Victor Hugo, romancier de l'abime: New Studies on Hugo's Novels (Legenda Main Series)

For a long time Victor Hugo's novels attracted little critical attention in spite of their obvious power and uniqueness. In recent years, however, scholars have returned to Notre-Dame de Paris, Les Miserables, Les Travailleurs de la mer, Quatrevingt-treize and L'Homme qui rit , uncovering the diversity, the thematic and narrative singularity, the shifting ironies and resistance to interpretative closure of works once judged simplistic and based upon 'une sagesse abregee'. The eleven essays in this volume bring together various critical approaches from eminent French, British and American scholars, to provide a new point of departure and to provoke discussion. The contributors range from the most distinguished specialists with world-wide reputations to young scholars at the beginning of their career who none the less have challenging and original things to say about a fascinating and unjustly neglected subject. This publication marks the bicentenary of Hugo's birth in 1802.