Power And Emotion In Victor Hugo's Les Miserables

Victor Hugo’s novel, Les Misérables, contains various forceful story lines that jolt the audience’s curiosity. With scenes filled with pain and emotion, songs brought them alive in the film version. From rebellious scenes to heart breaking ones, the music that played behind each song brought life, character, and emotion to the audience. "I Dreamed a Dream," "Empty Chairs and Empty Tables," and "Bring Him Home" made the scenes in the movie more powerful, however in the novel several scenes lack the power and emotion the movie presents to the public.

Turning to prostitution, Fantine loses her dignity she sings "I Dreamed a Dream" displaying her pain to the audience. Along with her display of emotion, people can visualize what times were like in the 1800s. "As to the mother, she seemed poor and sad; she had the appearance of a working women who is seeking to return to the life of a peasant. It was Fantine." (Hugo 41-42). Fantine had

Although the scene of Marius grieving never happens in the novel, there are lines in the Les Miserables that show Marius never really mourned over the deaths of his friends. While healing from his wounds, Marius in his delirium, "repeated the name of Cosette during entire nights in the dismal loquacity of fever and with the gloomy obstinacy of agony"(Hugo 338). This line exhibits how Marius is more worried about losing Cosette than he had about his friends. Also, "He determined in the face of refusal he would tear off his bandages, dislocate his shoulder, lay bare and open his remaining wounds, and refuse all nourishment. ETC. To have Cosette or to die" (Hugo 340). With the amount of passion Marius had fighting at the barricade, Cosette meant the most, forcing him to threaten to take his own life. "There 's a grief that can 't be spoken / There 's a pain goes on and on." "Empty Chairs and Empty Tables" adds an ambience in Marius ' life that the novel Les Miserables never does, making Marius a more likeable character in