What one reviewer said about The Hunchback Of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo:
Simply put, The Hunchback of Notre Dame is one of the best novels I have ever read. I loved Victor Hugo's writing style (or the translation thereof), the comprehensiveness of description of both characters and setting (for the most part), and the ideas that Hugo provoked in me as I went through the book.
The novel is about a beautiful, young, virtuous and romantic gypsy (La Esmeralda), a deformed and deaf bellringer of the cathedral of Notre Dame (Quasimodo), and an archdeacon (Frollo) whose obsessive nature creates the tragedy that all three will realize at the end of the novel.
All three characters have the one uniting feature of unrequited love. Esmeralda seeks the love of Phoebus, an officer whose only interest is that of the carnal nature, and sees the gypsy as only another girl to have his way with. Quasimodo and Frollo each seek the love of Esmeralda, who does not return it due to their physical and (best attempt at description) spiritual odiousness, respectively.
Ironically, the hideous Quasimodo and lovely Esmeralda hold the most in common, as Hugo makes the reader aware that both of them are adopted (and even in their infancy, their lives are linked), and that both are social pariahs, Quasimodo due to his appearance, and Esmeralda due to her gypsy heritage, her beauty, a crime attributed to her, and, of all things, a performing goat she trained, the sum of which tags her as a sorceress. In fact, both, due to these characteristics, are linked with the devil, although their actions show a goodness that outweighs that of any other characters in the novel.
Variations on the notion of "love" are examined in the book, There is Esmeralda's romantic love where she imagines the handsome captain Phoebus to be the embodiment of masculine virtue, Phoebus' physical love where the value of a woman is based on her appearance and promiscuity and lasts until he's satisfied his physical urges, Frollo's obsessive love where a person, whose life is spent on monomaniacly focusing on his faith, his studies, and alchemy, finds a beautiful young girl in his sights (his love amounting to a sickness, his resulting actions morbid symptoms), and Quasimodo's love, based on the kind acts of another. This last love is the only one of the three not focused on one's appearance, as Quasimodo does not develop this affection until Esmeralda soothes him while he is tortured for trying to kidnap her at Frollo's (his adoptive father) direction. It is Quasimodo's love and his expression of it in acts of kindness, not to mention saving Esmeralda's life once and trying to do so a second time, that makes him such an endearing character.
This novel also has some incredible descriptive moments, such as the dark streets of 15th century Paris while Frollo wanders in a state of confusion following what he thinks is the death of the woman he loves, and the depiction of Paris at dawn, quaint and placid just before the story's most tragic climax.
Hugo also provides some description of the architecture of the cathedral itself, which I found very interesting, and a description of the layout of Paris in the 15th century, which I found not so interesting, due to my unfamiliarity with the city itself and the history thereof, although a French reader, especially one in the 19th century, would have probably appreciated it. This is the only element of the novel that I did not like, and it is but one chapter.
This story grabbed me, and I was hanging on every word Hugo wrote. I found myself emotionally affected at many points of the story, which is not something that often occurs when I read a novel. I was so impressed with the book that I got Les Miserables after only reading 100 pages of Hunchback. I give this novel 5 stars, and it deserves every single one of them.
Victor Hugo stories are replete with all that is dark and dismal in humanity and society. It was so with Les Miserables. It is more so with Notre Dame de Paris. He seeks to shock his readers thoroughly, and succeeds in doing so. I’m not exaggerating when I say that this book produced on me the same effect that a horror story would. All the reviews of this story I’ve read do not go beyond the obvious, the central characters and their pathos they evoke. One only has to scratch the surface to find this story permeated with ugliness and its embodiment throughout. There is the ugliness of aspect[Quasimodo], of mind[Frollo], of character[Phoebus], of circumstance[Esmerelda], of fate[Paquette], of demeaning existence[the Cour de Miracles, the rat hole], of judicial administration, of society in general[superstitious, selfish, cruel]. At the beginning of the story as well as through three quarters of the book Quasimodo has all our sympathy. His wretched state, his crowning as pope of the fools, his public pillory, his adoration of Esmeralda; all wrench the heart. BUT during the later part of the story his actions grow uglier than his appearance. He turns into a creature of such demonic ferocity ,brutally murdering scores of people that one is filled with nothing but contempt and loathing for him. Some readers may condone his savagery in defence [of the gypsy girl, not he cathedral], in the name of love. But if love makes a beast of man and brings about so much destruction, it is worse than no love at all. In fact what Quasimodo and Frollo feel for Esmeralda is not love but a mad obsession damning all three of them eventually. This therefore cant be love, for love even in the tragedy is a redeeming force. Esmeralda , too evokes our sympathy. She is a victim of circumstances and the vices of others. But she is not as virtuous as she appears at the onset. As the story progresses she falls in love with a man of low character and yields herself physically to him. When he is stabbed while making love to her she is carried naked out of his rooms to be tried for his murder. In the end it turns out that she is the daughter of a prostitute, abducted in infancy which has no material bearing on the story [now if she had been the daughter of a noblewoman………perhaps she might have been saved] But The author seems stubbornly determined that none should have been redeemed. Then there is Claude Frollo. The degeneration of this august man of learning and religion to an obsessive maniac is pathetic and disgusting. One is left cold on learning his secret. Even the elements of humour are dark. Be it Pierre Gringoires adventures, Jehan Frollos antics or the trial of Quasimodo [a deaf prisoner tried by a deaf judge] If there were a vote for the most horrific scene in the book I wonder which would it be………… Would it be the one where Paquettes chid is abducted, or the one where Gringoier is almost hanged, or would it be the on where Claude Frollo confesses his dark secret to Esmerelda, or her trial, torture and condemnation, Or would it be the siege of Notre Dame where a terrible Quasimodo brutally kills scores of people by crushing them under heavy pillars and throwing boiling lead on them, or the one where he kills Jehan Frollo by first breaking the arms and legs of the defenseless fellow then holding him over the balcony by his legs and smashing his body against the wall repeatedly until his brains spill out on the street below. Ironically Claude Frollo had adopted Quasimodo so that the benefits of his good acts might accrue to his little brother this same Jehan.It just goes to show that when the mind becomes corrupt ones best acts fail to bear fruit. This book therefore is not a feel good, light read. Read it if you a taste for the dark, gloomy and morbid. Alternatively you might read the news
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