by Giuseppe de Samuele Cagnazzi , elder brother of Italian scientist Luca de Samuele Cagnazzi . Sophie found out that Leopold had been living in secret with an Englishwoman called Catherine Thomas. Soon, Hugo's father

693-693: A great source of inspiration for musicians, stirring them to create not only opera and ballet but musical theatre such as Notre-Dame de Paris and the ever-popular Les Misérables , London West End 's longest running musical. Additionally, Hugo's poems have attracted an exceptional amount of interest from musicians, and numerous melodies have been based on his poetry by composers such as Berlioz , Bizet , Fauré , Franck , Lalo , Liszt , Massenet , Saint-Saëns , Rachmaninoff , and Wagner . Today, Hugo's work continues to stimulate musicians to create new compositions. For example, Hugo's novel against capital punishment, The Last Day of

770-493: A letter to a friend that, thanks to Liszt's piano lessons, he learned how to play a favourite song on the piano – with only one finger. Hugo also worked with composer Louise Bertin , writing the libretto for her 1836 opera La Esmeralda , which was based on the character in The Hunchback of Notre Dame . Although for various reasons the opera closed soon after its fifth performance and is little known today, it has enjoyed

847-696: A mentor to Hugo and his brothers. In 1811, the family joined their father in Spain. Hugo and his brothers were sent to school in Madrid at the Real Colegio de San Antonio de Abad while Sophie returned to Paris on her own, now officially separated from her husband. In 1812, as the Peninsular War was turning against France, de La Horie was arrested and executed. In February 1815, Hugo and Eugène were taken away from their mother and placed by their father in

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924-526: A modern revival, both in a piano/song concert version by Liszt at the Festival international Victor Hugo et Égaux 2007 and in a full orchestral version presented in July 2008 at Le Festival de Radio France et Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon . He was also on friendly terms with Frederic Chopin . He introduced him to George Sand who would be his lover for years. In 1849, Hugo attended Chopin's funeral. On

1001-488: A periodical called Le Conservateur littéraire . Hugo published his first novel ( Hans of Iceland , 1823) the year following his marriage, and his second three years later ( Bug-Jargal , 1826). Between 1829 and 1840, he published five more volumes of poetry: Les Orientales , 1829; Les Feuilles d'automne , 1831; Les Chants du crépuscule  [ fr ] , 1835; Les Voix intérieures , 1837; and Les Rayons et les Ombres , 1840. This cemented his reputation as one of

1078-580: A photomural of Chateau Chillon. The castle has twice hosted the Compagnie du Graal theatre company, based in Thonon-les-Bains , in 2009 for a sound and light adaptation of Shakespeare 's King Lear and again in 2012 for the creation of an epic fresco inspired by the titan of Greek mythology, Hyperion . Albert Samuel Gatschet Albert Samuel Gatschet (October 3, 1832, Beatenberg , Canton of Bern – March 16, 1907, Washington, D.C. )

1155-458: A playwright grew with subsequent plays, such as Marion Delorme (1831), Le roi s'amuse (1832), and Ruy Blas (1838). Hugo's novel Notre-Dame de Paris ( The Hunchback of Notre-Dame ) was published in 1831 and quickly translated into other languages across Europe. One of the effects of the novel was to shame the City of Paris into restoring the much neglected Cathedral of Notre Dame , which

1232-578: A precursor to his great work on social injustice, Les Misérables . Hugo became the figurehead of the Romantic literary movement with the plays Cromwell (1827) and Hernani (1830). Hernani announced the arrival of French romanticism: performed at the Comédie-Française , it was greeted with several nights of rioting as romantics and traditionalists clashed over the play's deliberate disregard for neo-classical rules. Hugo's popularity as

1309-631: A steep side on one side and on the other side the lake and its steep bottom. The placement of the castle is strategic: it guards the passage between the Vaud Riviera  [ fr ] , which allows access to the north towards Germany and France , and the Rhone valley , a quick route to Italy , and offers a viewpoint over the Savoyard coast on the opposite side of the lake. A garrison could thus control (both militarily and commercially) access to

1386-538: A strong impact there. He also composed or published some of his best work during his period in Guernsey , including Les Misérables , and three widely praised collections of poetry ( Les Châtiments , 1853; Les Contemplations , 1856; and La Légende des siècles , 1859). However, Víctor Hugo said in Les Misérables: The wretched moral character of Thénardier, the frustrated bourgeois,

1463-572: A superior unity and constitute a European fraternity, just as Normandy , Brittany , Burgundy , Lorraine , have been blended into France", this new state would be administered by "a great Sovereign senate which will be to Europe what the Parliament is to England". Because of his concern for the rights of artists and copyright , he was a founding member of the Association Littéraire et Artistique Internationale , which led to

1540-558: A symbolic and premonitory significance for Daisy Miller, who thinks she can escape the shackles of social conventions. In 1890, watchmaker Edouard- GabrielWuthrich, finished a mechanical automaton that took five years to make. Made of zinc , steel and brass it is a 1/100 scale model illustrating the capture of the castle and liberation of François Bonivard by the Bernese in 1536. Measuring 100 cm × 67 cm × 42 cm (39 in × 26 in × 17 in), it

1617-644: A world out of Africa". This might partly explain why in spite of his deep interest and involvement in political matters he remained silent on the Algerian issue. He knew about the atrocities committed by the French Army during the French conquest of Algeria as evidenced by his diary but he never denounced them publicly; however, in Les Misérables , Hugo wrote: "Algeria too harshly conquered, and, as in

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1694-579: Is decorated with 14th century murals . Having been inspired by the story of François Bonivard after a visit to the castle, Lord Byron wrote a poem entitled The Prisoner of Chillon in 1816 about François. Byron supposedly carved his name on a pillar of the dungeon. Letitia Elizabeth Landon included a poetical illustration to a painting of the castle by Samuel Prout (engraved by J. B. Allen), [REDACTED] 'The Castle of Chillon' . in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1838. Gustave Courbet painted

1771-530: Is equipped with a music box with original sheet music handwritten by Genevan composer E. Perrin and includes one hundred moving figurines, including many small soldiers and scenes of torture in dungeons visible through barred windows. The automaton disappeared for decades and was eventually purchased by the Association of Friends of Chillon, the Cantonal Museum of Archeology and History (MCAH) and

1848-423: Is that this book is going to be one of the peaks, if not the crowning point of my work." Publication of Les Misérables went to the highest bidder. The Belgian publishing house Lacroix and Verboeckhoven undertook a marketing campaign unusual for the time, issuing press releases about the work a full six months before the launch. It also initially published only the first part of the novel (" Fantine "), which

1925-578: The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works . However, in Pauvert 's published archives, he states strongly that "any work of art has two authors: the people who confusingly feel something, a creator who translates these feelings, and the people again who consecrate his vision of that feeling. When one of the authors dies, the rights should totally be granted back to

2002-666: The Great Saint Bernard Pass . A charter of 1150, in which Count Humbert III granted the Cistercians of Hautcrêt free passage to Chillon, shows that the castle was under the authority of the House of Savoy . From the mid 12th century, the castle was summer home to the Counts of Savoy , who kept a fleet of ships on Lake Geneva. The castle was greatly expanded in 1248 and 1266-7 by Count Peter II . During this time

2079-626: The Zurich Antiquity Society, Johann Rudolf Rahn boasted about it, while the German Emperor, William II , inquired about the Chillon model when planning the reconstruction of the fortress of Haut-Koenigsbourg . Due to these restorations, the castle is in excellent condition and is a good model of feudal architecture. From the end of the 18th century, the castle attracted romantic writers and inspired poets from around

2156-567: The Ages ). Hugo was at the forefront of the Romantic literary movement with his play Cromwell and drama Hernani . His works have inspired music, both during his lifetime and after his death, including the opera Rigoletto and the musicals Les Misérables and Notre-Dame de Paris . He produced more than 4,000 drawings in his lifetime, and campaigned for social causes such as the abolition of capital punishment and slavery . Although he

2233-499: The Bagne in 1839 and took extensive notes, though he did not start writing the book until 1845. On one of the pages of his notes about the prison, he wrote in large block letters a possible name for his hero: "JEAN TRÉJEAN". When the book was finally written, Tréjean became Jean Valjean . Hugo was acutely aware of the quality of the novel, as evidenced in a letter he wrote to his publisher, Albert Lacroix, on 23 March 1862: "My conviction

2310-668: The Castle Foundation, for 59,000 Swiss francs , at an auction held in Paris in March 2016. The painter E. Lapierre depicted the castle in oil on canvas in 1896. Chillon was used as the cover image of Bill Evans' 1968 live album Bill Evans at the Montreux Jazz Festival and inspired the castle in the 1989 Disney animated film The Little Mermaid . Patrick Caulfield 's painting After Lunch (1975) includes

2387-636: The Commune subjected to brutal repression. He had been in Brussels since 22 March 1871 when in the 27 May issue of the Belgian newspaper l’Indépendance Victor Hugo denounced the government's refusal to grant political asylum to the Communards threatened with imprisonment, banishment or execution. This caused so much uproar that in the evening a mob of fifty to sixty men attempted to force their way into

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2464-601: The Pension Cordier, a private boarding school in Paris, where Hugo and Eugène remained for three years while also attending lectures at Lycée Louis le Grand. On 10 July 1816, Hugo wrote in his diary: "I shall be Chateaubriand or nothing." In 1817, he wrote a poem for a competition organised by the Academie Française , for which he received an honorable mention. The Academicians refused to believe that he

2541-538: The Spanish title was not legally recognized in France. Hugo later titled himself as a viscount, and it was as "Vicomte Victor Hugo" that he was appointed a peer of France on 13 April 1845. Weary of the constant moving required by military life, Sophie separated temporarily from Léopold and settled in Paris in 1803 with her sons. There, she began seeing General Victor Fanneau de La Horie , Hugo's godfather, who had been

2618-723: The Upper Chamber of Parliament as a pair de France in 1845, where he spoke against the death penalty and social injustice , and in favour of freedom of the press and self-government for Poland. In 1848, Hugo was elected to the National Assembly of the Second Republic as a conservative. In 1849, he broke with the conservatives when he gave a noted speech calling for the end of misery and poverty. Other speeches called for universal suffrage and free education for all children. Hugo's advocacy to abolish

2695-448: The author's name and reflected the acute social conscience that would infuse his later work. Le Dernier jour d'un condamné ( The Last Day of a Condemned Man ) would have a profound influence on later writers such as Albert Camus , Charles Dickens , and Fyodor Dostoyevsky . Claude Gueux, a documentary short story about a real-life murderer who had been executed in France, was published in 1834. Hugo himself later considered it to be

2772-460: The book. Hugo returned to political and social issues in his next novel, L'Homme Qui Rit ( The Man Who Laughs ), which was published in 1869 and painted a critical picture of the aristocracy. The novel was not as successful as his previous efforts, and Hugo himself began to comment on the growing distance between himself and literary contemporaries such as Flaubert and Émile Zola , whose realist and naturalist novels were now exceeding

2849-541: The case of India by the English, with more barbarism than civilization." After coming in contact with Victor Schœlcher , a writer who fought for the abolition of slavery and French colonialism in the Caribbean, he started strongly campaigning against slavery. In a letter to American abolitionist Maria Weston Chapman , on 6 July 1851, Hugo wrote: "Slavery in the United States! It is the duty of this republic to set such

2926-524: The castle several times during his Swiss exile in nearby La Tour-de-Peilz . The most famous representation is "The Castle of Chillon," oil on canvas painted in 1874 and currently located at the Musée Courbet in Ornans . In his 1878 novel " Daisy Miller ", Henry James has his heroine and a young American compatriot, Winterbourne, visit Chillon Castle. The one-time prison of François Bonivard assumes

3003-640: The castle was captured by a Bernese army, and all the prisoners, including Bonivard, were released. The castle became the residence for the Bernese bailiff. In 1798, the French-speaking canton of Vaud drove out the German-speaking Bernese authorities and declared the Lemanic Republic . The Vaudois invited in French troops to help them maintain autonomy from the other Swiss. When the French moved in and occupied , Chillon

3080-504: The castle's website, "Switzerland's most visited historic monument". There are parking spaces and a nearby bus stop. Inside the castle are recreations of the interiors of some of the main rooms including the grand bedroom, hall, and cave stores. Visitors can view four great halls, three courtyards, and a series of bedrooms including the Camera domini , which was occupied by the Duke of Savoy and

3157-523: The cause of Romanticism, became involved in politics (though mostly as a champion of Republicanism ), and was forced into exile due to his political stances. Along with Chateaubriand he attended the Coronation of Charles X in Reims in 1825. The precocious passion and eloquence of Hugo's early work brought success and fame at an early age. His first collection of poetry ( Odes et poésies diverses )

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3234-833: The death penalty was renowned internationally. When Louis Napoleon ( Napoleon III ) seized complete power in 1851 , establishing an anti-parliamentary constitution, Hugo openly declared him a traitor to France. He moved to Brussels , then Jersey , from which he was expelled for supporting L’Homme , a local newspaper that had published a letter to Queen Victoria by a French republican deemed treasonous . He finally settled with his family at Hauteville House in Saint Peter Port , Guernsey , where he would live in exile from October 1855 until 1870. While in exile, Hugo published his famous political pamphlets against Napoleon III, Napoléon le Petit and Histoire d'un crime . The pamphlets were banned in France but nonetheless had

3311-549: The distinctive windows were added by Master James of Saint George , who is believed also to have added similar windows to Harlech Castle in Wales at a later date. The counts and dukes of Savoy used the castle as a residence but also to house prisoners. Its most famous prisoner was probably François de Bonivard , a Genevois monk, prior of St. Victor in Geneva and historian, who was imprisoned there for six years in 1530. In 1536,

3388-671: The government. It was only after Napoleon III fell from power and the Third Republic was proclaimed that Hugo finally returned to his homeland in 1870, where he was promptly elected to the National Assembly and the Senate. He was in Paris during the siege by the Prussian Army in 1870 , famously eating animals given to him by the Paris Zoo. As the siege continued, and food became ever more scarce, he wrote in his diary that he

3465-474: The greatest elegiac and lyric poets of his time. Like many young writers of his generation, Hugo was profoundly influenced by François-René de Chateaubriand , the famous figure in the literary movement of Romanticism and France's pre-eminent literary figure during the early 19th century. In his youth, Hugo resolved to be " Chateaubriand or nothing", and his life would come to parallel that of his predecessor in many ways. Like Chateaubriand , Hugo furthered

3542-596: The highest peaks in the Vosges Mountains , on a journey from Lunéville to Besançon. "This elevated origin," he went on, "seems to have had effects on you so that your muse is now continually sublime." Hugo believed himself to have been conceived on 24 June 1801, which is the origin of Jean Valjean 's prisoner number 24601 . In 1810, Hugo's father was made Count Hugo de Cogolludo y Sigüenza by then King of Spain Joseph Bonaparte , though it seems that

3619-471: The masses that the issues it highlighted were soon on the agenda of the National Assembly of France . Today, the novel remains his best-known work. It is popular worldwide and has been adapted for cinema, television, and stage shows. An apocryphal tale has circulated, describing the shortest correspondence in history as having been between Hugo and his publisher Hurst and Blackett in 1862. Hugo

3696-423: The memory of this liberator of our black brothers, of this heroic martyr John Brown, who died for Christ just as Christ. Only one slave on Earth is enough to dishonour the freedom of all men. So the abolition of slavery is, at this hour, the supreme goal of the thinkers. As a novelist, diarist, and member of Parliament, Victor Hugo fought a lifelong battle for the abolition of the death penalty. The Last Day of

3773-629: The music of Gluck , Mozart , Weber and Meyerbeer . In Les Misérables , he calls the huntsman's chorus in Weber's Euryanthe , "perhaps the most beautiful piece of music ever composed". He also greatly admired Beethoven and, rather unusually for his time, appreciated works by composers from earlier centuries such as Palestrina and Monteverdi . Two famous musicians of the 19th century were friends of Hugo: Hector Berlioz and Franz Liszt . The latter played Beethoven in Hugo's home, and Hugo joked in

3850-701: The other hand, he had low esteem for Richard Wagner , whom he described as "a man of talent coupled with imbecility." Well over one thousand musical compositions have been inspired by Hugo's works from the 19th century until the present day. In particular, Hugo's plays, in which he rejected the rules of classical theatre in favour of romantic drama, attracted the interest of many composers who adapted them into operas. More than one hundred operas are based on Hugo's works and among them are Donizetti 's Lucrezia Borgia (1833), Verdi 's Rigoletto (1851) and Ernani (1844), and Ponchielli 's La Gioconda (1876). Hugo's novels, as well as his plays, have been

3927-435: The other, the people." He was one of the earlier supporters of the concept of domaine public payant , under which a nominal fee would be charged for copying or performing works in the public domain, and this would go into a common fund dedicated to helping artists, especially young people. Hugo's religious views changed radically over the course of his life. In his youth and under the influence of his mother, he identified as

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4004-544: The popularity of his own work. His last novel, Quatre-vingt-treize ( Ninety-Three ), published in 1874, dealt with a subject that Hugo had previously avoided: the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution . Though Hugo's popularity was on the decline at the time of its publication, many now consider Ninety-Three to be a work on par with Hugo's better-known novels. After three unsuccessful attempts, Hugo

4081-405: The previous success of Les Misérables . Dedicated to the channel island of Guernsey , where Hugo spent 15 years of exile, the novel tells of a man who attempts to win the approval of his beloved's father by rescuing his ship, intentionally marooned by its captain who hopes to escape with a treasure of money it is transporting, through an exhausting battle of human engineering against the force of

4158-589: The road to Italy and apply a toll. Chillon has been a military site since the central Middle Ages and the development of the current castle spans three periods: the Savoy Period, the Bernese Period, and the Vaudois Period. A square donjon was built on the island in the 11th century but we don't know the identity of the works' commissioner. It was built to control the road from Burgundy to

4235-412: The scaffold." His influence was credited in the removal of the death penalty from the constitutions of Geneva , Portugal , and Colombia . He had also pleaded for Benito Juárez to spare the recently captured emperor Maximilian I of Mexico , but to no avail. Although Napoleon III granted an amnesty to all political exiles in 1859, Hugo declined, as it meant he would have to curtail his criticisms of

4312-474: The sea and an almost mythical beast of the sea, a giant squid. Superficially an adventure, one of Hugo's biographers calls it a "metaphor for the 19th century–technical progress, creative genius and hard work overcoming the immanent evil of the material world." The word used in Guernsey to refer to squid ( pieuvre , also sometimes applied to octopus) was to enter the French language as a result of its use in

4389-416: The usefulness of churches) and, published posthumously, The End of Satan and God (1886 and 1891 respectively, in which he represents Christianity as a griffin and rationalism as an angel ). The Hunchback of Notre-Dame also garnered attention due to its portrayal of the abuse of power by the church, even getting listed as one of the "forbidden books" by it. In fact, earlier adaptations had to change

4466-447: The villain, Claude Frollo from being a priest to avoid backlash. Vincent van Gogh ascribed the saying "Religions pass away, but God remains," actually by Jules Michelet , to Hugo. Although Hugo's many talents did not include exceptional musical ability, he nevertheless had a great impact on the music world through the inspiration that his works provided for composers of the 19th and 20th centuries. Hugo himself particularly enjoyed

4543-419: The world, including Jean-Jacques Rousseau , Victor Hugo , Alexandre Dumas , Gustave Flaubert , Mary Shelley and Lord Byron . By 1939, helped by its proximity to the popular tourist destination Montreux , the castle was attracting over 100,000 visitors a year. By 2005, this number had increased to 300,000. Chillon remains open to the public for visits and tours on an entrance fee basis and is, according to

4620-641: The writer's house shouting, "Death to Victor Hugo! Hang him! Death to the scoundrel!" Hugo, who said "A war between Europeans is a civil war," was a strong advocate for the creation of the United States of Europe . He expounded his views on the subject in a speech he delivered during the International Peace Congress which took place in Paris in 1849. Here he declared "nations of the continent, will, without losing your distinctive qualities and glorious individuality, be blended into

4697-685: Was a Catholic, and he replied, "No. A Freethinker ." After 1872, Hugo never lost his antipathy towards the Catholic Church. He felt the Church was indifferent to the plight of the working class under the oppression of the monarchy. Perhaps he also was upset by the frequency with which his work appeared on the Church's list of banned books . Hugo counted 740 attacks on Les Misérables in the Catholic press. When Hugo's sons Charles and François-Victor died, he insisted that they be buried without

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4774-428: Was a French Romantic author, poet, essayist, playwright, and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. His most famous works are the novels The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) and Les Misérables (1862). In France, Hugo is renowned for his poetry collections, such as Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles ( The Legend of

4851-437: Was a Swiss-American ethnologist who trained as a linguist in the universities of Bern and Berlin . He later moved to the United States and settled there in order to study Native American languages , a field in which he was a pioneer. In 1877 he became an ethnologist with the US Geological Survey . In 1879 he became a member of the Bureau of American Ethnology , which was part of the Smithsonian Institution . In 1884, he

4928-418: Was a committed royalist when young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed, and he became a passionate supporter of republicanism , serving in politics as both deputy and senator. His work touched upon most of the political and social issues and the artistic trends of his time. His opposition to absolutism , and his literary stature, established him as a national hero. Hugo died on 22 May 1885, aged 83. He

5005-502: Was a wood merchant. Léopold enlisted in the army of Revolutionary France at fourteen. He was an atheist and an ardent supporter of the Republic. Hugo's mother Sophie was loyal to the deposed dynasty but would declare her children to be Protestants. They met in Châteaubriant in 1796 and married the following year. Since Hugo's father was an officer in Napoleon's army, the family moved frequently from posting to posting. Léopold Hugo wrote to his son that he had been conceived on one of

5082-404: Was attracting thousands of tourists who had read the popular novel. Hugo began planning a major novel about social misery and injustice as early as the 1830s, but a full 17 years were needed for Les Misérables to be realised and finally published in 1862. Hugo had previously used the departure of prisoners for the Bagne of Toulon in Le Dernier Jour d'un condamné . He went to Toulon to visit

5159-417: Was called to Spain to fight the Peninsular War . Madame Hugo and her children were sent back to Paris in 1808, where they moved to an old convent, 12 Impasse des Feuillantines , an isolated mansion in a deserted quarter of the left bank of the Seine. Hiding in a chapel at the back of the garden was de La Horie, who had conspired to restore the Bourbons and been condemned to death a few years earlier. He became

5236-424: Was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society . Gatschet published his observations of the Karankawa people of Texas . His study of the Klamath people located in present-day Oregon , published in 1890, is recognized as outstanding. In 1902 Gatschet was elected as a member of the American Antiquarian Society , whose members were studying ancient and historic peoples. This article about

5313-417: Was finally elected to the Académie française in 1841, solidifying his position in the world of French arts and letters. A group of French academicians, particularly Étienne de Jouy , were fighting against the "romantic evolution" and had managed to delay Victor Hugo's election. Thereafter, he became increasingly involved in French politics. On the nomination of King Louis-Philippe , Hugo entered

5390-521: Was given a state funeral in the Panthéon of Paris , which was attended by over 2 million people, the largest in French history. Victor-Marie Hugo was born on 26 February 1802 in Besançon in Eastern France. He was the youngest son of Joseph Léopold Sigisbert Hugo (1774–1828), a general in the Napoleonic army , and Sophie Trébuchet (1772–1821). The couple had two other sons: Abel Joseph (1798–1855) and Eugène (1800–1837). The Hugo family came from Nancy in Lorraine , where Hugo's grandfather

5467-425: Was hopeless; it was in America what it had been in Europe. Contact with a wicked man is sometimes enough to rot a good deed and cause something bad to come out of it. With Marius's money, Thénardier became a slave trader. Like most of his contemporaries, Hugo justified colonialism in terms of a civilizing mission and putting an end to the slave trade on the Barbary coast. In a speech delivered on 18 May 1879, during

5544-637: Was launched simultaneously in major cities. Installments of the book sold out within hours and had an enormous impact on French society. The critical establishment was generally hostile to the novel; Taine found it insincere, Barbey d'Aurevilly complained of its vulgarity, Gustave Flaubert found within it "neither truth nor greatness", the Goncourt brothers lambasted its artificiality, and Baudelaire —despite giving favourable reviews in newspapers—castigated it in private as "repulsive and inept". However, Les Misérables proved popular enough with

5621-465: Was on vacation when Les Misérables was published. He queried the reaction to the work by sending a single-character telegram to his publisher, asking ? . The publisher replied with a single ! to indicate its success. Hugo turned away from social/political issues in his next novel, Les Travailleurs de la Mer ( Toilers of the Sea ), published in 1866. The book was well received, perhaps due to

5698-449: Was only fifteen. Hugo moved in with his mother to 18 rue des Petits-Augustins the following year and began attending law school. Hugo fell in love and secretly became engaged, against his mother's wishes, to his childhood friend Adèle Foucher . In June 1821, Sophie Trebuchet died, and Léopold married his long-time mistress Catherine Thomas a month later. Hugo married Adèle the following year. In 1819, Hugo and his brothers began publishing

5775-493: Was published in 1822 when he was only 20 years old and earned him a royal pension from Louis XVIII . Though the poems were admired for their spontaneous fervor and fluency, the collection that followed four years later in 1826 ( Odes et Ballades ) revealed Hugo to be a great poet, a natural master of lyric and creative song. Victor Hugo's first mature work of fiction was published in February 1829 by Charles Gosselin without

5852-488: Was reduced to "eating the unknown". During the Paris Commune —the revolutionary government that took power on 18 March 1871 and was toppled on 28 May—Victor Hugo was harshly critical of the atrocities committed on both sides. On 9 April, he wrote in his diary, "In short, this Commune is as idiotic as the National Assembly is ferocious. From both sides, folly." Yet he made a point of offering his support to members of

5929-448: Was used as a munitions and weapons depot. At the end of the 19th century, a systematic restoration of the monument was undertaken, through which an ethic of monumental restoration was developed in one of the first cases of the application of archaeology and history to rebuild a structure in a historically accurate way. This was possible because of the combination of four factors: The result was judged to be exemplary. In an 1898 lecture to

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