Victor Hugo's Notre-Dame de Paris
Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris
By Murray Dahm
The French author Victor-Marie Hugo’s 1831 novel Notre-Dame de Paris (usually referred to in English as The Hunchback of Notredame) is one of the great works of French Literature. So much so that several aspects of the novel have entered into the public subconscious, even if the novel has not been read by large tracts of society.
Set in 1482 (the novel’s original title included the date), one of the major ‘characters’ of the story is the building of the Cathedral itself. This was part of the initial idea to represent the Gothic Cathedral as an iconic part of the Parisian story – the success of the novel essentially led to the preservation of the building. Hugo had already penned several articles arguing for the preservation of Paris’ medieval architecture.
The principal story tells of Quasimodo, the hunch-backed and disfigured bell-ringer of the cathedral, his guardian, the antagonist Archdeacon Claude Frollo, and the sixteen-year old Romani street-dancer Agnes (Esmerelda – and called in the text a Gypsy). She is the object of lust and affection of most of the novel’s male characters, including Quasimodo, Frollo, the archer captain Pheobus de Chateaupers, and the poet Pierre Gringore (one of the few actual historical characters in the book).
Several other elements of the story wind their way around the buildings of the cathedral and the city – this involves complicated (and exciting) abductions, attempted rapes, accusations of witchcraft, pillories, hangings and (several) rescues.
The novel was originally published in three volumes covering its 940 pages and is set at the end of the reign of Louis XI (r. 1461-1483). In the novel, Quasimodo – named after the fact he was adopted by Frollo on Quasimodo Sunday, the Second Sunday of Easter – is almost blind and deaf due to the ringing of the bells. He usually stays within the confines of the cathedral (he is shunned and rejected by the population of Paris due to his appearance) except on the occasion of the Festival of Fools (held in early January) – when a false Pope is elected and, in the novel, Quasimodo is considered the perfect candidate due to his deformities. He also leaves the safety of the cathedral to abduct Esemerelda on Frollo’s instructions and later to rescue her.
The novel has been famously adapted several times to stage and screen – my first exposure to it was through the screenings on television of the 1939 film version with Charles Laughton as Quasimodo. I then also saw a film festival screening of the silent 1923 Lon Chaney version with a newly composed soundtrack in the 1990s. I also have colleagues who considers the 1996 Disney musical films The Hunchback of Notre Dame one of the best (and most underrated) of all the Disney musicals (it is also one of the most faithful adaptations).
There have been many other films and other adaptations – including turning the novel into an opera La Esmerelda in 1836 for which (somewhat surprisingly) Hugo adapted his own work into the libretto. Hugo was famously unimpressed with other settings of his works as operas (such as Verdi’s operas Ernani (1844, based on Hugo’s 1830 play Hernani) and Rigoletto (1851, based on Hugo’s 1832 play Le roi s’amuse).
Many other operas based on Notre-Dame de Paris have been written – most called, peculiarly, Esmerelda but based independently on the novel not Hugo’s own libretto (in 1847, 1856, 1869, 1883, 1914, 1997). Many of these adaptations change multiple elements of the novel – especially having the lustful and sadistic villain as a Catholic Priest – this was too much for many censors. In some, Frollo is changed to the hero (and his wastrel brother Jehan turned into the villain), or his status is altered. Likewise, the shallow character of Captain Phoebus is sometimes made more heroic (in the novel he too is a villain and only wants to conquer Esmerelda, although she is infatuated with him – he is killed by the jealous Frollo). Likewise, Esmeralda is not hanged (as she is in the novel) and the disappearance of Quasimodo after he pushes Frollo from Notre-Dame to his death is altered – in the novel, years later a disfigured skeleton is discovered hugging another skeleton (that of Esmerelda) in the charnel house at Montfaucon – where the bodies of those executed were taken.
Even more than elements of the actual story, however, Hugo’s tale has influenced ideas about unrequited love and the ‘beauty on the inside’ motif (also an obvious element in the many Beauty and the Beast stories) of any outwardly ugly or deformed character.
*** Learn more about the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris and its medieval Parisian context in issue 15 of Medieval World: Culture & Conflict.
