So, after about 12 years I've rewatched Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame. I recently acquired it at at a tag sale, though thinking back on it it's kind of strange we didn't own it, seeing as I owned a lot of Hunchback-related toys. I had (and still have) a plastic toy of Djali (Esmeralda's goat), I had a backpack with Esmeralda on it in Kindergarten (the other kids in my class made fun of me because I could never say her name properly) and I had a water paint coloring book of the movie. It was one of those weird ones, with the palette on the paper underneath the picture, and you wet the 'paint' and I guess it would run and you'd use that the paint. And, on the back, there was a picture of Frollo with his hat off and he's balding and it was so funny (hence why he never scared me as a child). Oh, and I had a book where he found a kitten! It was so cute! And I had a finger puppet of one of the statues; I think it was Hugo. The one who said "Who cut the cheese"? Totally remember that commercial, even now. And my neighbor Kristin had this totally cool Esmeralda Barbie doll! (She had Pocahontas, too. Soooo jealous!) And I remembered some parts of the movie, like when Quasimodo is sliding in the water and singing and stuff, though one thing I did not remember was how creepy Claude Frollo is. He SNIFFS Esmeralda's hair at one point. Sniffs it. I'm not even kidding.
Anyway... uh. As you may have guessed, I read Victor Hugo's original novel upon which the movie is based (I decided to after rewatching the film, of course). It was actually pretty good, and I don't feel that Disney changed it too much--well, not any more than usual. Of course some things had to change, like some hangings and imprisonment... Anyway, it was a pretty good book. It makes me a little less nervous to move on to his other works like Les Miserables. In most respects, the book was fairly straightforward, aside from a few digressions and tangents to give a history of a building or person or an explanation of some law or whatever.
Let's see, some notes on my copy: It is relatively old, but AL Burt and his publishing company apparently felt no need to provide a printing date, nor to include the address of their company (which I could have used to gain an estimate of the date, as they apparently changed locations many times in their existence--1889-1937). My guess is that it would have been printed from 1934/4-1937, since it more closely resembles a book from the forties. I suppose that's neither here nor there however...
Oh, and some notes on the characters: Quasimodo hardly crops up till the second half of the novel. Claude Frollo was actually a very decent man (he adopted Quasimodo of his own free will, and killed no gypsy), though he goes half-mad--all the way mad--with lust for Esmeralda. Phoebus is not in love with Esmeralda, he merely wants to sleep with her (though she is in love with him). There is a minor character, Gringoire, who was apparently a real-life poet, who finds himself married to Esmeralda, but she won't let him have sex with her (and of course, he wants to--when he attempts to 'assert' himself she pulls a knife on him, I kid you not. Bravo!) so he apparently takes his--uh--affections out on Djali (thankfully I missed that, though he does seem overfond of the goat always). Oh, he does not appear in the movie at all, either. Let's see... Clopin appears as well, though he's not nearly as cool as he was in the movie. Oh, and the story: Well, it's actually pretty much the same at its base, except Quasimodo is deaf, and doesn't have schizophrenic delusions.
Victor Hugo often speaks to 'the reader', saying things such as, "If it is agreeable to the reader, we will endeavor to retrace in imagination..." (7). And often asking permission, or, if it would please the reader, and so on and so forth. I find that kind of cute. Look at Vic, breaking the fourth wall! You cutie you! Vonnegut thinks he's so novel. (OH SEE WHAT I DID THAR!?) He also occasionally reiterates the scene in a simpler way, which is pretty cool too. Victor Hugo actually invented SparkNotes. And the Internet.
"'What a goodly beard he has!'" (19). I know, you probably think it's idiotic and vexing that I like pointing out parts that have no depth other than that they made me chuckle. But 'goodly beard'!? Come on. I hope I have the chance to tell someone that some day. Preferably a stranger, but not one that's a hobo.
"The bailiff of the palace was a sort of amphibious magistrate, a kind of bat... a something between the rat and the bird, the judge and the soldier" (37). He also describes lawyers as crocodiles, but only crocodiles, unfortunately. Crocodile-birds? Oh wait, pterodactyls. Though, now that I think of it, a "something between the rat and the bird" seems a little redundant if he's talking about bats. Victor Hugo, you crocodile-bird you.
A description of Quasimodo: "...We shall not attempt to give the reader any idea of that tetrahedron nose, of that horse-shoe mouth, of that little left eye stubbed up with an eyebrow of carroty bristles, while the right [eye] was completely overwhelmed and buried by an enormous wen; of those irregular teeth, jagged here and there like the battlements of a fortress; of that horny lip, over which one of those teeth protruded, like the the tusk of an elephant" (43). Victor, thank you for going and giving me an idea of all of those things completely.
"'A one-eyed man is more incomplete than one who is quite blind'" (45). I thought this was an interesting way to look (no puns intended) at it, since when I first read it I was kind of confused. If someone stabbed one of my eyes out in a duel, I would be all, "Well, at least I have the other eye to see with!" But I started thinking--how maddening would that be? Exactly one half of the world would be open to you, and the other half would be, well, black. You could see that other half if you moved, of course, but never would it be open to you all at once. You'd be like a dog chasing its tail all the time. And you'd have no depth perception... So yeah, either go all the way either way. I think I'd hate to have just one day. It would be pretty awful to be completely blind, but if there's anything I've learned from TV and movies, it's that blind people have powers on par with psychics.
"'How gladly I would drown myself, only the water is so cold!'" (49). This line had to have been added to show how cowardly or weak Gringoire is. Ophelia so bad for yourself! Move away from the water! Oh, sorry, wrong story. In any case, this proves that Gringoire is stronger--or, more cowardly--than your average female Shanksspeare character, since Gringoire does not drown himself, and he didn't even need a sassy gay friend to convince him not to kill himself. Which is kind of a shame. It's a good book, but sassy gay friends do tend to improve everything.
There's another description of Quasimodo, which pertains more to his personality: he's strong, active (a "bandy-legged dwarf" [59], whatever that may mean), and spiteful. This kind of reminds me of a story of Edgar Allen Poe's I read a long time ago. I believe the story is called 'Hop-Frog', though that name may have actually only been the name of the main character, a dwarf and a cripple. He was the jester for a king who of course abused him and in revenge Hop-Frog sets him (and several other noblemen) ablaze. But I just... you know... they were both malformed, in almost the same manner (Hop-Frog is named so because his deformities make him unable to stand up straight so he moves with a strange hop, similarly to Quasimodo), and their deformities made them more powerful than the average man. Well, I guess the similarities kind of end there, but still, the description made me draw a connection. And that is a good thing.
Esmeralda amuses the townspeople with pretty tricks and dancing (as does Djali) and this of course inflames Gringoire with passion, though Quasimodo loves her for her kindness to him, even though he is malformed. Anyway, Gringoire decides to follow Esmeralda through the streets, and during his pursuits Quasimodo swoops down and attempts to take her away. Gringoire is petrified with fear, but Phoebus comes from nowhere and saves her. Thus, why she loves Phoebus, and why she rather dislikes Gringoire. Though I believe I mentioned (spoiler alert!) that Phoebus was only lustfully attracted to her... maybe. (Not checking.) There's even a scene where Phoebus is trying to get her into bed and she's like "Oh, I can't wait to be married!" and he says something like, "Why get married? We don't need marriage to validate our love!" Girls, when guys say that, they are probably trying to just get in on that. But my point is, this scene where Quasimodo takes her is important, because it sets up a lot of the future relationships of the book. Yep.
"Reality burst upon him, paining his eyes, treading upon his toes, and demolishing piecemeal the whole frightful poesy by which he had at first fancied himself to be surrounded. He could not help perceiving that he was not walking in the Styx, but in the mud; that he was not elbowed by demons, but by robbers; that his soul was not in danger, but merely his life, because he lacked that excellent mediator between the ruffian and the honest man--the purse" (71). (Gringoire being dragged through the Court of Miracles to his trial, because no one but the Egyptians and vagabonds are allowed down there. Also, I realized for the first time ever whilst reading this that 'gypsy' is short/slang for Egyptian. Oh huhhh.)
Ah! All right, so there's this whole twist (kind of) in the story that's sort of predictable and kind of not. Because I can't shut up about the movie (I'm not even talking about the Lon Chaney one either, gah) I kind of figured it out. Quasimodo's mother is a gypsy (hence why Claude Frollo kicks her down the stairs) then, so I figured it was about the same. Well, they reveal in a flashback that Quasimodo was left on a board for foundlings in Notre Dame (apparently you could just leave babies there back in the day) apparently because of his deformities. Claude Frollo, full of pity, adopts the child of his own free will. But, later on, we meet an old woman whose story is seemingly unrelated and random to the plot, other than that she hates gypsies, because sixteen or so years ago they stole her beautiful child and replaced it with one of their misshapen own. Oh hi, Quasi. And never does the lady stop speaking of how much she hates to see Esmeralda, because her daughter would have been that age, had she not been eaten by the gypsies. That's what gypsies do to kids, by the way. You see what's going on here? Well, I hope so, because this is a lot simpler than Victor Hugo's writing. Sorry if I spoiled it--it's just how I roll.
Yeah, but one of my points is that in the book, Frollo is a really good-hearted guy until he gets an eye on Esmeralda. After his parents died he raised his infant brother on his own (and his brother is a brat too, he's constantly stealing money from Frollo) and like I said adopted Quasimodo and treated him as though a son. Apparently, Quasimodo's first try at bell-ringing had an effect upon Frollo like "that produced upon a parent by the first articulate sounds uttered by his child" (128). Awww, Frollo! Too bad you went crazy.
"Such of them as not most religiously disposed had hoped that the thing would be more easily accomplished in Paradise than at Rome, and had therefore at once prayed to God instead of the pope in behalf of the deceased" (151). I can't tell if Victor Hugo is being sarcastic or not here. The book was written in 1831, and apparently Hugo was Catholic when he was younger (according to Wikipedia) but it does not say how young exactly. Later in his life he became a 'freethinker' and became extremely opposed to the church... but there aren't really any clear dates on this. In fact, I can't really find anything much regarding his Catholic life, though he has some interesting beliefs (the most in my opinion is that he believed evil was a necessary state to wade through in order to achieve higher being)... that apparently wrecked his family life. Oh, oops. (Source: http://www.answers.com/topic/victor-hugo ) Well, I might as well defend my position of why I'd believe it would be sarcastic--of course those less 'religiously disposed' would be more religiously disposed because they're actually praying directly to God--not through the pope.
"'The gallows leads to hell.' 'That is a rousing fire.' 'Jehan, Jehan, the end will be bad.' 'The beginning at least will have been good'" (212).
Ah, yes, here is Phoebus talking his way out of marrying Esmeralda: "'Of what use is marriage? Do people love one another the less for not having mangled Latin in the shop of a priest?'" (232). Yeah, he just wanted to get some--he's even so bold as to pull off her neckerchief and gets an eyeful of her bare shoulders! Woah, Phoebus! Talk about a sleazy dude. (No, but seriously, he probably would have raped Esmeralda if Frollo hadn't stopped him.)
"'We Egyptians want nothing else but air and love'" (233).
"'Alas! If victory has not remained with me, it is this fault of God, who has not made man equal in strength to the demon'" (256). Frollo, lamenting his lust. I thought this was pretty cool because of the Hellfire song--I LOVE the part where Frollo sings and says: "It's not my fault; it's in God's plan--he made the devil so much stronger than a man!"
"Love is like a tree: it shoots of itself, it strikes its roots deeply into our whole being, and frequently continues to be green over a heart in ruins" (296).
"Seizing with both hands the hair remaining on [Frollo's] bald head, [Esmerelda] strove to prevent his kisses... 'Loose me!' she cried, distractedly, 'or I will spit in thy face!' He loosed his hold. 'Strike me; heap indignities upon me; do what thou wilt; but for mercy's sake, love me!'" (308).
On page 319 it is briefly mentioned that it was "'only last month that they hanged a sow'" (319). This is--I believe--based on the actual trial where a sow was accused of beating a child. She was hanged. Her piglets were let free because they were only following the poor example set by their mother.
"'She must have swum over'... 'Who ever heard of a woman swimming?' cried the soldier" (397). I KNOW, RIGHT? Utter stupidity to even suggest that. Women. Swimming. Did we just wander into the twilight zone? Because I'm pretty sure we just did.
Just a note that's yet another spoiler: Esmeralda's mother actually dies in the fashion Quasimodo's does in the movie. Frollo's death isn't that dissimilar from the film; he's clinging to a pipe on Notre Dame which bent under his weight and he fell to his death on the streets of Paris. Esmeralda is hanged, though she is wearing a white rag dress, which may symbolize her purity (as she was not guilty of the crime for which she was accused). Gringoire contented himself with saving Djali, as he is really, really attached to that goat. Like, seriously, man. It's a goat.
I guess I won't spoil it completely, though I am very fond of the ending, even if its somewhat grisly but it's also very touching. Well, this is certainly one of the best books of my recent reading history. Yay.
Yeah, I don't really have much else.
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