#hapgood translation

omg i now understand why some people were confused/surprised, even after reading the brick, to learn that fantine et al. rode a roller coaster on their day out....hapgood strikes again 😭

Victor Hugo: Nobody loves the light like the blind man. However, this sceptic had one fanaticism. This fanaticism was neither a dogma, nor an idea, nor an art, nor a science; it was a man: Enjolras. Grantaire admired, loved, and venerated Enjolras. To whom did this anarchical scoffer unite himself in this phalanx of absolute minds? To the most absolute. In what manner had Enjolras subjugated him? By his ideas? No. By his character. A phenomenon which is often observable. A sceptic who adheres to a believer is as simple as the law of complementary colors. That which we lack attracts us. No one loves the light like the blind man. The dwarf adores the drum-major. The toad always has his eyes fixed on heaven. Why? In order to watch the bird in its flight. Grantaire, in whom writhed doubt, loved to watch faith soar in Enjolras. He had need of Enjolras. That chaste, healthy, firm, upright, hard, candid nature charmed him, without his being clearly aware of it, and without the idea of explaining it to himself having occurred to him. He admired his opposite by instinct. His soft, yielding, dislocated, sickly, shapeless ideas attached themselves to Enjolras as to a spinal column. His moral backbone leaned on that firmness. Grantaire in the presence of Enjolras became some one once more.

the 'thanks!' at the end of gillenormand's joyful little outburst kinda cracked me up

Enjolras : Civil war—what does that mean? Is there a foreign war? Is not all war between men, war between brothers? War is qualified only by its object. [...] There is only just and unjust war. Until that day when the grand human agreement is concluded, war, that at least which is the effort of the future, which is hastening on against the past, [...] may be necessary. [...] War does [...] become a disgrace, [...] when it is used for assassinating the right, progress, reason, civilization, truth. Then war, whether foreign or civil ; it is called crime. [Is the war only just when against foreigners?] Well, the monarchy is a foreigner; [...] the right divine is a stranger. [...] An enormous fortress of prejudices, privileges, superstitions [...] and darkness still stands erect in this world. [...] It must be cast down. [...] To conquer at Austerlitz is grand; to take the Bastille is immense.”