I laughed all the way through today's chapter, but let me quote my favorite bits of Grantaire's monologue:
"I'm thirsty. Mortal, I have a dream [...] I desire to forget life. Life is a hideous invention of somebody I don't know."
"Such a pity I'm ignorant or I'd quote you a mass of things, but I don't know anything [one page later] Si volet usus, says Horace."
"I dispense you from quieting me. Anyway, I'm sad."
Like... how can you read this man's opening rant and not immediately love him. He's such an idiot. He makes some good points. He immediately destroys those points by being once more an idiot. He's like no one I've ever met. He's every college student. He's literally me. He needs to never speak again. He needs to be constantly allowed to speak. He's obnoxious. He's lovable. He's all these things.
“One of these conversations really shook up* Marius’ thinking,” Hugo says, before proceeding to write up a four page Grantaire rant and barely mentioning Marius at all for the rest of the chapter.
To be fair, the point of the chapter is scene-setting more than it is plot. We’re still being introduced to the group, and being introduced to it through Marius’ eyes at that, and so what we get here is a cacophony of unconnected moments, all of which overlap and none of which have any context. It’s just noise. Which means, of course, that we start with the loudest of them all, our friend R.
Look, there are people who have made entire fandom careers out of dissecting Grantaire rants. I am not one of them. So I will mostly stick to pointing out two things. First, this speech is always more coherent than I remember it being. It does actually flow from one topic to the next, despite it clearly being given by someone completely pissed, in the British sense of the term. Second, Hugo absolutely knew this dude. I’ve met this dude, although not very often. Hugo understands how drunk ranting works, in structure and content. Which, probably, is at least part of why all the Amis are students. Sure, there’s political reasons having to do with Hugo and his audience, but also this feels very much like the kind of people Hugo met at parties and got drunk with. When I and my friends get drunk we rant about bad archaeology and colonialism and why xyz theoretical model is bad. When Hugo and his friends get drunk, they riff on classical heroes and art and philosophy and Paris.
In other news, I am very intrigued by the 30-year-old advising the 18-year-old about an upcoming duel. Where’s their story? This is a friendship I want to see pop up again, although I doubt either of these two are ever mentioned again. I get not giving us more names for the Amis, because 9 is already a lot, but dangit, I like super minor characters. I want to know More.
We do definitely get a pretty solid glimpse of what the named characters care about though. Grantaire is declaiming at no one, Bossuet is similarly arguing with no one but also trying to placate Grantaire. Jehan is being passionate about Romanticism. Joly and Bahorel are talking about women and fashion. Combeferre and Courfeyrac are talking politics. (Courfeyrac, by the way, has been talking about politics pretty much every single time he’s been on screen up to this point.) I can’t in good conscience call it a concise set of character sketches, not with Grantaire and Courfeyrac, but it’s definitely an abbreviated and yet revealing set.
Also this? This feels like a targeted critique, given Combeferre’s intro: “Let us never illuminate the people with artificial light." Courfeyrac is cutting straight to the heart of Combeferre’s philosophy and challenging it by arguing that Combeferre’s preferred method of waiting for the dawn will only ever produce artificial light. And Combeferre knows it too, or at least knows that this document is not the way.
I love the descriptions of Courfeyrac taking Marius under his wings and not asking him any questions. He asks him about his politics and then introduces him to the group. I really like that the way the amis are described is like a hornet’s nest. They are continually buzzing with opinions, whereas Marius had settled on one opinion, that of Bonapartism of his father and considered it absolute. The hornet’s nest analogy also helps explain his inner turbulence by staying in the company of these young people. He is seeing and absorbing many different ideas on several subjects.
It’s also interesting that his fixed views are described as a particular way of seeing the horizons, because that was one of the ways Combeferre was described, as someone whose eye was on the horizons signifying the future, but Combeferre signifies light and he also reads extensively on topics and is able to present both sides of the argument.
Combeferre’s canards analogy, becomes an argument to keep both the classical tragedy alongside the Romantic tragedy while Bahorel is arguing for the Romantic theatre. It does also bring out Combeferre looking at both sides of the argument and it fits with his character of wanting progress to come naturally, whereas Bahorel wants to uproot the old system.
Much has also been said about Courfeyrac’s Rousseau joke, but it does highlight how much Courfeyrac values personal relationships and is also very much not-Tholomyes, while Enjolras does not care about Rousseau’s personal life, only his philosophy. Enjolras is looking at the bigger picture and it is obvious that he does not care for personal love just yet. He is concerned with all of humanity.
Enjolras is willing to overlook Rousseau’s faults of abandoning his own children, Donougher mentions in the notes that Rousseau was the one who abandoned them. Courfeyrac on the other hand argues for the abandoned children. Also, he makes a dreadful pun, which makes me love him all the more. Although, personally, their different focus does mirror Bahorel and Combeferre’s argument and also shows that people can concern themselves with different ideas/opinions while working towards an idea with all their heart. It’s why these young individuals exist together as a hornet’s nest of different opinions yet still manage to be friends.
Prouvaire’s Napoleon reference seems to be such a nod to Gerard de Nerval writing poems about Napoleon in his youth but also Prouvaire himself might have liked Napoleon initially and therefore speaks of him softly.
3.4.4
We are still within that hornet’s nest of opinions being thrown around and debated and Marius is witness to all that. I love the way it has been described, ‘words were tossed about and caught.’ It’s a genuine community through friendship and Marius has found himself in the middle of it.
There’s also Enjolras and Marius, who are both quiet. Enjolras who does not need to say anything, he is happy in the fact that all his favourite people are here, and ideas are flowing. Marius is quiet because all the ideas are new for him.
Grantaire is trying to forget despair through drink and he is evoking a mixture of history and memory. He has his sights fixed on the ideal much as Enjolras, but being his inverse, he sees everything that is unattainable. Grantaire talks about men being vicious to each other and yet still believes in friendship, a lot of it is probably surface level with him but he is actively not helping, he is being a genuine nuisance here. He is seeing things that are wrong, but instead of mobilising towards action, it only propels him towards inaction. He also thinks that everything follows the rules of success- success might be an allusion to NII and therefore Grantaire as a relatively bourgeois student is despairing of ever changing the political scenario. And that despair is turned into a rant and inaction. He has lived through several turbulent scenarios in his life so far and those have served to only disappoint him.
And not just a nuisance, he also tries to harass Louison.
Only he does praise Paris, which ought to please Hugo.
And then Bossuet comes in between. Bossuet ends up doing things actively which is a direct argument against Grantaire and his despair. He stops Grantaire from harassing Louison, he tells Grantaire to stop speaking because he is spewing out nonsense and Grantaire still manages to make fun of that.
I love the dialogue between Bahorel and Joly. Not only is Bahorel making a dirty joke- ‘get down on your knees’- Bahorel, you immense dork! But he and Joly are talking about equal partnership for women. Bahorel’s mistress and Bahorel have an agreement, not only that, Bahorel likes that she laughs. I need to dial things back to the French Revolution because that was when an active discussion was started about what should women’s place be in families, during divorce, etc. and a lot of women did fight to get more rights for themselves, according to the Family on Trial in Revolutionary France. Bahorel is I feel, honouring those principles, or at least as a French Romantic/Bousingot, he’s giving her freedom in the relationship and they share a mutual understanding. Even in his advice, he is advocating Joly to please Musichetta.
Prouvaire in his Romanticism is defending pagan mythology, probably a nod to the rejection of traditional religion by the Romantics in favour of a social/artistic revolution, as well as to the Petit Cenacle Romantics- part of Hugo’s army against the Classicists. Prouvaire’s comparison to Nerval seems obvious, and in later chapters Hugo quotes Nerval as saying God is dead. I really love the nod by Hugo to his friend. He is also intrepid in his discussion which has the thrill of lyrics and laughter.
Much has already been said about the Charter of 1814, but I would like to say that I love Courfeyrac being described as energetic and fiery throughout their dialogue which ends with the charter in the flames, this is some really nice symbolism here and Courfeyrac is dazzling here while Combeferre attemprts to defend the Charter very weakly. I do like Combeferre’s role in the group as the devil’s advocate, arguing the other side even if he may not be convinced by it.
I also like the conversations being described as a merry bombardment, I can see parallels to Waterloo even here, except that there is no one leader, just several different young people with different ideas and voices who are focused on an ideal -progress.
The most interesting part of Grantaire’s speech, to me at least, is that it confirms that Grantaire is very much self-aware, to the point that he’s circled all the way back to stagnation. As soon as he decries the faults of something, he turns around and utilizes that very same rhetoric to make a point. Not out of ignorance, he’s doing so deliberately! “O vanity! The patching up of everything with big words!” Grantaire seems to be strategically nullifying his own arguments. If this is true, he’s not a skeptic (or sceptic because I’m reading Wilbour) at all but a true cynic. He’s not a very good cynic, if I dare say so, because he actively invalidates his own points as he makes them which won’t help either him or The Cause in the long run. Grantaire is giving arguments that can be easily shot down because he doesn’t actually want the answers.
“So much for myself; as for the rest of you, you are just as good as I am. I make fun of your perfections, excellences, and good qualities. Every good quality run into a defect...” Grantaire wants to have his progressive cake and eat it too. The revolution has to succeed flawlessly or he’s right, all of society inevitably rots and there are no good men. But this means he can’t allow himself to honestly point out the flaws because he hates the idea that he’s right. He’s stuck in a purgatory of his own ideological creation: “I agree with that goodman who perhaps never existed.” He’s as black and white as Enjolras, unfortunately. They both work in extremes on the exact same spectrum; to Enjolras any bit of good is worth the whole revolution, to Grantaire any bit of bad is worth throwing it away. “A crowd gives you nothing but choice of ugliness.”
Tangentially: @kingedmundsroyalmurder I believe you were struggling with the idea of Grantaire and Combeferre together? I think there’s a potentially interesting answer here. Grantaire says, “Nothing is so stupid as to vanquish; the real glory is to convince.” Now, with the caveat that Grantaire immediately tries to shut his own argument down (”you are satisfied with succeeding, what mediocrity!”), I think this is where Combeferre shines. If Enjolras is vanquishing, Combeferre is convincing and I think he and Grantaire might make a much better team than e/R in this context. I know fanon likes to portray Grantaire as the rational skeptic whose counterarguments strengthen the approach of Les Amis, but I think it’s really Combeferre who plays that role by emphasizing the progress of man over all else. Grantaire wants to be convinced, but he’s too easily disheartened by anything less than full success.
ALSO take the caveat that Grantaire is not only drunk but the worst kind of unreliable narrator.
Final notes: this is every meetup of humanities college students ever. Bossuet talks law, someone else talks swordform, Joly is in the doghouse with Musichetta, R wants to show off his ass, Jehan argues paganism, and everyone hates the government.
Courfeyrac makes the exact same arguments that people today make against maintaining the British royal family (see the video in my 3.3.4 post for that deconstruction) and Combeferre plays the rational skeptic (just like I said above, vindication).
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One evening, the friends are meeting in the Musain, all (except Enjolras and Marius, who are quiet) arguing about all sorts of things.
Grantaire, who is drunk, launches into a monologue. He talks about the meaninglessness and vanity of life. He says that he himself is ignorant and knows nothing, but that, since no one is intrinsically valuable, it doesn’t matter. He says that history repeats itself and that conquering is meaningless--it is better to convince. He says that France is just Ancient Greece all over again, so he doesn’t care for it, just as he doesn’t care for any country.
Bossuet tries to stop him. It’s no use.
Grantaire says that man is a mistake.
In another part of the room, two men are speaking quietly about a list of names. Others are discussing a duel.
Joly and Bahorel are playing dominoes and talking about Bahorel’s mistress, who is very cheerful, and Joly’s mistress, Musichetta.
Prouvaire is defending Olympus against Christian mythology.
In another corner, Combeferre and Courfeyrac are talking about politics and arguing over the charter. Courfeyrac says that he doesn’t want a king. He throws the charter into the fire.
“And sarcasms, sallies, jests, that French thing which is called entrain, and that English thing which is called humor, good and bad taste, good and bad reasons, all the wild pyrotechnics of dialogue, mounting together and crossing from all points of the room, produced a sort of merry bombardment over their heads.”
In the backroom of the Cafe Musain. Fully half this chapter is Grantaire ranting to no one about national identity, economic inequality, and how to kill Russian rulers, but it still gives us many iconic moments:
*@pilferingapples' name, also the idea of Grantaire as an artist/former art student, and him being called "R" by other people.
*Snazzy-dresser Bahorel giving Joly romantic advice. Also @laughingmistress's name and everything we know about Musichetta [except that Bossuet is/was also her lover, which comes up in 4.12.2].
*Courfeyrac lighting the charter on fire. Combeferre as the less-than-effective "responsible member of this friend-group".
Prouvaire's enthusiasm for everything (timid only in repose) and interest in mythology get some fandom attention, but we never seem to remember the two guys writing a play, the ones prepping for a duel, and Bossuet being a freaking law nerd. Yes, he's very clear about hating the law school and/or professors, but here in his free time, he's very animated about and highly knowledgable of some very regionally-specific historic points of law. Seignorial dues are not a thing in the 1820s. My pet theory is that Bossuet is a history nerd.
Joly & Bahorel use tu, as does Grantaire in addressing Bossuet. Basically, it's all singular-tu and plural-vous here in the Revolutionary Found Family.
Having met, or reacquainted ourselves with, the Rue Plumet house, its garden, and Cosette & JVJ, we now get to see them all together: Cosette playing in the garden, JVJ depriving himself in his cabin.
The parallels between motherless Fantine and motherless Cosette are making me sad. Also, JVJ's unwillingness to speak of Fantine. While Hugo pulls out the whole modesty idea, I still feel like JVJ is finding himself unworthy (as he does, frequently, in this very chapter) to speak of Fantine, the saintly suffering martyr.
On a happier note, I love how Cosette questions the fairness of their arrangements (I have nice things, he does not, that's not right), and uses JVJ's love for her to make him treat himself more kindly.
The remarks about ignorance being labelled innocence, and womens' education being lacking were definitely written by Combeferre (Jehan worked on the last chapter).
