Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Why place the encomium to the Parisian working class in the midst of a Sunday idyll (1.3.5.112)?

2 comments:

Jane Orr said...

This encomium to the working class is set during a political period (the early years of the restoration of the monarchy) which was like a Sunday idyll for France, after the violence of the Revolutionary years. The report on the faubourg residents which Hugo mentions underestimates them as "Carefree and indolent as cats," "small men," but Hugo warns that cats can turn into lions. Sunday idylls are brief.

Jane Orr said...

This encomium to the working class is set during a political period (the early years of the restoration of the monarchy) which was like a Sunday idyll for France, after the violence of the Revolutionary years. The report on the faubourg residents which Hugo mentions underestimates them as "Carefree and indolent as cats," "small men," but Hugo warns that cats can turn into lions.