personalmephistopheles | Entries tagged with les mis

[Originally posted to Tumblr on 3 September 2013, and cross-posted to Wordpress on the same day.]

“All stories are about wolves. All worth repeating, that is. Anything else is sentimental drivel. …Think about it. There’s escaping from the wolves, fighting the wolves, capturing the wolves, taming the wolves. Being thrown to the wolves, or throwing others to the wolves so the wolves will eat them instead of you. Running with the wolf pack. Turning into a wolf. Best of all, turning into the head wolf. No other decent stories exist.”

–Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin.

The wolf, like any number of animals frequently used as symbols, is one that can be imbued with a number of meanings, many of them contradictory. It is perhaps this versatility that makes wolves and wolf imagery so popular in literature, film, and music, indicating both aloneness and pack mentality, sexuality and transformation, responsibility and wilderness, and any number of other things. As a result, it is no surprise that Victor Hugo not only makes use of at least one possible interpretation of wolf imagery throughout Les Misérables, but uses that interpretation in a number of different ways and in association with a broad range of characters.

The most consistent use of wolf imagery in Les Misérables is in relation to criminal activity, with references to “furtive goings and comings, silent entrances and exits of nocturnal men, and the wolf-like tread of crime” (5.3.8). Most often Hugo’s use of wolf imagery extends to the notion of criminality in regards to several of the characters found in the novel, from Bamatabois’ wolf-like gait as he creeps up on Fantine (1.5.12) to Montparnasse’s demeanour upon being caught by Valjean, which is described as being “the humiliated and furious attitude of the wolf who has been caught by a sheep” (4.4.2). This imagery extends from these minor characters to a sizeable number of major players in the novel, who all exist in various shades of grey morally but who are all, in some way, linked together through imagery and contact with one another.

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[Tiny meta originally posted on Tumblr 8 May 2013, but that I wanted to preserve]

So the other day, there was a quote going around, but because it was Feuilly appreciation day, it didn’t feel right to use the quote to talk about Combeferre, so I’ve waited until now to do it. It’s not much, just some thoughts I was having at the time.

“Does anybody understand these men,” exclaimed Feuilly bitterly, (and he cited the names, well-known names, famous even, some of the old army) “who promised to join us, and took an oath to help us, and who were bound to it in honor, and who are our generals, and who abandon us!”

And Combeferre simply answered with a grave smile, “There are people who observe the rules of honor as we observe the stars, from far off.”

-Les Miserables, “The Heroes.”

On the one hand, Feuilly’s bitter disappointment in this quote is absolutely heartbreaking because he believed in the men whose names he rattles off - he believed that they’d help and it’s utterly foreign to him, the notion that they would do something as utterly dishonourable as to abandon them in their time of need.

On the other, it’s Combeferre’s response that kills me. Because everything about Combeferre’s response - the “grave smile,” the simplicity of his answer, the way that he answers a very complex question with a response that doesn’t begin to cover the same ground - it all points to one thing.

Combeferre knew.

Combeferre has his share of idealism, true, but he is also practical and understands people better than Enjolras does, and so Combeferre knew that those men, even as they vowed to aid them, had no intention of following through when the time came. While Enjolras fully believed that they would not be fighting alone, Combeferre knew that the odds were that they might be, but he hoped that they wouldn’t, and it was his hope for humanity, for the fact that they might not fight alone, that kept him there.

So while Feuilly is disappointed and betrayed, Combeferre is merely grave and unsurprised, because he knew all along that they would be alone, and something about that sort of breaks my heart a bit.

[Originally written for the site Stage Door Dish, and posted on 20 March 2013; later cross-posted via link to Wordpress 21 August 2013 and eventually completely reposted on Wordpress in November 2018]

Both on stage and in film, there are three fundamental things which can either establish a character as memorable for the audience or leave them in obscurity. The first two of these are writing and acting, which often end up going hand in hand, but the third, costuming, is arguably just as important. It is costuming, in combination with acting and writing, which in the recent film adaptation of The Hobbit, created thirteen distinct characters from what could have been a shapeless mass of dwarves. In this same way, the costume designers for Tom Hooper’s adaptation of Les Misérables were able to create distinct looks for each of the barricade boys, and as a result, even new fans can distinguish them from one another and develop ideas about them based on how their personalities are expressed in things as subtle as the colour schemes of their clothing. How did they do this? Let’s take a look!

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: E
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Combeferre, Grantaire
Primary Pairings: Combeferre/Grantaire
Secondary Pairings: Implied queerplatonic Combeferre/Enjolras
Word Count: 3181

General Summary: It's been two months since Grantaire woke up to Combeferre in his kitchen, a dark bruise still forming just under his jaw, and despite having avoided both Combeferre and Enjolras ever since, all it takes is a single text to send him into a panic.

A follow-up piece to "Hearsay."

Author’s Note: A follow-up piece written for a good friend of mine in January 2014.

It had been almost two months since Grantaire had woken up to Combeferre in his kitchen, a dark bruise still forming just under his jaw, when he been startled awake at three in the afternoon to find a single text staring up at him from the dingy screen of his mobile phone. A single, brief text, only four words long.

We need to talk.

It was from Combeferre.

It took Grantaire approximately a quarter of a second to feel himself start to panic. It took a hot shower and three mugs of coffee that were more whisky than actual coffee before he managed to send a response.

Can you come over here?

The response was almost immediate.

I’ll be there in fifteen.

Read the Rest Here...

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: T
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Bahorel, Combeferre, Enjolras, Feuilly, Grantaire, Jean Prouvaire
Primary Pairings: Combeferre/Grantaire
Secondary Pairings: Enjolras/Grantaire (in the past)
Word Count: 923

General Summary: Grantaire has seen Combeferre drunk, but due to the circumstances, can't tell anyone.

Not that anyone would believe him.

Author’s Note: This was a prompt fill for Combeferre and the word "capernoited," meaning "slightly intoxicated or tipsy" done back on 12 October 2013.

"Has anyone even seen 'Ferre drunk before?" Bahorel looked around the room at the stragglers who had stayed behind after the meeting.

Feuilly and Jehan shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders.

"R? You’ve gotten pissed with pretty much everyone. You seen him drunk?"

Lifting his head from the table, but not his eyes, Grantaire shrugged noncommittally.

"No."

It was more a testament to the alcohol in his system than anything else how easily the lie slipped from his lips. Then again, he thought, he could probably have been completely honest and it wouldn’t have mattered - who would believe him anyway?

Read the Rest Here...

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: T
Setting: 1920s Prohibition au (dw tag)
Characters: Javert, Azelma 'Az' Jondrette
Primary Pairings: Javert/Azelma 'Az' Jondrette
Word Count: 429

General Summary: For Javert, admitting that something makes you happy has always been like a jinx, and it is in this regard only that he is superstitious.

This is sort of a companion piece to "Minding Cues."

Author’s Note: sCan't remember what the prompting was for writing this. I think I just did. Written on 4 August 2013.

“Are you happy?”

The words brush over the back of his ear as the lips they slipped from graze his skin.

“What?”

Even to his own ears, his voice is slightly fuzzy and drowsy; he sounds “fucked out,” as the body laying against him in the dark would have put it.

“Does this make you happy?”

And the underlying follow-up: “Do I make you happy?”

He doesn’t answer

Read the Rest Here...

General Summary: Azelma Jondrette has always had to rely on subtle cues to express what cannot, for them, safely be said aloud, and they're not entirely sure what to do with a lover who is capable of picking up on those cues.

Author’s Note: A short piece I wrote about Azelma and how they deal with their genderfluidity and sexuality.

Clothing is unreliable, and so Azelma Jondrette has always made use of certain cues to tip their lovers off. Most of these were subconscious habit – like the towels. If they came out of the showers with their towel knotted low on their hips, then as far as he was concerned, all bets were off, and anything was fair game; however, if they emerged with their towel wrapped securely around their body, cloth pressed against the flatness of their chest and tugged down to cover most of their thighs, then there were parts of her anatomy which were off-limits. Other cues could be found in the ways that they carried themselves, by the way they stood, how they chose to adjust a piece of clothing – regardless of what the clothing was.

In the vast majority of cases, they fail to pick up on it and with few exceptions, Azelma grins and bears it without complaint – only because actively protesting is dangerous when your clothes are off and your gun is on the other side of the room, and even if it wasn’t, there’s only so many times, they suppose, that you can pull a gun on a man before it gets around that you’re prone to it.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: M (whole series) / T (this chapter)
Setting: 1920s Prohibition au (dw tag)
Characters (in this chapter): Babet, Javert, Azelma "Az" Jondrette, Montparnasse, Éponine Thénardier
Warnings: Implied Transphobia
Word Count: 3672

General Summary: The ABC Group is a small organisation who operate purely on principle - a group of bootleggers who run a not-for-profit speakeasy known as The Corinth out of the upper room of the Musain Café, with all profits going to aid the finances of one Mr. Jean Valjean and his daughter.

Despite run-ins with rivals, including the notorious Thénardier crime family, the group has managed to thrive in the heart of the city, but things have taken a sudden turn for the worse, with the Feds slowly circling under the direction of BOI agent Javert.

[Note: There will be major character death in later chapters.]

Important note involving ages of characters: Most of Les Amis (as well as Éponine, Azelma, and Cosette) are between the ages of 23 and 30, with the exception of Gavroche, who is 14/15. Valjean is 60ish, but due to the way in which I’ve set up where his backstory intersects with Javert’s, Javert is around 39.

Chapter Summary: In which Special Agent Javert of the BOI receives a visitor, and the Thénardier twins prepare for their respective roles in the ABC - Thénardier negotiations the following night.

Author’s Note: I started this as part of a Les Mis Across History event and only got two chapters in before losing my confidence. I would still like to finish it someday but don't know if I could do it as well as I thought.

In her three years working as a secretary for what the office ladies called “the biggest stick in the mud the BOI has to offer,” Jeanette Delaney had become accustomed to all manner of people walking in and out of the central office to see her employer. No one claimed to understand his methods, but he was ruthless and he was effective, and so as long as the paperwork was filed at the end of the day, no one seemed to question the ways in which he chose to conduct his investigations. As a result she hardly even bothered to glance up when the front door opened, then thudded shut again, allowing for the harsh click of high heels on tile to reach the desk before looking at the person in front of her.

Her gaze slid up a pair of long, shapely legs, bare from just below the knee down; from there up skin was covered by a straight-waisted, dark green dress, the lack of sleeves remedied by a stylish black, silk scarf that wound around their throat and draped over their bare shoulders. Finally, she reached their face, and was stunned to find a face that was somehow both beautiful and handsome under a light dusting of makeup, dark hair done up fashionably with a series of small, silver filigreed hairpins, rouged lips twitching into a wry smile as their brown eyes watched them with something bordering on amusement.

“Can I help you, um,” darting her eyes back down to her desk, Jeanette began leafing through the scheduled appointments, “Can I help you, Mist–”

“Jondrette.” The visitor interjected smoothly, “Ms. A. Jondrette – I won’t be on the books, but I assure you, I am expected.” When the girl hesitated, she nodded towards the phone. “You can call and check if you’re worried – I won’t mind.”

Read the Rest Here...

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Enjolras, Éponine Thénardier
Primary Pairings: Enjolras/Éponine Thénardier (queerplatonic)
Secondary Pairings: Enjolras/Grantaire (unrequited)
Word Count: 287

General Summary: Enjolras doesn’t work quite like other people do, but Éponine doesn’t mind it.

Author’s Note: A piece I wrote for one of my best friends when she had a bad day back in July 2013.

She sometimes doesn’t quite understand how he functions - how he pushes himself to extremes until the gears just refuse to turn and he collapses in a heap of long, slender limbs and golden blond curls, and so she watches him sleep.

( Read more... )

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Characters: Combeferre, Courfeyrac, Jean Prouvaire
Primary Pairings: Combeferre/Jean Prouvaire
Word Count: 1373

General Summary: Combeferre offers an at-his-wit's-end Jean Prouvaire the use of his private reading room, and Jehan happily accepts. To both men's surprise, everything else just sort of falls into place.

Author’s Note: My half of an art trade that I wrote in June 2013.

Combeferre had not planned on this when he first offered the use of his sitting room to Jean Prouvaire. They had been, as they often were, in the back room of the Café Musain when he had overheard the poet in conversation with Courfeyrac, complaining of too much noise outside of his rooms making it impossible to focus. He had, almost surprising himself as much as them, smoothly interjected and offered the use of his sitting room.

“It’s quite well-lit,” he had heard himself explaining, “and quiet – my rooms are very out of the way.”

He had ignored Courfeyrac’s questioning eyebrow in favour of the way that Jehan’s grin seemed to take up half his face, and the way that his delicate fingers played with his cravat as he thanked him and inquired as to the address and what times would be acceptable for him to visit. Combeferre had simply said that his door was open to him any time that he was home, and Jehan had beamed at him before leaving him and Courfeyrac to hold court with Enjolras as was the usual procedure after a meeting.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Setting: 1920s Prohibition au (dw tag)
Characters: Fantine, Cosette Fauchelevent, Jean Valjean
Warnings: Implied forced institutionalisation
Word Count: 968

General Summary: Jean Valjean had never intended to become a father, in fact, he had been set against it from the beginning.

[Takes place prior to the chapter fic The Streets Were Full of Strangers, but ends where the first chapter begins.]

Author’s Note: A relatively sweet prequel fic that I wrote around Father's Day 2013.

Jean Valjean had never expected to become a father – in fact, he had never planned on it. After their arrival in New York at the turn of the century, he had watched his parents die slowly under poor work conditions in an attempt to keep their family together and fed, and had nearly worked himself to death in an effort to keep his sister and her own children safe after the death of her husband in a factory accident. After she remarried, less for love than for the financial security of her children, he had vowed at thirty to never to father children of his own.

He had not counted on the appearance of Fantine on the doorstep of his cramped apartment one rainy night in 1912. He hardly knew her – she had worked in a dressmaker’s shop with his sister at one point, and had been the envy of the neighbourhood, but beyond that, they had never spoken.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: M (whole series) / G (this chapter)
Setting: 1920s Prohibition au (dw tag)
Characters (in this chapter): Bahorel, Bossuet, Combeferre, Courfeyrac, Enjolras, Feuilly, Grantaire, Joly, Musichetta, Marius Pontmercy, Jean Prouvaire, Éponine Thénardier, Jean Valjean
Word Count: 2565

General Summary: The ABC Group is a small organisation who operate purely on principle - a group of bootleggers who run a not-for-profit speakeasy known as The Corinth out of the upper room of the Musain Café, with all profits going to aid the finances of one Mr. Jean Valjean and his daughter.

Despite run-ins with rivals, including the notorious Thénardier crime family, the group has managed to thrive in the heart of the city, but things have taken a sudden turn for the worse, with the Feds slowly circling under the direction of BOI agent Javert.

[Note: There will be major character death in later chapters.]

Important note involving ages of characters: Most of Les Amis (as well as Éponine and Cosette) are between the ages of 23 and 30, with the exception of Gavroche, who is 14/15. Valjean is 60ish, but due to the way in which I’ve set up where his backstory intersects with Javert’s, Javert is around 39.

Chapter Summary: Marius attends a Sunday night meeting at The Corinth, and discovers that something is amiss between the ABC Group and their rivals, the Thénardiers.

The streets were strangely deserted as Marius Pontmercy made his way to The Corinth, though it was Sunday night, so he supposed that he ought not to be too surprised, even for this part of town. As he slipped through the darkened Musain Café, he exchanged curt nods with Mr. Valjean, the owner who was working late as usual – in part in case anything was needed upstairs, and in part because he could hardly afford not to. It was, Marius was aware, only due to his financial troubles that he had allowed the ABC Group, as Enjolras had christened them, to occupy his upper room, transforming it into the Corinth. Avoiding eye contact for too long, he hung his coat on an overloaded coat rack and mounted the stairs.

The lights of The Corinth were dimmed and the thick, faux-velvet curtains drawn, leaving bizarrely shaped shadows across the mural-covered walls of the speakeasy. Enjolras stood at the round table central to the room, his blond hair tied back from his face with a red ribbon – something that had initially drawn mockery, at least until his reputation for being as ruthless as he was principled spread through the city; Marius shuddered remembering the rumours about the consequences of crossing the ABC Group’s boss. He had yet to see him in action, aside from his impassioned speeches and remarkable efficiency, but it was hard not to fear the sharp, intelligent blue eyes and the set of his marble features.

“We are bootleggers on principle, not for profit,” Courfeyrac had warned him before bringing him up for the first time, “Any profit goes towards helping Mr. Valjean and his daughter.” At the time, Marius had been sceptical – who the hell bootlegs for charity after all – but after a few weeks, it became clear that Courfeyrac had not been exaggerating.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Enjolras, Grantaire
Word Count: 502

General Summary: Enjolras has never had much patience for puzzles. Even Courf's Rubik's cubes, which he leaves around the flat where he or Combeferre could easily stumble over them, go unsolved. Not because he can't solve them, but because he hasn't the patience for it, and there is work to be done.

Grantaire, too, is a puzzle.

Author’s Note: Something I wrote in a fit of pique in late April 2013.

Grantaire is a puzzle.

Grantaire is a puzzle and Enjolras can’t decide who he is exactly half the time.

There is nothing constant about Grantaire. Not entirely so, anyway.

Some days he arrives at the café trouble incarnate, his eyes flickering about and that damned defiant smirk curling his lips. It’s on those days that Enjolras openly declares him to be unbearable. Even at his drunkest, he’s mouthy and articulate enough to launch into lengthy, heavily sarcasm-laden criticisms of every word to leave Enjolras’ mouth; even at his most hungover, he can manage a sneer and a well-placed barb that will inevitably spur Enjolras to rise to his bait. Sometimes he comes in with a bandage or two – evidence of another reckless night out with Bahorel, no doubt, or else he doesn’t show at all, but appears days later with paint in his hair and chafed wrists, and a strangely triumphant smile on his face.

Other days, however, he might as well be a completely different person.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: T
Characters: Courfeyrac, Marius Pontmercy
Primary Pairings: Courfeyrac/Marius Pontmercy
Word Count: 534

General Summary: Marius has been coping with what he thinks may be some embarrassing feelings towards Courfeyrac, who finds nothing particularly embarrassing.

Author’s Note: Written for a friend back in April 2013

He couldn’t shake it. No matter how much he tried to change things, to steer his imagination elsewhere, his mind always returned to the same places. To his back against a wall, a mattress, even a window pane once. To teeth scraping over freckled clavicles and kisses that were somehow at once chaste and anything but. He always, despite every effort, found himself squirming and haunted by the ghosts of soft, clever hands peeling his clothes away and skating over his hips, by the smile - amused, but indulgent - that inevitably appeared as he flushed at the breathlessness of his own voice.

It wasn’t until he realised that he had whimpered aloud that Marius snapped back to himself and realised where he was. He found himself in the corridor near Courfeyrac’s room, and swallowing hard, glanced around to ensure that he was alone, but when he turned his head to glance towards Courfeyrac’s door, his heart dropped into the pit of his stomach.

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Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: E
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Bahorel, Feuilly
Primary Pairings: Bahorel/Feuilly
Word Count: 1509

General Summary: Bahorel has a bad habit of interrupting Feuilly when he's trying to get things done, and over time, it's become a sort of game that they play, but eventually Feuilly's had quite enough.

Author’s Note: I wrote this in early April 2013 for a friend who requested it.

It had almost become a sort of game between them. There weren’t really any rules to the game so much as it was just Bahorel pushing buttons and seeing just how far he could get before he got hit, or otherwise chastised into retreating. So when Feuilly heard the other man slip, as soundlessly as he was capable of being, into the flat, it was all he could do not to let an irritated sigh escape his lips before he returned to slicing vegetables. At least he wasn’t drunk this time - not with how quiet he had managed to be.

The game always began like that. Bahorel would attempt to get the jump on his flatmate - always unsuccessfully - and start in slowly, by his standards anyway, and then escalate things as far as he could before being told to fuck off. So when one of Bahorel’s hands slipped under his shirt to rest against the small of his back, Feuilly didn’t even flinch.

"'Evening." Bahorel’s breath was warm against the back of his ear, and his knife stuttered imperceptibly against a pepper.

"Bit past that," he replied mildly, his knife hand slipping easily back into its original rhythm despite a slight shiver traversing the length of his body as the hand under his shirt slid up his spine a little ways.

Read the Rest Here...

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Setting: Modern au
Characters: Courfeyrac, Grantaire, Jean Prouvaire
Word Count: 709

General Summary: Grantaire loves a cliché. Loves, I tell you.

Author’s Note: From 22 March 2013. A bit shit now, and I would write everyone differently, but it still makes me chuckle, so I'm cross-posting it anyway. (to be honest it would be made better with a little reshuffling of the characters but fuck it)

"It was a dark and stormy night, a-"

"No. Stop right there."

"What?" Scowling, Grantaire looked up from his writing, almost hitting his head on the window sill in the process.

"'It was a dark and stormy night'?"

"Yeah?"

"You can’t be serious, R."

( Read more... )

Fandom: Les Miserables
Rating: G
Characters: Enjolras, Grantaire
Primary Pairings: Unrequited Enjolras/Grantaire
Word Count: 551

General Summary: When Enjolras orders him to leave, Grantaire can hardly hear the words leaving his lips, but he can hear his voice and he can see his face.

Author’s Note: A reverse perspective take on a particular scene in Les Mis. Written February 2013.

He is beautiful.

Through the haze of the alcohol, this single thought registered itself in his mind. With the light behind him, Enjolras’ features would have been difficult to make out, had not they already been so carefully memorised in his mind’s eye, which rendered both the man and his displeasure as clear as day. The haughty lift of his head as he turned from where he stood, the faint glints of muffled sunlight on his hair and face both gave him the air of an avenging angel.

Or of Milton’s Lucifer. The observation fluttered to his lips, but never left them as he squinted up against the light - whether it was the sunlight or a light somehow emitted by the contained fury etched into his features was both indistinguishable and irrelevant.

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Gin and Bitterness

Entries tagged with les mis

Uneasy Animals: The Wolf as Criminal in ‘Les Misérables’

On Feuilly and Combeferre at the Barricade

How colourful costuming in ‘Les Misérables’ brings the Barricade Boys to life

Missed Cues

Hearsay

Old Habits

Minding Cues

The Streets Were Full of Strangers (Chapter 2)

Routine Maintenance

Serendipity

Fatherhood

The Streets Were Full of Strangers (Chapter 1)

Rubick's

Unexpected Results

Behind the Cut

'It was a Dark and Stormy Night' and Five Other Clichés

"You Will See."

The Writer

Other Places

September 2023

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