Book: Le comte de Monte-Cristo
Mar. 28th, 2004 07:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
livAuthor: Alexandre Dumas
Details: Originally published 1844; pub Livre de Poche 1995; ISBN 2-253-09805-1 / 2-253-09806-X; English e-text (no French text available online, that I can find)1,
Verdict: Le comte de Monte-Cristo is great fun, despite being on the long side.
Reasons for reading it:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lethargic_man raves about it.
How it came into my hands:lethargic_man gave it to me for my birthday. In fact, he gave it to me twice: he gave me an English edition for my 24th, and I was an ungrateful wench and said 'That's very nice, but you know I'm too much of a snob to read French novels in translation'. So he gave me a French edition for my 25th; what a patient and generous boyfriend I have!
While Le comte de Monte-Cristo has many appealing qualities, it does suffer from having been written as a serial. It may in fact be my just reward for complaining that modern fantasy tends to be too long; this one was originally published in eighteen volumes! I am a little behind on my reviews, but most of the reason why I didn't post any new books for ages was that it took me about six weeks to read lCdMC, and then I was somewhat daunted by the prospect of reviewing it. That said, a good proportion of it is exciting enough that reading it didn't feel like a chore. My main complaint was not the length, but the way the structure is not as tight as it might be, and the effectiveness of the writing is diluted by too many irrelevant sub-plots and minor characters.
I absolutely loved the first section, with Dantès' unjust imprisonment (which actually resonated very strongly for me with the Dreyfuss affair, which I did a project on for A Level), his friendship with Faria, his dramatic escape culminating in finding the treasure. That makes a really good adventure story, with just the right balance between really breathtakingly dire circumstances without going so far as to make the 'happy ending' completely implausible. Except that that's only a quarter of the way through the book, and there's still over a thousand pages where Monte Cristo has unlimited resources (materially but also in terms of influence and personality), making it rather hard to be surprised when all his plans work themselves out just as he intended. There are a few setbacks along the way, but they do rather feel like padding, and there aren't enough of them to maintain the drama.
As for the plans themselves, they strike me as unnecessarily convoluted (perhaps to maintain the requisite number of episodes). And the whole setup is really rather brutal. Yes, one can sympathize with Dantès' desire for vengeance on the people who destroyed his life, but the picture of several decades of relentless, cold-blooded pursuit of the goal of punishing them and everyone connected to them is not a particularly appealing one. I was quite considerably uncomfortable with the way this sustained cruelty is portrayed as a sort of divine mission. The count's total indifference to various people unconnected with his original enemies is very chilling. For example, I kept hoping that the story of how Ali came to be Monte Cristo's slave would turn out to be a fabrication, part of the count's elaborate act, but it is never denied.
In some ways Monte Cristo reminds me of Zakalwe from Use of Weapons, as an outsider using his effectively superhuman power to manipulate society for grand ends, with little empathy for the individual human beings caught up in his schemes. As with Zakalwe, I half wanted to sympathize with him, especially after the opening chapters in his Dantès incarnation.
There are definitely some great sections in the latter three quarters of the novel, though. There's a rather nicely done little miniature murder mystery, albeit of the kind where the reader knows whodunnit, and it's just a case of watching the characters finding a way to acquit the wrongfully accused and identify the real culprit. And boy, was I unimpressed with the 'forensics', but that's a minor detail. And the scene where Mercédès confronts Dantès: vous ne tuerez pas mon fils! is absolutely sublime. There's some lovely characterization in general, although with such a large cast there do end up being too many minor characters who aren't even disguised as anything other than plot vehicles.
The story relies too heavily on people appearing to be dead but turning out to have survived after all. It's fair enough with Dantès himself, and indeed there is an explicitly Resurrection theme going on, but too much of that stretches suspension of disbelief, and loses the tension, and by the time we get to Valentine and Maximilien, there's no drama whatsoever, it's entirely obvious that both of them are going to come back from their 'deaths'. That arc is also cast as a sort of Romeo and Juliet story, which is odd; I've been half-writing a story (that is to say, vaguely toying with the idea of writing it!) about what would have happened to R&J had the Friar's plan succeeded. The version in lCdMC is simply a retelling with a happy ending, which isn't really what I had in mind, and is in fact rather irritating.
I didn't like the romantic arcs in general, actually. The relationship between Monte Cristo and Haydée would be quite dodgy enough without the repeated emphasis on her regarding him as both father and lover. I would probably have been annoyed had Monte Cristo got back together with Mercédès, unless it had been orchestrated exceptionally well. But it's hard to accept her being left out of the happy ending.
Also, I was quite furious with the assumption of Monte Cristo (which to all appearances is shared by the narrative voice) that Mercédès somehow failed because she did not remain 'faithful' to him for several decades after believing he was dead! There's a big problem within Orthodox Judaism called the agunah (chained woman) problem, where a legal technicality can lead to certain women being unable to remarry because they can not obtain sufficiently convincing proof of their absent husband's death. This is a problem with Jewish law, and it's generally agreed to be a scandal, even by the most openly misogynistic parts of the Orthodox community. But in lCdMC, Mercédès is even more chained than a Jewish agunah. I can't believe that anyone could dare to think less of her because she married Fernand when she had seen no sign of her fiancé for 14 years except an eyewitness account of his death at the end of that time.
lCdMC reminded me why I need to read more in French, and more nineteenth century literature as well. Reading in French meant that I read slightly more slowly; probably only about 20% more slowly, but it's noticeable over such a long book! It also meant that I was able to enjoy the elaborate language without getting annoyed by how completely preposterous and over-the-top and nineteenth century it is. The sentences are far too long, and the constructions are so formal it's almost ludicrous, even in dialogue. Even the supposedly rustic and unsophisticated characters pack their sentences with incredibly convoluted phrases and obscure words and grammar that is almost never used except in the most formal writing. But reading in a second language, I was able to admire the sentences for their own sake, and not be too bothered by the lack of realism of the dialogue.
I'd forgotten just how much less prudish the nineteenth century was in France compared to English Victorianism! lCdMC has really rather a lot of sex (including a rather sweet lesbian couple) and some quite weird drug scenes.
Anyway, yeah, that was a bit of a marathon, but enjoyable all the same!
1] But that's because I can't see for looking. See below.
Details: Originally published 1844; pub Livre de Poche 1995; ISBN 2-253-09805-1 / 2-253-09806-X; English e-text (no French text available online, that I can find)1,
Verdict: Le comte de Monte-Cristo is great fun, despite being on the long side.
Reasons for reading it:
lethargic_man raves about it.How it came into my hands:
lethargic_man gave it to me for my birthday. In fact, he gave it to me twice: he gave me an English edition for my 24th, and I was an ungrateful wench and said 'That's very nice, but you know I'm too much of a snob to read French novels in translation'. So he gave me a French edition for my 25th; what a patient and generous boyfriend I have!While Le comte de Monte-Cristo has many appealing qualities, it does suffer from having been written as a serial. It may in fact be my just reward for complaining that modern fantasy tends to be too long; this one was originally published in eighteen volumes! I am a little behind on my reviews, but most of the reason why I didn't post any new books for ages was that it took me about six weeks to read lCdMC, and then I was somewhat daunted by the prospect of reviewing it. That said, a good proportion of it is exciting enough that reading it didn't feel like a chore. My main complaint was not the length, but the way the structure is not as tight as it might be, and the effectiveness of the writing is diluted by too many irrelevant sub-plots and minor characters.
I absolutely loved the first section, with Dantès' unjust imprisonment (which actually resonated very strongly for me with the Dreyfuss affair, which I did a project on for A Level), his friendship with Faria, his dramatic escape culminating in finding the treasure. That makes a really good adventure story, with just the right balance between really breathtakingly dire circumstances without going so far as to make the 'happy ending' completely implausible. Except that that's only a quarter of the way through the book, and there's still over a thousand pages where Monte Cristo has unlimited resources (materially but also in terms of influence and personality), making it rather hard to be surprised when all his plans work themselves out just as he intended. There are a few setbacks along the way, but they do rather feel like padding, and there aren't enough of them to maintain the drama.
As for the plans themselves, they strike me as unnecessarily convoluted (perhaps to maintain the requisite number of episodes). And the whole setup is really rather brutal. Yes, one can sympathize with Dantès' desire for vengeance on the people who destroyed his life, but the picture of several decades of relentless, cold-blooded pursuit of the goal of punishing them and everyone connected to them is not a particularly appealing one. I was quite considerably uncomfortable with the way this sustained cruelty is portrayed as a sort of divine mission. The count's total indifference to various people unconnected with his original enemies is very chilling. For example, I kept hoping that the story of how Ali came to be Monte Cristo's slave would turn out to be a fabrication, part of the count's elaborate act, but it is never denied.
In some ways Monte Cristo reminds me of Zakalwe from Use of Weapons, as an outsider using his effectively superhuman power to manipulate society for grand ends, with little empathy for the individual human beings caught up in his schemes. As with Zakalwe, I half wanted to sympathize with him, especially after the opening chapters in his Dantès incarnation.
There are definitely some great sections in the latter three quarters of the novel, though. There's a rather nicely done little miniature murder mystery, albeit of the kind where the reader knows whodunnit, and it's just a case of watching the characters finding a way to acquit the wrongfully accused and identify the real culprit. And boy, was I unimpressed with the 'forensics', but that's a minor detail. And the scene where Mercédès confronts Dantès: vous ne tuerez pas mon fils! is absolutely sublime. There's some lovely characterization in general, although with such a large cast there do end up being too many minor characters who aren't even disguised as anything other than plot vehicles.
The story relies too heavily on people appearing to be dead but turning out to have survived after all. It's fair enough with Dantès himself, and indeed there is an explicitly Resurrection theme going on, but too much of that stretches suspension of disbelief, and loses the tension, and by the time we get to Valentine and Maximilien, there's no drama whatsoever, it's entirely obvious that both of them are going to come back from their 'deaths'. That arc is also cast as a sort of Romeo and Juliet story, which is odd; I've been half-writing a story (that is to say, vaguely toying with the idea of writing it!) about what would have happened to R&J had the Friar's plan succeeded. The version in lCdMC is simply a retelling with a happy ending, which isn't really what I had in mind, and is in fact rather irritating.
I didn't like the romantic arcs in general, actually. The relationship between Monte Cristo and Haydée would be quite dodgy enough without the repeated emphasis on her regarding him as both father and lover. I would probably have been annoyed had Monte Cristo got back together with Mercédès, unless it had been orchestrated exceptionally well. But it's hard to accept her being left out of the happy ending.
Also, I was quite furious with the assumption of Monte Cristo (which to all appearances is shared by the narrative voice) that Mercédès somehow failed because she did not remain 'faithful' to him for several decades after believing he was dead! There's a big problem within Orthodox Judaism called the agunah (chained woman) problem, where a legal technicality can lead to certain women being unable to remarry because they can not obtain sufficiently convincing proof of their absent husband's death. This is a problem with Jewish law, and it's generally agreed to be a scandal, even by the most openly misogynistic parts of the Orthodox community. But in lCdMC, Mercédès is even more chained than a Jewish agunah. I can't believe that anyone could dare to think less of her because she married Fernand when she had seen no sign of her fiancé for 14 years except an eyewitness account of his death at the end of that time.
lCdMC reminded me why I need to read more in French, and more nineteenth century literature as well. Reading in French meant that I read slightly more slowly; probably only about 20% more slowly, but it's noticeable over such a long book! It also meant that I was able to enjoy the elaborate language without getting annoyed by how completely preposterous and over-the-top and nineteenth century it is. The sentences are far too long, and the constructions are so formal it's almost ludicrous, even in dialogue. Even the supposedly rustic and unsophisticated characters pack their sentences with incredibly convoluted phrases and obscure words and grammar that is almost never used except in the most formal writing. But reading in a second language, I was able to admire the sentences for their own sake, and not be too bothered by the lack of realism of the dialogue.
I'd forgotten just how much less prudish the nineteenth century was in France compared to English Victorianism! lCdMC has really rather a lot of sex (including a rather sweet lesbian couple) and some quite weird drug scenes.
Anyway, yeah, that was a bit of a marathon, but enjoyable all the same!
1] But that's because I can't see for looking. See below.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-18 03:43 am (UTC)You didn't try very hard. ;^b (http://www.dumaspere.com/pages/biblio/sommaire.php?lid=r14)
While Le comte de Monte-Cristo has many appealing qualities, it does suffer from having been written as a serial. It may in fact be my just reward for complaining that modern fantasy tends to be too long; this one was originally published in eighteen volumes!
They must have been pretty short volumes, though. The edition I first read was a single volume, printed on onionskin paper, and as a result I didn't realise for many years just how long it was!
there's still over a thousand pages where Monte Cristo has unlimited resources (materially but also in terms of influence and personality), making it rather hard to be surprised when all his plans work themselves out just as he intended.
Except they don't. It's twelve years since I last read this (and perhaps, having learned from experience with
Yes, one can sympathize with Dantès' desire for vengeance on the people who destroyed his life, but the picture of several decades of relentless, cold-blooded pursuit of the goal of punishing them and everyone connected to them is not a particularly appealing one. I was quite considerably uncomfortable with the way this sustained cruelty is portrayed as a sort of divine mission. The count's total indifference to various people unconnected with his original enemies is very chilling.
Now consider this in the political context of the time: the Reign of Terror within living memory, Napoleon's drive to take on the rest of Europe in battle, the fighting between Bonapartists and royalists. Noirtier, IIRC, was what we could call a terrorist in the first part of the book.
lCdMC has really rather a lot of sex (including a rather sweet lesbian couple) and some quite weird drug scenes.
The edition I first read rendered hachich as "hatchis"; it took me a very long time to figure out what drug was involved here.
Later, when I read The Picture of Dorian Gray, the "green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy and persistent" that Dorian puts aside in favour of going to an opium den resonated strongly for me with the "kind of greenish paste" that Sindbad the Sailor gives Franz in The Count of Monte Cristo. I wonder if this was deliberate. (Presumably the reason Dorian puts it aside is that hashish wasn't strong enough to satisfy his desire at that time.)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-18 02:14 pm (UTC)Thankyou! *kiss* I looked all over the place and just couldn't find anything.
I should have reread it before recommending it to you
I know the feeling. But there isn't enough time for lots and lots of rereading. I should have reread The Ground Beneath Her Feet before I lent it to you too, that would have allowed me to discuss it more intelligently.
Monte Cristo's anguish when his revenge spirals out of his control and starts claiming innocent lives.
I think a large part of my problem with the book was that I didn't find this section convincing. It's all very well for Monte Cristo to be all regretful over the death of a child, but his regret doesn't change the fact that he's damaged a lot of innocent people's lives. He cries about Edouard, but he has no qualms at all about people like Ali and Bertuccio, who have nothing to do with the people he hates, let alone the fallout from his plans on various other innocent relatives. He is quite prepared to see Valentine framed for murder, on the grounds that she comes from a 'race maudite'; the only reason he softens towards her is that Maximilien falls for her. He quite happily subjects Eugénie Danglars to impoverishment, exile and public humiliation when he nearly tricks her into marrying her own half-brother, where she's done nothing wrong but happening to be her father's daughter. And one of the people who suffers worst from all his machinations is Mercédès, whom he's supposed to be in love with, for goodness' sake!
(no subject)
Date: 2016-08-07 08:59 am (UTC)Well, after meaning to reread a number of books you'd read at my recommendation a while after I read them myself, and wanting to reread in order to reply to (or at least fully understand) your comments, I finally realised this was never going to happen if I didn't put my to-read list on hold for a while, so I've set aside a year now for rereading. Unfortunately, it's now twelve years since you read this book, so the problem still exists, but reversed.
As for the plans themselves, they strike me as unnecessarily convoluted
Part of that is Monte Cristo's apparent desire not to act as the instrument of vengeance himself but to manoeuvre other people with grudges into taking down his enemies for him. The other part, which I didn't know of until I went to Wikipedia recently to see what it had to say about the novel, is that the stories of revenge were based on real-life incidents.
The story relies too heavily on people appearing to be dead but turning out to have survived after all. It's fair enough with Dantès himself, and indeed there is an explicitly Resurrection theme going on, but too much of that stretches suspension of disbelief, and loses the tension, and by the time we get to Valentine and Maximilien, there's no drama whatsoever, it's entirely obvious that both of them are going to come back from their 'deaths'.
I think the reader is not supposed to be wondering whether they will, but (a) will the count succeed in stopping Maximilien from doing a Romeo, and (b) trying to figure out what the count's motive is for not telling him immediately that she's not really dead.
in lCdMC, Mercédès is even more chained than a Jewish agunah. I can't believe that anyone could dare to think less of her because she married Fernand when she had seen no sign of her fiancé for 14 years except an eyewitness account of his death at the end of that time.
Actually, she gave in to Fernand's pressure and married him after two years, which is a bit different from fourteen. I do not say this to exonerate Monte Cristo, but the situation is a bit less black-and-white than you portray it.
It's all very well for Monte Cristo to be all regretful over the death of a child, but his regret doesn't change the fact that he's damaged a lot of innocent people's lives. He cries about Edouard, but he has no qualms at all about people like Ali and Bertuccio, who have nothing to do with the people he hates,
Bertuccio I will accept he has traumatised by raking up the embers of his past, but how has he damaged Ali? He saved his life!
let alone the fallout from his plans on various other innocent relatives.
This is something I was looking out for on my reread. I think you've missed his character development here; at the beginning he's considers himself as an agent of the God who punishes the children for the sins of the parents to the third and fourth generation—he actually quotes that—but first Mercédès' intervention on behalf of Albert then Maximilien's on behalf of Valentine change his mind. It's not simply that Maximilien falls for Valentine that changes his mind; it's that this is symptomatic of his realisation that his actions have consequences affecting other people. That's why he tries to save Edouard, and why he lets Noirtier in on the secret of Valentine's survival (even whilst still pursuing revenge against de Villefort), and why he comes to doubt everything he has worked towards, until he receives a message from above, as he sees it, in the passage of Faria's book he sees very near the end of the novel. If I have criticism of this plot arc anywhere, it's that this final message reconfirms him as an avenging angel rather than justifying what he has done but adding "enough!".
_The Stars My Destination_
Date: 2016-08-07 09:03 am (UTC)