>>25471081
>he reads literature waiting for "things to happen" so he can gasp and point at them in excitement
why don't you just find someone to jangle some keys in your face. it would be more dignified than what you're doing.

As a mostly slop reader, I've been reading a few of the classics the last years (Les Mis among them), and it's interesting how different these older books are. There's no way you'd get something like the, how many chapters is it? A dozen chapters? Just building up this Bishop (and doing a lot of worldbuilding, I guess), who interacts with the main character *twice* and then is gone from the story.

All the bishop chapters are kino, though. And a lot of them read like something straight out of contemporary, well, like you could read it on reddit or something. The whole conversation with the rich guy, going on about how religion is opiate for the people, but he's above it etc. Literally reads like a very articulate reddit post.

Was really disappointed by Javert though. The musical makes him seem like a badass, but book Javert is kind of pathetic. Jean Veljan is great though.
Fucking hated Fantine. Fuck that bitch. Every POV chapter from her is just her whining about how hard her life is, and borderline reveling in her own misery. Get this real impression that her misery makes her virtuous. Fuck that. Has a kid out of wedlock (no virtue there) and then abandons her to someone else to raise and seemingly NEVER checks up on the kid once in her entire life. Fuck Fantine.

>>25471133
I agree the bishop chapters are comfy and kino, also super necessary.
Javert aura farmed hard in the masure gorbeau though fr not pathetic at all.
Fantine was too busy trying to get money for Cosette to check up on her but i agree that giving your child to complete stranger is kind of retarded but i think she was unironically retarded also what the fuck was Gavroche problem? Why did he do it?

>>25471081
Hugo likes to go on tangents, but they're part of his vision of the "total" novel. The main characters and plot lines are just small cogs in the grand scheme of the 1815 Restoration. He can go on and on for dozens of pages about things seemingly unrelated like Waterloo or French Argot, but they're all part of the atmosphere and the larger picture. Les Misérables is a portrait of the century.

>>25471133
>There's no way you'd get something like the, how many chapters is it? A dozen chapters? Just building up this Bishop (and doing a lot of worldbuilding, I guess), who interacts with the main character *twice* and then is gone from the story.
In the foreword of crime and punishment, there's an excerpt from a letter dosto wrote where he says he finished the book, but then his publisher said it was too short and made him add at least 8 more chapters just to pad the length. I think a lot of these older books go through a similar process, where the story is there and they add a bunch of irrelevant bullshit just to pad it so publishers will actually make their book.

>>25471533
Even without extra padding Les Mis is long as fuck, I doubt anybody would demand from Hugo to add more shit