Victor Hugo

"Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame was written in 1831, at a time when the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris was falling into disrepair. This epic novel helped spark a preservationist movement that led to the cathedral being restored to its full glory. Set in 1482, the story tells of how four men--the hunchbacked bell-ringer, Quasimodo; the archdeacon of Notre Dame, Claude Frollo; the dashing soldier Phoebus de Chateaupers; and the poet Pierre...

Trying to forget his past and live an honest life, escaped convict Jean Valjean risks his freedom to take care of a motherless young girl during a period of political unrest in Paris.

Three hundred and forty-eight years, six months, and nineteen days ago to-day, the Parisians awoke to the sound of all the bells in the triple circuit of the city, the university, and the town ringing a full peal. The sixth of January 1482, is not, however, a day of which history has preserved the memory. There was nothing notable in the event, which thus set the bells and the bourgeois of Paris in a ferment from early morning. It was neither an assault...

In nineteenth century France, a former convict tries to overcome his past and is asked to raise a prostitute's daughter, while being hounded by a policeman who vows to put him back behind bars.

This omnibus collects three of Hugo?s best-known novels. The Hunchback of Notre Dame tells the story of four men from different walks of life who vie for the hand of the gypsy woman Esmerelda. Les Misérables, Hugo?s masterpiece, is the story of thief Jean Valjean?s spiritual transformation and his pursuit by relentless forces of justice. The Man Who Laughs is Hugo?s somber and serious meditation on class struggle and the sufferings of the underclass....

First published in 1829 at the beginning of Victor Hugo's literary career, "The Last Day of a Condemned Man" is one of the author's first mature works of fiction. It recounts the thoughts of a condemned man as the day of his execution draws near. Inspired by the sight of an executioner preparing the guillotine for another scheduled public execution, Hugo quickly wrote this moving and eloquent work describing the condemned man's final thoughts as he...