Les Miserables

I started reading this 'cause I figured I could use a dose of old-school literature.

I'm surprised to find myself enjoying basically every single page.  Even the lengthy tangents which have little to do with the actual plot.

I can safely conclude that Jean Valjean is the most underrated absolute badass in fiction.

Has anyone else tried reading this?  Better yet, has anyone read it in the original French version?

Neat coincedence, my high school's main musical this year is Les Miserables.

Hell of a high school show. (at least 18 to browse 4chan, GTFO, etc)

You know what strikes me about books like this?  We look at them as historical pieces, but at the time they were written, it was all contemporary.  If you lived back when this book was hot off the presses, you probably had a dad or granddad that fought at Waterloo, you might read his descriptions of Paris and go "Hey, I know that street!"

>>3
that makes them pretty much like the Tom Clancy of their time, right?

The movie was really good.

It rocked unimaginebly. I read it in Arabic as a kid, and goddamn did I love it. To this day, it's the only book that ever made me cry. And yes, I can safely say that Valjean would put any other fictional charater in history to shame.

If you haven't read it yet, for the love of all that is good and holy READ IT NOW.