i havent watched the new les mis but from what i heard it sounds like someone gave andrew davies a brief description of the plot and told him to make a show about it
I realize youâre being hyperbolic (and wow does this series invite hyperbole) but I want to take a moment to be a little serious:Â Iâve seen a lot of people saying this, and I gotta say, I disagree. I think itâs obvious the show was made based on a reading of the book; there are too many little details for it to be anything else (Victurnien! the grisettes! some of the specific dialogue! Madeleineâs house fire rescue! etc!).Â
But there have been changes made, for certainâthere are always were going to be changes, if only for the sake of the medium shift, though itâs definitely well beyond that. Some are trivial, some are majorâ and all of them rely on interpretation of the material.Â
I have some major , major  arguments with that interpretation so far (and some minor ones!) â but I am certain itâs an interpretation of material that was actually read, just like Iâm sure that really Mario Vargas Llosa read  Les Miserables before bafflingly deciding that Javert represented social justice.Â
If reading a text guaranteed a single united understandingâŚwell, Literature teachers would have a much easier time grading papers.:P I can argue with this series just fine while assuming that the people involved know  what theyâre doing. The question about any changes isnât âdid they even read this bookâ, itâs âhaving read this book, why did they do thatâ .  Because whatever Choices are getting made in this, theyâre getting made very consciously.
