About this title: Three extraordinary characters caught in a web of fatal obsession are at the centre of Hugo's novel. The grotesque hunchback Quasimodo, bell-ringer of Notre-Dame, owes his life to the austere archdeacon, Claude Frollo, who in turn is bound by a hopeless passion to the gypsy dancer Esmeralda. She, meanwhile, is bewitched by a handsome, empty-headed ...
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Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Description: Good. Light shelf wear and minimal interior marks. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Acceptable. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers! Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Distribooks Inc
Date Published: 1995-05
ISBN-13:9782877141246ISBN:2877141241
Description: Good. Every heavytail order includes with a sweet! We carefully hand clean and reinspect each and every item we ship. Our quality control process ensures items to be in the condition described or better. Heavytail is determined to earn your repeat business through old fashioned customer service. We love international orders. read more
Binding: Mass-market paperback
Publisher: Gallimard
Date Published: 1991
ISBN-13:9782070365494ISBN:2070365492
Description: Good. No dust jacket as issued. Highlighting/underlining. book in excellent condition with laminated cover. ex-student copy with very clean and neat annotations, highlighting and underlining throughout. EN FRANCAIS. Text in French. paperback. Glued binding. 704 p. Folio, 549. read more
Edition: Edition Unstated
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Publisher: Garnier Flammarion
Date Published: 1967
Description: Good. As issued No Jacket. Spine lean, corner bumps, stiff wraps, small stains to the rear cover, other shopwear, and bottom edge of book is stained but does not bleed up into book until last couple of pages but even then never encroaches on the text. En Francais. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Very Good-; P. F. Collier & Son Company, New York
Date Published: 1917
Description: With no dust jacket. 8vo 8"-9" tall Browning on page edges; slight edgewear on covers; The Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction; 531 pages. read more
"The Hunckback of Notre Dame, under the original title Notre Dame de Paris (because the plot really centers around the cathedral, not Quasimodo) is like a twisted Romeo & Juliet story sans star-crossed lovers. The *real* protagonist (in my opinion) is Esmerelda, the 16 year old gypsy dancer. She falls in love with the chauvanistic peacock Captain Pheobus who takes advantage of her love, meanwhile courting a rich young noblewoman. Quasimodo the deaf bell-ringer, and Claude Frollo, the fanatical archdeacon of Notre Dame, are the ones who fall for the gypsy. So naturally things get quite chaotic when the gypsy girl is sentenced to death for "murdering" the Captain.
The action is spectacular, especially the siege of Notre Dame, and hopefully I don't give anything away when I say that there's a lot of dying going on...
This book does have its long, slow parts too...such as the beginning. and unless you are an ardent scholar of medieval architecture, go ahead and skim chapters with the titles "Notre Dame" and "A Birds Eye View of Paris".
My favorite parts: Poet Pierre Gringoire's "marriage" to Esmerelda (whom Captain Phoebus calls "similar" because he can never remember her name), and also P.G.'s unhealthy obsession with Djahli the goat."
"This is a beautiful novel of hope, prejudice, history, love, philosophy, and...architecture.
In fact, the entire story centers not around the extraordinary main characters, but the cathedral itself (as is more evident in the original title, Notre Dame de Paris). As strange of a concept as it sounds, Hugo is able to pull it off with ease, creating the perfect atmosphere for such a novel.
A good rule of thumb with Victor Hugo is to pay the utmost attention to what you are reading; the man is a master with dark and clever puns, metaphors, and personification. There is no sentence that the book could do without, and it is best to give The Hunchback of Notre Dame the effort it is worth.
There is not one thing I could find fault with in this book, but if you are one to get uneasy with novels with cruelty, misery and death as a factor, you may find yourself shifting in your seat a bit."
"ok... i'll be honest. i hated the first 150 pages and had i not been reading it for book club i would have abandoned it. about 300 pages in i started to think it was okay. around 400... i really liked it. at page 450 i couldn't put it down. i stayed up till 2am last night finishing it.
so... is it worth the painful first half to get to the second half? now that i've done it... i would say so.
victor hugo could have used a good editor. pages and pages of diatribes and descriptions that made me feel like pulling my hair out - but the story is chilling and wonderful. i understood after reading it why there are so many abridged versions. :)
of course its a piece out of history... melodramatic and predictable... but one expects that.
all in all... i felt satisfied going to bed last night having read such a great book. still... next time i read Hugo... i will be prepared for a big front end investment."
"Amazing book! Loved the author's view on things. I really felt like I was getting glimpses of a great mind by reading this book. You might want to read it with a highlighter for good quotes. I'm reading Les Miserable right now and again I really like Victor Hugo's writing. There are times where he really goes into depth about history, or something and it is hard to read but if you can get past those parts you will thank yourself because he has some great writing."
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