The Man Who LaughsVICTOR HUGO'S long and chequered life (1802-85) was filled with experiences of the most diverse character - literature and politics, the court and the street, parliament and the theatre, labour, struggles, disappointments, exile and triumphs. --- In 1855 he began a 15-year-long exile on the island of Guernsey, where he completed, among others, his longest and most famous work, Les Misérables (1862), and also The Man Who Laughs (L'Homme qui rit; 1869), also known as "By Order of the King", a historic novel with fictional characters, set in England 1688-1705. --- .it will be seen that, here again, the story is admirably adapted to the moral. The constructive ingenuity exhibited throughout is almost morbid. Nothing could be more happily imagined. than the adventures of Gwynplaine, the itinerant mountebank, snatched suddenly out of his little way of life, and installed without preparation as one of the hereditary legislators of a great country. It is with a very bitter irony that the paper, on which all this depends, is left to float for years at the will of wind and tide. What, again, can be finer in conception than that voice from the people heard suddenly in the House of Lords, in solemn arraignment of the pleasures and privileges of its splendid occupants? The horrible laughter, stamped for ever "by order of the king" upon the face of this strange spokesman of democracy, adds yet another feature of justice to the scene; in all time, travesty has been the argument of oppression; and, in all time, the oppressed might have made this answer: "If I am vile, is it not your system that has made me so?" ---Robert Louis Stevenson |
Contents
1 | |
32 | |
37 | |
41 | |
47 | |
52 | |
THE NORTH POINT OF PORTLAND | 57 |
THE HOOKER AT SEA CHAPTER I SUPERHUMAN LAWS | 62 |
AN OUTSIDERS VIEW OF MEN AND THINGS | 262 |
GWYNPLAINE THINKS JUSTICE AND URSUS TALKS TRUTH | 267 |
URSUS THE POET DRAGS ON URSUS THE PHILOSOPHER | 275 |
THE BEGINNING OF THE FISSURE CHAPTER I THE TADCASTER INN | 278 |
OPENAIR ELOQUENCE | 281 |
WHERE THE PASSERBY REAPPEARS | 285 |
CONTRARIES FRATERNIZE IN HATE | 291 |
THE WAPENTAKE | 295 |
OUR FIRST ROUGH SKETCHES FILLED IN | 64 |
TROUBLED MEN ON THE TROUBLED SEA | 69 |
A CLOUD DIFFERENT FROM THE OTHERS ENTERS ON THE SCENE | 72 |
HARDQUANONNE | 81 |
SUPERHUMAN HORRORS | 84 |
NIXETNOX | 88 |
THE CHARGE CONFIDED TO A RAGING SEA | 90 |
THE COLOSSAL SAVAGE THE STORM | 91 |
THE CASKETS | 95 |
FACE TO FACE WITH THE ROCK | 97 |
FACE TO FACE WITH NIGHT | 101 |
ORTACH | 102 |
PORTENTOSUM MARE | 103 |
THE PROBLEM SUDDENLY WORKS IN SILENCE | 108 |
THE LAST RESOURCE | 110 |
THE HIGHEST RESOURCE | 113 |
THE CHILD IN THE SHADOW CHAPTER I CHESIL | 121 |
THE EFFECT OF SNOW | 125 |
A BURDEN MAKES A ROUGH ROAD ROUGHER | 129 |
ANOTHER FORM OF DESERT | 133 |
MISANTHROPY PLAYS ITS PRANKS | 138 |
THE AWAKING | 151 |
THE EVERLASTING PRESENCE OF THE PAST MAN REFLECTS MAN CHAPTER I LORD CLANCHARLIE | 155 |
LORD DAVID DIRRYMOIR | 166 |
THE DUCHESS JOSIANA | 172 |
THE LEADER OF FASHION | 179 |
QUEEN ANNE | 186 |
BARKILPHEDRO | 193 |
BARKILPHEDRO GNAWS HIS WAY | 198 |
INFERI | 203 |
HATE IS AS STRONG AS LOVE | 205 |
THE FLAME WHICH WOULD BE SEEN IF MAN WERE TRANSPARENT | 211 |
BARKILPHEDRO IN AMBUSCADE | 218 |
SCOTLAND IRELAND AND ENGLAND | 222 |
GWYNPLAINE AND DEA CHAPTER I WHEREIN WE SEE THE FACE OF HIM OF WHOM WE HAVE HITHERTO SEEN ONLY THE ACTS | 230 |
DEA | 235 |
OCULOS NON HABET ET VIDET | 237 |
WELLMATCHED LOVERS | 239 |
THE BLUE SKY THROUGH THE BLACK CLOUD | 242 |
URSUS AS TUTOR AND URSUS AS GUARDIAN | 245 |
BLINDNESS GIVES LESSONS IN CLAIRVOYANCE | 249 |
NOT ONLY HAPPINESS BUT PROSPERITY | 252 |
ABSURDITIES WHICH FOLKS WITHOUT TASTE CALL POETRY | 257 |
THE MOUSE EXAMINED BY THE CATS | 298 |
WHY SHOULD A GOLD PIECE LOWER ITSELF BY MIXING WITH A HEAP OF PENNIES? | 307 |
SYMPTOMS OF POISONING | 312 |
ABYSSUS ABYSSUM VOCAT | 317 |
THE CELL OF TORTURE CHAPTER I THE TEMPTATION OF ST GWYNPLAINE | 325 |
FROM GAY TO GRAVE | 332 |
LEX REX FEX | 338 |
URSUS SPIES THE POLICE | 340 |
A FEARFUL PLACE | 345 |
THE KIND OF MAGISTRACY UNDER THE WIGS OF FORMER DAYS | 347 |
SHUDDERING | 350 |
LAMENTATION | 352 |
THE SEA AND FATE ARE MOVED BY THE SAME BREATH CHAPTER I THE DURABILITY OF FRAGILE THINGS | 365 |
THE WAIF KNOWS ITS OWN COURSE | 374 |
AN AWAKENING | 386 |
FASCINATION | 388 |
WE THINK WE REMEMBER WE FORGET | 394 |
URSUS UNDER DIFFERENT ASPECTS CHAPTER I WHAT THE MISANTHROPE SAID | 401 |
WHAT HE DID | 404 |
COMPLICATIONS | 415 |
MOENIBUS SURDIS CAMPANA MUTA | 418 |
STATE POLICY DEALS WITH LITTLE MATTERS AS WELL AS WITH GREAT | 424 |
THE TITANESS CHAPTER I THE AWAKENING | 433 |
THE RESEMBLANCE OF A PALACE TO A WOOD | 435 |
EVE | 439 |
SATAN | 445 |
THEY RECOGNIZE BUT DO NOT KNOW EACH OTHER | 455 |
THE CAPITOL AND THINGS AROUND IT CHAPTER I ANALYSIS OF MAJESTIC MATTERS | 457 |
IMPARTIALITY | 469 |
THE OLD HALL | 477 |
THE OLD CHAMBER | 482 |
ARISTOCRATIC GOSSIP | 486 |
THE HIGH AND THE LOW | 494 |
STORMS OF MEN ARE WORSE THAN STORMS OF OCEANS | 498 |
HE WOULD BE A GOOD BROTHER WERE HE NOT A GOOD SON | 514 |
IN RUINS CHAPTER I IT IS THROUGH EXCESS OF GREATNESS THAT MAN REACHES EXCESS OF MISERY | 519 |
THE DREGS | 523 |
THE NIGHT AND THE SEA CHAPTER I A WATCHDOG MAY BE A GUARDIAN ANGEL | 539 |
BARKILPHEDRO HAVING AIMED AT THE EAGLE BRINGS DOWN THE DOVE | 543 |
PARADISE REGAINED BELOW | 550 |
NAY ON HIGH | 555 |
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Common terms and phrases
abyss Anne arms Barkilphedro Baron Basque beautiful Black Rod blind bowed called caravan carriage Chaos Vanquished CHAPTER Charles II child cloud Comprachicos court cried crowd darkness dead depths doctor door dream duchess Duke Earl everything eyes face fear felt Fibi France gibbet Green Box Gwyn Gwynplaine Gwynplaine's hand happy Hardquanonne head heard heaven Helmsgail Homo honour hooker House of Lords James II Josiana justice king knew laugh light London looked Lord Chancellor Lord Clancharlie Lord David Louis XIV Majesty Master Nicless mountebank mouth never night passed peer of England peerage placed prince prison queen quorum royal seemed seen shadow sheriff side silence skipper snow soul Southwark star stone storm suddenly Tadcaster things thought tion Tom-Jim-Jack took turned Ursus vessel Viscount voice wall wapentake wave William Cowper wind wolf woman words ynplaine
Popular passages
Page 40 - ... do so without abandoning the means of earning a livelihood. They of necessity possess boxes of tools and instruments of labor, whatever their errant trade may be. Those of whom we speak were dragging their baggage with them, often an encumbrance. It could not have been easy to bring these movables to the bottom of the cliff. This, however, revealed the intention of a definite departure. No time was lost ; there was one continued passing to and fro from the shore to the vessel, and from the vessel...