#les mis analysis

Near the end, the film has a scene of Henry meeting an innkeeper who defends Thénardier, and gets in an argument with him; This was the scene I listed as the beautiful thing the movie gave us and joked "what is there to defend (about Thénardier)?"

But now, i am starting to genuinely wonder- Is there something that can be defended regarding Thénardier?

Now, let's be clear; Thénardier the innkeeper is an awful, bad man, and comes close to being the evilest character in the book (and the musical, though the latter one has a different way of portraying him); He is a greedy leech completely devoid of any empathy who does everything he does out of greed and desire and can't even be bothered to recognize two of his own children.

Perphas the final nail in the coffin is the very end of the book, where not only does Thénardier get to prosper because of a certain booby's weird morality regarding debts, he moves to America and becomes a slave trader! Worse still, he takes his only surviving daughter Azelma with him, and given that earlier he had forced her to cut her hand by punching a window for pity points + a general lack of love and affection for all of his kids, she is not in for a good time, or fate, in the worst case scenario.

However, a thing that should be noted is that Thénardier is still a misérable; The title i supposed to refer to almost everyone in the book, and Thénardier, evil as he is, is no exception; He is as miserable as they come but "fights" his misery by hurting his fellow misérables.

While when he first started extorting Fantine he was somewhat a higher class than hers, he was no rich as say, Tholomyès (🤮) or Gillenormand; He still had to be a bootlicker to those "higher" than him (while openly hating them when by himself), much like Javert is with his own superiors which is why he is so often compared to a dog chasing wolves.

However, by the time the second half of the book starts and Thénardier starts committing even worse crimes, he has become poor, very poor;

i gotta say, when i first started as a Les Mis fan back in September, i found it very satisfying to see the Thénardier parents stuck suffering in poverty and misery after everything they did to poor little Cosette, but overtime i've found myself pitying them. Their situation is genuinely horrific and i wouldn't wish it on anyone, plus even if one regards the parents as deserving of their misfortune, what about their children who are stuck in the same situation? Do Èponine and Azelma deserve to live in squallid conditions being forced to participate in their father's crimes which gets them arrested at one point? Does Gavroche deserve to be left on the streets? Do the younger boys deserve to be sold and also left on the streets the moment their guardian can no longer care for them because of their parents getting in trouble with the law?

There's also a lot of other things that could be said about Thénardier, including the fact he both suffers due to society but benefits from it; Thénardier is able to extort Fantine while his wife is free to abuse little Cosette as much as they like because the townspeople in Montfermeil constantly enable this behavior and almost nobody is willing to help Fantine and the law itself turns on her because she is poor, disfigured and a sex worker.

It's interesting how Thénardier tries painting himself as a tragic figure, a war veteran who never got anything from the state for his services and was left to rot, which is ironically a description that better fits Georges Pontmercy rather than himself, as Thénardier was never a veteran, he was a looter who took advantage of the battlefield to rob corpses, and that's how he met Georges to begin with.

With all of this in mind, what do you say? Is there something genuinely defendable about Thénardier or is there nothing at all? Or maybe something more "complex" can be derived from this?

1. F like femme

Aka woman. There is no woman separating Enjolras and Grantaire (and this part actually comes from this post, note 22. Note that I care little for biographical explanations, mostly because I’m ignorant). Which fits with the list of very Greek and very gay couples Hugo uses to compare E and R to, as well as the fact that Enjolras is too busy loving no-one/Patria and Grantaire is too ugly (both within and without) to have any kind of steady relationship with a woman. Incidentally, he’s also far too busy adoring Enjolras for a woman to fit in the equation, and plain reading of the brick is enough to say this.

So, taking the O/P parallel literally, we can say that there is nothing between E and G, because there is actually no woman in the equation. But...

2. F like France

This fits with this reading of Enjolras and Grantaire’s relationship as a symbol for France’s stance on the Republic and the Revolution in the 1830′s (or the whole 19th century, at least until the 1880′s. not the point, though). I just said there was no woman between Enjolras and Grantaire, because of the parallel Hugo draws between them and Orestes and Pylades : there is no letter between O and P, and there is therefore none between E and G, fuck what the alphabet says.

But I bet you all now this painting : 

La Liberté ou la République française, Antoine-Jean Gros, 1794

Okay, maybe not that one. What about this one :

So this is La liberté guidant le peuple by Delacroix, painted in 1830, in memory of the July Revolution. The little guy is not Gavroche, but he inspired Gav’s character, and, as people generally don’t know whether the Brick was published before or after Delacroix painted this, they generally think he used Hugo’s little sparrow on the barricade. Inaccurate, but I think it’s oddly sweet. Not the point, though. Let’s focus on Marianne. 

Marianne didn’t actually become Marianne until the 1848 revolution. Still, the allegory of France has been a fierce revolutionary woman since the French Revolution, mostly because of the maternal figure of Mother-Patria and of the reference to the Roman Republic. When the first Republic was installed in 1792, the republicans considered images were a far better master than words for the illiterate masses. Hence, for example, Gros’ painting (and if I’m not wrong this is the Gros R used to take classes with... I mean don’t quote me on this one but I think so) from 1794. 

In the very beginning of the 1830′s, the moment that interests us in canon, the ideas of France and of the Republic are, for one, quite mixed in the mind of the French republicans (although the vast majority of French people are not republicans, but what can you do), and strongly associated with the figure of the woman who is going to become Marianne. 

Guess you know where I’m going.

There is no woman between Enjolras and Grantaire? Oh, but, there is. There is the woman. There is France. 

France, the ideal Enjolras fights for and dreams with, the France mixed up with the idea of the Republic, because, in short, things during the Revolution being what they were, the Republic isn’t only a political system for the French in the 19th century, it’s a belief, an ethic, a way of living. Enjolras believes in France like he doesn’t believe in Grantaire. Enjolras, ever the idealist, loves the ideal of France.

France, the country how it is. France, that is Paris, because in the eyes of the intellectual and political class in the 19th century Paris made France. France, that is a country that lies in a semi-stasis known as the July Monarchy, a monarchy born from a revolution that didn’t bring a republic in its wake. France, a country where republicans are a banned minority and the Revolution is mostly remembered with Robespierre and Saint-Just’s Terror (I’m caricaturing). France, the country Grantaire doesn’t believe in but loves all the same, or the country he can’t really love at all since we’ve established France = Paris (ish) and Paris = Grantaire, and Grantaire quite hates himself, does he not?

France stands between Enjolras and Grantaire. On one side, the ideal Enjolras fights for is what makes him Enjolras in the first place, and is what will always (or almost) keep him glancing away from this drunkard of a non-believer. On the other, the reality Grantaire represents, the mediocre, half-asleep, disheartened country he can never believe in. And maybe, in the middle, this spinal chord for Grantaire’s ideas, the humanity Enjolras seems to lack... the light for the blind man?

What is there between E and G? 

“Creole”; A Complex Term

It should first be noted that the term “creole” encompasses a wide range of different ethnic groups. In the footnotes of Julie Rose’s Les Misérables translation, “creole” is defined as “a European born in the tropics, usually in the Caribbean”. However, this definition overlooks many of the other groups that also were considered “creole”. Moreover, it conveniently ignores the fact that “creole” individuals are not necessarily white. In fact, during the eighteenth and nineteenth-centuries, “creole” people were often understood/stereotyped as mixed-race immigrants.

Many creoles were thought to be the offspring of the plaçage custom, wherein white men were permitted to form relationships with women of colour in French and Spanish slave colonies in North America and the Caribbean.

Thus, it is entirely plausible that Gueulemer is mixed-race. Although, it should be noted that Hugo writes that the character was "thought to be a creole”— it is never formally confirmed in the novel. Nonetheless, Gueulemer's physical appearance and personality traits align with numerous racist stereotypes of the time that were commonly held by white, European society towards black and mixed-race individuals.

With Hugo insinuating that Gueulemer is mixed-race and has Caribbean ancestry, he (intentionally or unintentionally) applies a set of preconceived racial notions onto the character. To put it another way— even if Gueulemer is not actually a “creole”, his appearance and personality align with society's racist preconceptions of how a “creole” looks and acts. This is a critical factor to consider when analysing Gueulemer's character in the context of racism and racial perceptions in the nineteenth-century.

The Stereotyped “Creole” Appearance

As previously mentioned, one of the most prominent stereotypes surrounding "creoles" was that they were mixed-race and that they possessed physical characteristics that differed from those of white Europeans. Not only did these include realistic differences such as darker skin and different hair textures, but also numerous stereotyped features that were rooted in racist ideology— which will be discussed further below.

Gueulemer, as originally described by Hugo, possesses many of these physical characteristics— thus indicating that he probably is a mixed-race “creole”:

Gueulemer, bâti de cette façon sculpturale, aurait pu dompter les monstres; il avait trouvé plus court d'en être un. Front bas, tempes larges, moins de quarante ans et la patte d'oie, le poil rude et court, la joue en brosse, une barbe sanglière; on voit d'ici l'homme. Ses muscles sollicitaient le travail, sa stupidité n'en voulait pas. C'était une grosse force paresseuse. Il était assassin par nonchalance. On le croyait créole. [Built along such sculptural lines, Gueulemer could have broken monsters; he had found it easier to become one. With a low forehead, broad temples, a mass of crow’s-feet though not yet forty years old, wiry short hair, bushy cheeks, the beard of a wild boar- you can see the man from here. His muscles cried out for work, his stupidity wouldn’t hear of it. He was a huge lazy force. He was a killer out of nonchalance. He was thought to be a Creole. Julie Rose translation]

Identifiers such as Gueulemer’s “wiry short hair” arguably imply that he is mixed-race. However, it is the shape of Gueulemer's head that would have stood out most prominently as an indicator that the character has black ancestry to the novel's original readership. This can be realised by analysing the racist ideologies held within nineteenth-century Phrenology studies, wherein the shape of an individual’s skull is examined to determine their race and moral character.

Hugo makes a particular point to emphasise that Gueulemer has a low forehead, broad temples, and “the skull of a bird.” While some critics of Les Misérables have analysed the importance of this factor in relation to phrenological studies linking to criminality, the connection to racial phrenology has not been explored to the same extent.

Unfortunately, Gueulemer's head shape aligns with many of the discriminatory, racist stereotypes surrounding the appearance of black people in phrenological studies. An important aspect of Phrenology included the field’s ‘racial studies’, which emphasised the superiority of white, Europeans by comparing their skull shapes to the skull shapes of non-white individuals. In particular, it is the detail of the low forehead that was most prominently associated with multiple ethnic minority groups, including African and Caribbean natives, which supposedly “proved” their inferior minds and “primitive” personalities.

The below excerpt is from a Phrenology book published in the mid nineteenth-century, and it provides further evidence of the similarities between Gueulemer's head shape and the perceived shape of a black person's head in racist Phrenological studies. [source]

It is unclear whether Hugo intentionally or unconsciously aligned the physical appearance of Gueulemer's head shape with these discriminatory stereotypes, but regardless the connections are present and we should acknowledge the racist thought behind them.

The Stereotyped “Creole” personality

Phrenology as a study also fed into the idea that people with certain skull shapes had particular personalities and a pre-determined moral compass. One of the most prevalent phrenological stereotypes was that people with a low or sloping forehead were intellectually inferior and more likely to engage in criminal behaviour. The assumption was that a smaller forehead meant a less developed brain, and consequently, less mental capacity. This stereotype was again applied by white Europeans to individuals with ethnicities different from their own in an attempt to ‘Other’ them.

Unfortunately, Hugo perpetuates this stereotype also within certain parts of the narrative of Les Misérables. We only need to look at Gueulemer’s actions and introductory paragraph to see that he is clearly inferior to the other Patron-Minette members in everything but his brutish strength.

Although it is implied that Gueulemer played an active role in Marshal Brune’s assassination in 1815, for the most part he is explicitly described as being stupid and a “huge, lazy force”— with these characteristics being playing upon for comedic effect in various scenes in the novel. A notable example of this is when Gueulemer randomly takes his mask off and reveals his face to Valjean during the Gorbeau ambush, just so that he “could laugh”. Additionally, Gueulemer’s stupidity is comedically played off in a scene cut from the novel where the Amis and Patron-Minette meet. In this example, Gueulemer entirely misses the mark on the conversation and ends up stating the obvious in a few lines of dialogue after the facts had already been established by other characters:

“Who are you?” asked Enjolras. A voice, in which a police agent could have recognized Babet’s rather proper accent, answered, “We are protestors like you.” “Different from us,” said Combeferre. […] “We are thieves,” cried another voice, that of Gueulemer.

It’s also interesting to pick up on Gueulemer’s general lack of dialogue in the novel compared to some of the other Patron-Minette members, which might even suggest that he is too simple-minded to speak eloquent French fully. In fact, this matter was once commonly felt by French “creole” immigrants, who were often perceived as being unintelligent because they did not speak French fully— but this was because the group tended to speak their own slightly altered version of the language. However, I can only speculate on there being any link here to Gueulemer’s unusual quietness in terms of his dialogue— regardless of the reasons why he does not often speak, he continues to appear as a dim-witted character.

Gueulemer’s stupidity is particularly emphasised with Hugo putting him in "stark contrast" to Babet, not only in physical appearance but also in intelligence, and making a note of it to his readers. The crucial point here being that Babet is described as a learned, ambitious, intelligent man and that he seems to be a white European. Therefore, Hugo inadvertently portrays the same racist ideals that Phrenology sought to demonstrate by comparing Europeans with other races to “prove” their superiority. Gueulemer even appears submissive to Babet, simply carrying out tasks that he wants him to do, he does not even seem to have any ambitions of his own— after all, he is described as being a “killer out of nonchalance” and we do not see him command any orders for the criminal group in the novel.

There is one final “creole” personality stereotype that I feel is relevant to this discussion. Many white Europeans perceived “creoles” (and in general a lot of ethnic minority groups) as being more immoral and prone to corruption. Of course, this stereotype is extremely important when we consider Gueulemer’s place as one of the four heads of the infamous Patron-Minette gang.

It doesn’t end with Gueulemer...

Gueulemer is not the only character of colour in Les Misérables. In fact, Gueulemer is one of three figures in the novel [to the best of my knowledge] who are described in ways that suggest they may not be white. The other two characters I refer to are Javert, who may have Romani heritage (described as “race bohème”), and Homère Hogu, a minor character who is explicitly labelled as black (referred to as a “nègre”) and only appears once in the novel.

Unlike with Gueulemer and Javert, where their race is only implied and ultimately left up to speculation, Hugo's description of Homère Hogu explicitly identifies him by his race— and the character is reduced to a single, racist descriptor only: “nègre”. It is important to note that despite Hugo only using one word to describe this minor character— white European readers would immediately have been able to form a stereotyped idea of Homère Hogu's appearance and personality, thanks to the existing racist perceptions of the “nègre” phrase and character.

I find it significant to mention here how Homère Hogu, like Gueulemer, is also affiliated with the Patron-Minette. Thus, two of the very few non-white characters in the novel are portrayed as criminals (and let us not forget that in Javert's case there is still a criminal history present. After all, his mother gave birth to him in prison and his father was also locked up in the galleys). It should additionally be acknowledged that both Gueulemer and Homère Hogu are connected to African or Caribbean ancestry specifically. This differs from Javert, who is implied to have a different kind of heritage— being described with terms that suggest he has Romani blood. Hence, there is perhaps a necessity to closer examine nineteenth-century attitudes towards race and criminality specifically concerning black individuals, as well as all ethnic minority groups.