Neoclassicism in Les Miserable; or, Why Grantaire and Enjolras Were Probably Banging
I thought the Grantaire/Enjolras shipping was something for the hell of it. Not really based in reality, but it kinda fits, it’s fun, shipping is fun, no one was harmed in the making of this ship, Victor Hugo might be turning in his grave but hell he’s dead, la de da.
Nope, Victor Hugo actually compares Grantaire to Hephaestion, Patroclus, Nisus, Pollux, Eudamidas, and Pechmeja. Let’s look at these people in history for a moment. Their names all appear in partnership with another person, with the exception of Eudamidas and Pechmeja. If you don’t care about them, skip the next paragraph.
I researched Eudamidas and Pechmeja, but couldn’t find any trace of their partners… Eudamidas turns up vague mentions of a brother, but he was a pretty obscure person in Lacedemonian history. He shows up in a few things passingly. Pechmeja, full name I think Ange Pechmeja, might have been a poet, but all pages found on him were in French. Which I do not speak, read, or write.)
So there’s these different kinds of relationships in Greek culture that basically throw out the whole “you can be friends or romantic partners and THAT IS IT” thing that the Western world so loves to perpetuate (I’m not really a fan). Very briefly, when you say “Greek Love”, it refers to pederasty, involving the “active” lover, the erastes, and the eromenos/pais, the “boy”, which Wikipedia tells me is an affectionate name, not actually referring to age. No, it isn’t pedophilia, that’s a different, modern term. My sources involve Wikipedia and various classes, so make of it what you will). Suffice to say, the general (grumbled) consensus is that oftentimes these relationships were romantic, close, and often sexual in nature. It wasn’t really “gay” as we now know the identity, but it was a same-sex relationship. It didn’t exclude them from sleeping with women, either. Sexual identity was very different.
Patroclus and Achilles were one such pair. Acknowledged by Plato and Aeschylus to be lovers, their status is of course, still in limbo, as Medieval Christianity erased any sense of homoeroticism, while Shakespeare embraced it in Troilus and Cressida. The problem with all these relationships being called such is that centuries of various cultures and historians glorifying or condemning homosexual relationships cloud things quite a bit. All I can really say with certainty is that some historians believe they were more than Good Friends.
Hephaestion and Alexander the Great were one of these pairs. Look them up. There’s about 8 primary sources in the entire world regarding Alexander, possibly less. Not a ton of reading. They were never acknowledged as lovers in the primary sources, however, they did compare themselves to Patroclus and Achilles, who at the time, were believed to be in a relationship, see above paragraph.
Nisus and Euryalus were yet another pair, in Virgil’s Aeneid. Their love is acknowledged by Virgil as following the Greek Love pattern of relationships, and is called “pius”, or honorable.
And Pollux and Castor were brothers. They don’t particularly fit this theory, but the implication is that Grantaire and Enjolras were very close, I believe.. They were twins.
The original quote is referring to Grantaire,
“There are men who seem born to be the opposite, the reverse, the counterpart. They are Pollux, Patroclus, Nisus, Eudamidas, Hephaestion, Pechmeja. They live only upon condition of leaning on another; their names are continuations, and are only written preceded by the conjunction and; their existence is not their own; it is the other side of a destiny which is not theirs. Grantaire was one of these men. He was the reverse of Enjolras.“
- Victor Hugo, Les Miserable, pg. 651
So basically Victor Hugo said that these two were intimately close, possibly banging, in the Greek Love sort of way.
It is also worth mentioning that Napoleon Bonaparte’s rule coincides with the neoclassicist movement in France- that is, the idolization of Greco-Roman culture. For example, the Josephine, or empire, waist on womens dresses was to create a Greco-Roman statuesque silhouette. Les Amis are all, of course, definitely not loyalists (as this is what caused Marius to fall out with his grandfather, among other things), and Marius himself turns into a fervent supporter of Bonaparte (despite being several years too late to do anything about it).
In conclusion, they were probably banging, or at least very emotionally intimate, and Victor Hugo implies as much. The End.
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