![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
(no subject)
All right. Book Four: "Saint-Denis and the Idyll of the Rue Plumet," otherwise known as BRACE YOURSELVES, EVERYONE, WE'RE UP TO THE BARRICADES.
Before I get to that, though, I want to talk a bit about Eponine, and also Gavroche
But let's start out with Eponine.
So guys, remember that time that Eponine stopped her father and a bunch of extremely angry convicts from breaking into Valjean's house? "What the devil!" she says, "this summer, I'll be hungry; this winter, I'll be cold. Are they some fools, these geese, to think they can scare a girl?" She laughs at them, as they menace her with knives "What is it to me whether somebody picks me up tomorrow on the pavement of the Rue Plumet?" She says: "I just cry out. They come, bang! You're six, but I'm everybody."
And six of the baddest dudes in Paris just turn tail and slink away -- because yeah, they're big and scary, but what can you do with a girl who is actually starving to death, who has only not thrown herself in the river yet because it's too cold and there are easier ways to die, who knows that life can be better, because it has been better, but it won't ever be better for her again?
So remember that time that Eponine tells Marius that his friends are fighting on the barricade (and Marius was like "???? I have friends? NEWS TO ME," but we'll get to that later) because she can't have anything of her own, and she's going to die one way or another, and if she's going to die she might as well get him to die too; remember that time she jumps in front of a bullet because it turns out she doesn't actually want him to die, probably, or at least not yet?
If Jean Valjean has a shadow double in Les Mis, I think it's Eponine. They're two people who know enough to know very well their own capacity for evil; who think that love for someone else might save them, might make them better, except it turns out that love can be incredibly selfish as well as incredibly transcendent. Valjean deals with it better than Eponine, but then, he's a lot older. And no one ever bought Eponine's soul for God.
-- and now, moving onto other people who are also doomed and starving to death, LET'S TALK ABOUT GAVROCHE.
So the first time we really get a good sense of Gavroche is when he happens to be hanging out in an alley when a pretty-boy robber named Montparnasse makes the mistake of trying to rob Jean Valjean.
Jean Valjean of course takes the kid down in like two seconds, and uses the opportunity to just UNLEASH ALL HIS PRISON PTSD on Montparnasse. "Don't steal! BECAUSE PRISON IS THE WORST THING THAT CAN POSSIBLY HAPPEN TO YOU AND LET ME TELL YOU WHY IN EXCRUCIATING DETAIL why no I have never been to see a therapist, why do you ask?" And then after like twenty minutes of ranting he just throws his purse at a stunned Montparnasse and storms off.
Gavroche, who thinks this is basically the most hilarious thing to ever happen -- and rightly so -- promptly pickpockets the purse off Montparnasse and throws it to an old man who's starving, because why not, and then bounces off.
Some other things Gavroche does over the course of this section:
- patriotically throws stones through every window and lamp he comes across -- you can't have lights on during a revolution, after all!
- adopts a couple even younger kids off the street and marches them off to live in his elephant (they are secretly his brothers, but he doesn't know that)
- rescues some dude from prison who turns out to be his father
- insults basically every old lady he meets
- gets into bitchfights with Enjolras ("Why don't you give me a musket?" "When there are enough for the men, we'll give them to the children." "Well, if you're killed before me, I'll take yours!")
- then denounces Javert as an inspector (mostly so he can get his hands on Javert's musket)
- accidentally terrifies a whole regiment of National Guard into thinking he's a full revolutionary force while trying to drag a cart off to the barricade
AND SPEAKING OF THE BARRICADE!
Okay, basically my favorite scene in the whole book is the one where Joly (the hypochondriac), Bossuet (the unlucky one) and Grantaire (the drunk one) are hanging out in their favorite cafe when a gamin brings a letter to Bossuet from Enjolras.
BOSSUET: Hey, Enjolras says Lamarque is dead and his funeral is going on like right now.
JOLY: But I have a cold and it is raining. :(
BOSSUET: I guess we can miss the funeral without missing the revolution . . .
JOLY: I mean, I'm totally in for the revolution! But funerals are basically boring, and I am le tired. :(
BOSSUET: Fine, we can have a nap and THEN join the revolution.
(Meanwhile, Grantaire is having a hissy fit because Enjolras didn't write and tell him about the revolution, and Joly and Bossuet are like "but didn't you just spent three pages ranting about how the revolution is stupid?" and Grantaire is like "WELL NOW I THINK IT'S EXTRA STUPID >:| >:| >:|")
Anyway, after they've drunk a bit more wine, they see their friends marching down the street -- distinguished from all the other bands of revolutionaries by the one in the rear shouting "POLAND FOREVER!" despite the fact that the revolution has nothing to do with Poland -- and they lean out the window and are like 'HEY GUYS WHERE ARE YOU GOING?'
ENJOLRAS: We're starting the revolution!
BOSSUET: But we are lazy and don't want to move! Let's just start the revolution HERE.
So . . . they start the revolution there. Because Joly was le tired, and WHY NOT.
This is also a beautiful example of how these beautiful idiots (whom I love) are not one hundred percent thinking things through; they keep telling the innkeeper that they are fighting for HER RIGHTS and she is like "guys, I would like to have the right to have an inn that is not full of dead revolutionaries. THANKS."
So they're all starting up the revolution, and an old man who is Marius' only friend tragically dies --
-- which, by the way, I am pretty sure is personal vengeance on me, because I made the mistake of making a comment to someone the other day that "well, at least after everyone dies on the barricade, Marius will still have M. Mabeuf!" I TOTALLY DID NOT REMEMBER HIS TRAGIC DEATH. He kept books and was a botanist! He did not care about the revolution AT ALL! I am not convinced that Victor Hugo did not change the text from beyond the grave just to spite me --
-- and finally, finally, Marius turns up, after the whole mess where Cosette has moved away and now he's in despair and so on. (Courfeyrac had tried to tell him about Lamarque's funeral earlier and Marius was like ????? is this relevant ????? See above, re: Marius has friends?)
A sidenote on Marius, by the way; Marius spends a lot of this book in serious depression, like actual depression, like I think Victor Hugo knew what he was talking about depression, the kind where you spend all day sitting around thinking "I'm going to do things!" and then can't get up the energy to do anything. So that's what's going on with Marius.
He has also just quarreled with his grandfather again, because his grandfather made the mistake of suggesting he take Cosette as his mistress, and Marius is like *CLUTCHES PEARLS* "MY VIRGIN EARS! MY BELOVED COSETTE!" and flounces away in a huff.
Anyway, Marius turns up at the barricade, because he's in despair as mentioned, and watches everything going down, and weighs his pros and cons, and his pros and cons look like this:
PROS OF FIGHTING ON THE BARRICADE:
- help one remaining sort-of-friend (roommate Courfeyrac)
- die
CONS OF FIGHTING ON THE BARRICADE:
- Dad and Napoleon would probably not approve of the revolution :(
And he basically twiddles his thumbs over this moral dilemma, as is per the Marius course, until Courfeyrac and Gavroche are both about to die and basically going "SURE WOULD BE CONVENIENT IF SOMEONE LEAPED IN TO SAVE US RIGHT NOW!" At which point Marius does. And then he does his dramatic "I WILL BLOW UP THIS BARRICADE SO HELP ME," and Eponine dies, and he gets Cosette's new address from her, and also remembers belatedly that, oops, Eponine and Gavroche are both Thenardiers and he sort of owes a debt of life to the Thenardiers, and . . . Eponine is already dead . . . oops?
But hey, maybe he can save Gavroche! So he gives Gavroche the letter to take to Cosette.
Gavroche is like "sure! I can do that and get back in plenty of time to die at the barricade! :D SEE YOU LATER, MARIUS, SAME DOOMED TIME, SAME DOOMED PLACE" and scampers off.
Once again: NICE GOING MARIUS. A+ HERO WORK, THERE.
The last thing to mention about the barricade is Javert, who cannot actually tell a lie. So he's basically skulking around hoping no one will ask him who he is. And as soon as someone actually does, he's all "I AM A POLICE INSPECTOR. Better tie me up and shoot me!" OH JAVERT.
But the only person Enjolras actually shoots at this time is someone who shoots a civilian. After which Enjolras declaims that shooting people is terrible, but fortunately he has pronounced sentence on himself also, and he's going to die at the barricade, so that's all right then! OH ENJOLRAS.
Before I get to that, though, I want to talk a bit about Eponine, and also Gavroche
But let's start out with Eponine.
So guys, remember that time that Eponine stopped her father and a bunch of extremely angry convicts from breaking into Valjean's house? "What the devil!" she says, "this summer, I'll be hungry; this winter, I'll be cold. Are they some fools, these geese, to think they can scare a girl?" She laughs at them, as they menace her with knives "What is it to me whether somebody picks me up tomorrow on the pavement of the Rue Plumet?" She says: "I just cry out. They come, bang! You're six, but I'm everybody."
And six of the baddest dudes in Paris just turn tail and slink away -- because yeah, they're big and scary, but what can you do with a girl who is actually starving to death, who has only not thrown herself in the river yet because it's too cold and there are easier ways to die, who knows that life can be better, because it has been better, but it won't ever be better for her again?
So remember that time that Eponine tells Marius that his friends are fighting on the barricade (and Marius was like "???? I have friends? NEWS TO ME," but we'll get to that later) because she can't have anything of her own, and she's going to die one way or another, and if she's going to die she might as well get him to die too; remember that time she jumps in front of a bullet because it turns out she doesn't actually want him to die, probably, or at least not yet?
If Jean Valjean has a shadow double in Les Mis, I think it's Eponine. They're two people who know enough to know very well their own capacity for evil; who think that love for someone else might save them, might make them better, except it turns out that love can be incredibly selfish as well as incredibly transcendent. Valjean deals with it better than Eponine, but then, he's a lot older. And no one ever bought Eponine's soul for God.
-- and now, moving onto other people who are also doomed and starving to death, LET'S TALK ABOUT GAVROCHE.
So the first time we really get a good sense of Gavroche is when he happens to be hanging out in an alley when a pretty-boy robber named Montparnasse makes the mistake of trying to rob Jean Valjean.
Jean Valjean of course takes the kid down in like two seconds, and uses the opportunity to just UNLEASH ALL HIS PRISON PTSD on Montparnasse. "Don't steal! BECAUSE PRISON IS THE WORST THING THAT CAN POSSIBLY HAPPEN TO YOU AND LET ME TELL YOU WHY IN EXCRUCIATING DETAIL why no I have never been to see a therapist, why do you ask?" And then after like twenty minutes of ranting he just throws his purse at a stunned Montparnasse and storms off.
Gavroche, who thinks this is basically the most hilarious thing to ever happen -- and rightly so -- promptly pickpockets the purse off Montparnasse and throws it to an old man who's starving, because why not, and then bounces off.
Some other things Gavroche does over the course of this section:
- patriotically throws stones through every window and lamp he comes across -- you can't have lights on during a revolution, after all!
- adopts a couple even younger kids off the street and marches them off to live in his elephant (they are secretly his brothers, but he doesn't know that)
- rescues some dude from prison who turns out to be his father
- insults basically every old lady he meets
- gets into bitchfights with Enjolras ("Why don't you give me a musket?" "When there are enough for the men, we'll give them to the children." "Well, if you're killed before me, I'll take yours!")
- then denounces Javert as an inspector (mostly so he can get his hands on Javert's musket)
- accidentally terrifies a whole regiment of National Guard into thinking he's a full revolutionary force while trying to drag a cart off to the barricade
AND SPEAKING OF THE BARRICADE!
Okay, basically my favorite scene in the whole book is the one where Joly (the hypochondriac), Bossuet (the unlucky one) and Grantaire (the drunk one) are hanging out in their favorite cafe when a gamin brings a letter to Bossuet from Enjolras.
BOSSUET: Hey, Enjolras says Lamarque is dead and his funeral is going on like right now.
JOLY: But I have a cold and it is raining. :(
BOSSUET: I guess we can miss the funeral without missing the revolution . . .
JOLY: I mean, I'm totally in for the revolution! But funerals are basically boring, and I am le tired. :(
BOSSUET: Fine, we can have a nap and THEN join the revolution.
(Meanwhile, Grantaire is having a hissy fit because Enjolras didn't write and tell him about the revolution, and Joly and Bossuet are like "but didn't you just spent three pages ranting about how the revolution is stupid?" and Grantaire is like "WELL NOW I THINK IT'S EXTRA STUPID >:| >:| >:|")
Anyway, after they've drunk a bit more wine, they see their friends marching down the street -- distinguished from all the other bands of revolutionaries by the one in the rear shouting "POLAND FOREVER!" despite the fact that the revolution has nothing to do with Poland -- and they lean out the window and are like 'HEY GUYS WHERE ARE YOU GOING?'
ENJOLRAS: We're starting the revolution!
BOSSUET: But we are lazy and don't want to move! Let's just start the revolution HERE.
So . . . they start the revolution there. Because Joly was le tired, and WHY NOT.
This is also a beautiful example of how these beautiful idiots (whom I love) are not one hundred percent thinking things through; they keep telling the innkeeper that they are fighting for HER RIGHTS and she is like "guys, I would like to have the right to have an inn that is not full of dead revolutionaries. THANKS."
So they're all starting up the revolution, and an old man who is Marius' only friend tragically dies --
-- which, by the way, I am pretty sure is personal vengeance on me, because I made the mistake of making a comment to someone the other day that "well, at least after everyone dies on the barricade, Marius will still have M. Mabeuf!" I TOTALLY DID NOT REMEMBER HIS TRAGIC DEATH. He kept books and was a botanist! He did not care about the revolution AT ALL! I am not convinced that Victor Hugo did not change the text from beyond the grave just to spite me --
-- and finally, finally, Marius turns up, after the whole mess where Cosette has moved away and now he's in despair and so on. (Courfeyrac had tried to tell him about Lamarque's funeral earlier and Marius was like ????? is this relevant ????? See above, re: Marius has friends?)
A sidenote on Marius, by the way; Marius spends a lot of this book in serious depression, like actual depression, like I think Victor Hugo knew what he was talking about depression, the kind where you spend all day sitting around thinking "I'm going to do things!" and then can't get up the energy to do anything. So that's what's going on with Marius.
He has also just quarreled with his grandfather again, because his grandfather made the mistake of suggesting he take Cosette as his mistress, and Marius is like *CLUTCHES PEARLS* "MY VIRGIN EARS! MY BELOVED COSETTE!" and flounces away in a huff.
Anyway, Marius turns up at the barricade, because he's in despair as mentioned, and watches everything going down, and weighs his pros and cons, and his pros and cons look like this:
PROS OF FIGHTING ON THE BARRICADE:
- help one remaining sort-of-friend (roommate Courfeyrac)
- die
CONS OF FIGHTING ON THE BARRICADE:
- Dad and Napoleon would probably not approve of the revolution :(
And he basically twiddles his thumbs over this moral dilemma, as is per the Marius course, until Courfeyrac and Gavroche are both about to die and basically going "SURE WOULD BE CONVENIENT IF SOMEONE LEAPED IN TO SAVE US RIGHT NOW!" At which point Marius does. And then he does his dramatic "I WILL BLOW UP THIS BARRICADE SO HELP ME," and Eponine dies, and he gets Cosette's new address from her, and also remembers belatedly that, oops, Eponine and Gavroche are both Thenardiers and he sort of owes a debt of life to the Thenardiers, and . . . Eponine is already dead . . . oops?
But hey, maybe he can save Gavroche! So he gives Gavroche the letter to take to Cosette.
Gavroche is like "sure! I can do that and get back in plenty of time to die at the barricade! :D SEE YOU LATER, MARIUS, SAME DOOMED TIME, SAME DOOMED PLACE" and scampers off.
Once again: NICE GOING MARIUS. A+ HERO WORK, THERE.
The last thing to mention about the barricade is Javert, who cannot actually tell a lie. So he's basically skulking around hoping no one will ask him who he is. And as soon as someone actually does, he's all "I AM A POLICE INSPECTOR. Better tie me up and shoot me!" OH JAVERT.
But the only person Enjolras actually shoots at this time is someone who shoots a civilian. After which Enjolras declaims that shooting people is terrible, but fortunately he has pronounced sentence on himself also, and he's going to die at the barricade, so that's all right then! OH ENJOLRAS.
no subject
I keep meaning to read the Brick again - last time, I made it as far as the sewer bit and was 'ALL RIGHT, PAPA VIC, YOU WIN. I QUIT' but never got around to it.
no subject
Ha, I just blitzed through the sewer bit an hour ago by virtue of taking it with me when I went to do laundry. Although actually I remembered it as being a lot longer than it was, so when it turned out to be only about fifteen pages worth of sewers I was like "Aww, Victor Hugo, admirable restraint!"
no subject
no subject
(Victor Hugo has so many feelings about everything)
no subject
no subject
no subject
(I got a little behind on my reading this weekend. I'll probably finish it up in the next day or two. BUT APPARENTLY THIS WAS A GOOD THING BECAUSE YOU WERE ABLE TO WARN ME ABOUT TERRIBLENESS.)
Also, because I actually have gotten to this part, I looooove Gavroche and the two little kids whom I totally did not remember were his brothers! I said I did not need to know what happened to them BUT I SO NEED THEM TO HAVE A HAPPY ENDING.
I also totally didn't remember Eponine and Montparnasse having a thing going! They are my new favorite dysfunctional ship!
no subject
(And all the revolutionaries are talking about his noble patriotic heart, Courfeyrac is standing in a corner going ". . . dude, I know that guy, he has ZERO interest in revolution. WTF! I have no idea what just happened!" RIGHT THERE WITH YOU, COURFEYRAC.)
Gavroche is such a good fake dad to his two brothers! :( WAY BETTER THAN THEIR REAL DAD. Not that that's hard. But still!
I also am deeply curious about Eponine and Montparnasse, because indeed, SUPER DYSFUNCTIONAL.
no subject
THE ELEPHANT, which deserves all the caps.
Joly's being le tired causing them to build the barricade right there, despite their possibly being other places that would be strategically better, but what the hell.
Also Poland. Because Poland! It's important. To--er--someone. I wonder what I would get out of Feuilly's Poland fixation if I knew what the hell went down in Poland at the relevant time period. What does it all mean? Should I be grateful or sad that instead of fifty pages on Poland we get the disquisition on Everything Else?
M. Mabeuf's coat, on the other hand, does not make me happy. It makes me Very Sad to remember it and go SNIFF a lot. But that's all right; that's what this book is for.
Have I mentioned I'm enjoying the hell out of this booklog?
no subject
Hey, Joly's cold is very important. DID THE REVOLUTIONARIES BRING AN UMBRELLA? (I also love Joly still examining his tongue in the mirror even the barricade is about to fall. Oh, Joly.)
I ALSO really want to know what is so important to Feuilly about Poland. But apparently not enough to do actual research . . . . YET.
:D :D :D I am very glad! Thank you for the rec, by the way, which I don't think I've said yet.
More about Poland!
Did I hear someone call my name? ^_^
So, if you're a romantic doomed French revolutionary youth in the 1830s, you'd better be a fan of Poland, because the Polish revolutions are BEST AND MOST ROMANTIC DOOMED REVOLUTIONS IN THE HISTORY OF EVAR.
It goes back to the days of the Partitions of Poland, when the huge Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth -- which for several centuries had ruled over a sizeable chunk of the Baltic regions of Eastern Europe -- had a serious streak of military bad luck and was chopped into pieces to be ruled over by the Austrians, Prussians, and Russians. However, the rise of Napoleon led a large number of patriotic Poles -- including the dashing Tadeusz Kościuszko, who'd fought in the American Revolution and was very, very much in favour of LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL BUT ESPECIALLY POLAND -- to sign on with the French in hopes of charging across Europe and getting as much of their land back as possible.
And they were busy. Very, very busy. Between 1794 and 1815, we have, in chronological order with the help of Wikipedia:
- The Kościuszko Uprising (1794), which ended so badly for the Poles that the Russians, Prussians, and Austrians decided to completely carve up the rest of Poland among themselves;
- The Greater Poland Uprising (1794), which spilled over from the Kościuszko Uprising and was just as firmly crushed;
- The slightly more successful The Greater Poland Uprising (1806), where the Poles actually did some decent curb-stomping against the Prussians with the help of Napoleon and a serious chunk of the French army; and
- Various battles with countries that were fighting against France during the Napoleonic Wars, including Austria, Prussia, Russia, and Sweden.
After the Congress of Vienna in 1815, Poland (as part of the losing side) essentially ended up as a puppet state of the Russian Empire. And since the story is set in 1832, Feuilly is almost certainly invoking the romantically doomed November Uprising (1830-31), where a group of young Polish army officers made yet another attempt to rebel against said Russian Empire...which ended about as well for them as you might expect.
Re: More about Poland!
This is super fascinating and makes a ton of sense. Go on playing the Polish National Anthem, Feuilly! NO MORE will we mock your desire to pounce on everybody you know and tell them all about Poland. (Well, maybe a little bit. But only a little.)
Re: More about Poland!
Re: More about Poland!
...oh god. FEUILLY IS A HIPSTER. He was into Poland before anyone else had heard of Poland!
Re: More about Poland!
Re: More about Poland!
no subject
no subject
no subject
Also, when Eponine dies she is like, "Hey Marius, by the way, don't tell my brother I'm here, he'll be super mad," and there are feelings everywhere.
no subject
no subject
Oh that's beautiful.
...
Oh, what useless revolutionaries.
no subject
THEY DO TRY REAL HARD. But the cause was probably doomed when in the middle of the barricade they elected Marius co-leader.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Yes yes yes yes.
no subject
(Though I do also get super annoyed at Marius for his behavior towards Eponine - I mean, for a start, when you meet your next-door-neighbor for the first time and she starts talking idly about how she's starving and thinking of throwing herself in the river, that is perhaps the time you consider getting her some help rather shoving her out the door.)
no subject
no subject
BUT: ALSO THIS. Way to go, Marius. Helpful and effective as ever!
no subject
But of course, you know this.
no subject
no subject
THIS IS GLORIOUS.
no subject
mostly not dead yet, though, we save that for the next book. :D?
no subject
no subject
no subject
"Red! The blood of angry men!
Black! The dark of ages past!
Tea! A drink with jam and bread!
Which will bring us back to..."
no subject
Obviously I am now also infected. And trying, desperately, not to do this with the rest of the songs.
So, how do you solve a problem like Marius? :-)
no subject
Here via Radish Reviews.
no subject
I really love what you say about the doubling of Eponine and Valjean, which is something I never thought about before, but YES. Yes to their being the two characters who deal with love being transcendent, but selfish, but then potentially redemptive in the end anyway. (And Valjean! Poor Valjean, taking off from the convent because he really did want Cosette to have a full life with the possibility of romantic love -- but then when it actually happened being all NO WAIT I DIDN'T REALLY MEAN IT PLEASE STOP -- ugh, what a thing, to be caught between your best instincts and your actual visceral reaction :( )
The whole Valjean-Montparnasse-Gavroche thing was the best ever, only I am sad that M. Mabeuf didn't use the purse! Grrrrr.
Also I totally loved how after, you know, not caring about the revolution at all, Marius is all "Yeah I feel suicidal because Cosette is gone so GONNA BLOW UP THIS BARRICADE JUST WATCH," as you say, and then sort of accidentally saves the barricade, and everyone's all "Marius our new leader!!" and Marius is all ?????
And also also Javert! LOVE JAVERT. I'd totally forgotten (or never really figured out) what a terrible terrible spy he is, despite Hugo going to great lengths to tell us in earlier books that, no really, Javert is a great spy!
no subject
(Yes! I love that about Valjean -- I love that he's not a saint, in any way, and that every time he does the right thing it's at the cost of GREAT INNER STRUGGLE about "noooooo do I have to I DON'T WANNA." And he sort of dislikes everyone! SOCIALLY AWKWARD SAINT JEAN VALJEAN.)
I am sad about that too! A GIFT FROM THE HEAVENS, Mabeuf! You got your own personal Robin Hood! And then the purse just went to waste.
Hahahahaha right? Javert is a great spy as long as no one asks him any questions, EVER. He's great at silent trailing! But as with so many people in this book, conversation is his downfall . . .
no subject
Exhibit B: Grantaire. (And Exhibit C: Grantaire's self-medication, which is almost its own character.) This time through, I'm really struck by how accurately Hugo portrays so many different kinds of depression, but Grantaire's might actually depress me the most. Eponine needs social services, which don't really exist yet but charity does, and if she'd lived next door to Valjean instead of to Marius she might have gotten the help she needed. Marius needs therapy (SO MUCH THERAPY), which also doesn't exist yet, but he might still find a priest or a doctor or just a friend who could give him some of the help he needs.
Grantaire just needs meds. And he's 150 years away from any meaningful help.
no subject
And Valjean also needs therapy, because I'm fairly sure he's got some variety of prison PTSD, but that's another story.
But yeah. Grantaire needs meds. And he's never going to get them.