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Similarites Between "The Hunchback Of Notre Dame" and "Les Miserables"

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Victor Hugo uses themes that reoccur in both The Hunchback Of Notre Dame and Les Miserables. He clearly states the plights of the century and the great eternal questions that humans have the desire to know but do not have the courage to ask. In Hugo’s novels, modern readers will be enthralled with the larger than life characters and their incessant battle with evil. The two novels have more similarities than differences. They include paradox and irony, a romantic tone, obsession and betrayal as themes, and last they both involve a great deal of imagery and emphasis on characterization and setting.
Underneath the daring love that is unfolding between Quasimodo and Esmeralda, the historical tragedies of 1492 are being unwound. Hugo is …show more content…

He will do anything to have her. The obsession controls his body, mind, and soul toward the darkest evil. He is dressed in priest attire and is seemed to be a spiritual light. Hugo is telling the reader that Frollo is really the devil. While Quasimodo, who has been accused of being the devil because of his exterior, is more like a saint. In Les Miserables, the theme of obsession is also a key factor. Javert is a man obsessed with finding Valjean and spends many years searching for him. He’s depicted as a honest police officer, whose mail goal is to find Valjean and arrest him for a petty crime. Javerts obsession leads him to his suicide. Obsession controls the characters to do things they normally would never do. Betrayal is another theme in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. In the novel Quasimodo represents the most genuine form of loyalty, he is the most compassionate character to experience betrayal. Frollo is the only person that shows affection for him. When Frollo tells Quasimodo to kidnap Esmeralda he does so without any question. When he is arrested and beat, Frollo doesn’t come to his defense. Frollo, again allows someone to take the fall, when he stabs Phoebus and allows Esmeralda to take the blame, and allows her life to be taken from a lie. Frollo is a figure of the devil, he seems sincere and God-loving on the outside but on the inside he is a devious liar. Betrayal also plays a part in Les Miserables. Javert has to choose between

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