Roman Notre Dame Cathedral as a Romantic work. "Notre Dame Cathedral" as a romantic historical novel

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ROMANTIC PRINCIPLES IN V. HUGO'S NOVEL

"Cathedral of Notre Dame of Paris"

INTRODUCTION

Victor Hugo's novel Notre Dame de Paris remains a true example of the first period in the development of romanticism, a textbook example of it.

In his work, Victor Hugo created unique romantic images: Esmeralda is the embodiment of humanity and spiritual beauty, Quasimodo, in whose ugly body a sympathetic heart is found.

Unlike the heroes of literature of the 17th and 18th centuries, Hugo's heroes combine contradictory qualities. Making extensive use of the romantic technique of contrasting images, sometimes deliberately exaggerating, turning to the grotesque, the writer creates complex ambiguous characters. He is attracted by gigantic passions, heroic deeds. He extols the strength of his character as a hero, rebellious, rebellious spirit, ability to deal with circumstances. In the characters, conflicts, plot, landscape of Notre Dame Cathedral, the romantic principle of reflecting life triumphed - exceptional characters in extraordinary circumstances. The world of unbridled passions, romantic characters, surprises and accidents, the image of a brave person who does not shy away from any dangers, this is what Hugo sings in these works.

Hugo claims that there is a constant struggle between good and evil in the world. In the novel, even more clearly than in Hugo's poetry, the search for new moral values was outlined, which the writer finds, as a rule, not in the camp of the rich and those in power, but in the camp of the destitute and despised poor. All the best feelings - kindness, sincerity, selfless devotion - are given to the foundling Quasimodo and the gypsy Esmeralda, who are the true heroes of the novel, while the antipodes, standing at the helm of secular or spiritual power, like King Louis XI or the same archdeacon Frollo, differ cruelty, fanaticism, indifference to the suffering of people.

It is significant that it was precisely this moral idea of Hugo's first novel that F. M. Dostoevsky highly appreciated. Offering Notre Dame Cathedral for translation into Russian, he wrote in a preface published in 1862 in the journal Vremya that the idea of this work is “the restoration of a dead person crushed by the unjust oppression of circumstances ... This thought is the justification of the humiliated and all outcast pariahs of society.” “Who would not think,” Dostoevsky wrote further, “that Quasimodo is the personification of the oppressed and despised medieval people ... in which love and a thirst for justice finally wake up, and with them the consciousness of their truth and their still untouched infinite forces.”

Chapter 1.

ROMANTICISM AS A LITERARY TREND

1.1 Cause

Romanticism as an ideological and artistic direction in culture appeared at the endXVIII century. Then the French wordromantique meant "strange", "fantastic", "picturesque".

ATXIX century the word "Romanticism" becomes a term for a new literary movement, the opposite of Classicism.

In the modern sense, the term “Romanticism” is given a different, expanded meaning. They designate a type of artistic creativity that opposes Realism, in which the decisive role is played not by the perception of reality, but by its re-creation, the embodiment of the ideal of the artist. This type of creativity is characterized by demonstrative conventionality of form, fantasy, grotesque images, and symbolism.

The event that served as an impetus for realizing the inconsistency of the ideas of the 18th century and for changing the worldview of people in general was the Great French Bourgeois Revolution of 1789. It brought instead of the expected result - "Freedom, Equality and Brotherhood" - only hunger and devastation, and with them disappointment in the ideas of the enlighteners. Disappointment in the revolution as a way to change social life caused a sharp reorientation of social psychology itself, a turn of interest from the external life of a person and his activities in society to the problems of the spiritual, emotional life of the individual.

In this atmosphere of doubt, changes in views, assessments, judgments, surprises at the turn of the 18th - 19th centuries, a new phenomenon of spiritual life arose - romanticism.

Romantic art is characterized by: disgust for bourgeois reality, a resolute rejection of the rationalistic principles of bourgeois education and classicism, distrust of the cult of reason, which was characteristic of the enlighteners and writers of the new classicism.

The moral and aesthetic pathos of romanticism is associated primarily with the affirmation of the dignity of the human person, the intrinsic value of its spiritual and creative life. This found expression in the images of the heroes of romantic art, which is characterized by the image of extraordinary characters and strong passions, aspiration for unlimited freedom. The revolution proclaimed the freedom of the individual, but the same revolution gave rise to the spirit of acquisitiveness and selfishness. These two sides of personality (the pathos of freedom and individualism) manifested themselves in a very complex way in the romantic conception of the world and man.

1.2. Main distinguishing features

Disappointment in the power of the mind and in society gradually grew to “cosmic pessimism”, it was accompanied by moods of hopelessness, despair, “world sorrow”. The inner theme of the “terrible world”, with its blind power of material relations, the longing for the eternal monotony of everyday reality, has passed through the entire history of romantic literature.

Romantics were sure that “here and now” is an ideal, i.e. a more meaningful, rich, fulfilling life is impossible, but they did not doubt its existence - this is the so-called romantic duality. It was the search for the ideal, the pursuit of it, the thirst for renewal and perfection that filled their lives with meaning.

The Romantics resolutely rejected the new social order. They put forward their "romantic hero" an exceptional, spiritually rich personality who felt lonely and restless in the emerging bourgeois world, mercantile and hostile to man. Romantic heroes sometimes turned away from reality in despair, sometimes rebelled against it, painfully feeling the gap between the ideal and reality, powerless to change the life around them, but preferring to perish than to reconcile with it. The life of bourgeois society seemed so vulgar and prosaic to the romantics that they sometimes refused to portray it at all and colored the world with their imagination. Romantics often depicted their heroes as being in hostile relations with the surrounding reality, dissatisfied with the present and striving for another world that is in their dreams.

Romantics denied the necessity and possibility of an objective reflection of reality. Therefore, they proclaimed the subjective arbitrariness of creative imagination as the basis of art. Exceptional events and the extraordinary environment in which the characters acted were chosen as plots for romantic works.

Romantics were attracted by everything unusual (the ideal may be there): fantasy, the mystical world of otherworldly forces, the future, distant exotic countries, the originality of the peoples inhabiting them, past historical eras. The demand for a faithful recreation of place and time is one of the most important achievements of the era of romanticism. It was during this period that the genre of the historical novel was created.

But the characters themselves were exceptional. They were interested in all-consuming passions, strong feelings, secret movements of the soul, they spoke about the depth and inner infinity of the personality and about the tragic loneliness of a real person in the world around him.

Romantics were indeed lonely among people who did not want to notice the vulgarity, prosaic and lack of spirituality of their lives. Rebels and seekers they despised these people. They preferred to be not accepted and misunderstood than, like most of those around them, wallow in the mediocrity, dullness and routine of a colorless and prosaic world. Loneliness- Another feature of a romantic hero.

Along with increased attention to the individual, a characteristic feature of romanticism was a sense of the movement of history and human involvement in it. The feeling of instability and variability of the world, the complexity and inconsistency of the human soul determined the dramatic, sometimes tragic perception of life by romantics.

In the field of form, romanticism opposed the classical “imitation of nature” creative freedom an artist who creates his own special world, more beautiful and therefore more real than the surrounding reality.

Chapter 2

VICTOR HUGO AND HIS WORK

2.1 Romantic principles of Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) entered the history of literature as the head and theorist of French democratic romanticism. In the preface to the drama Cromwell, he gave a vivid exposition of the principles of romanticism as a new literary trend, thereby declaring war on classicism, which still had a strong influence on all French literature. This preface was called the "Manifesto" of the Romantics.

Hugo demands absolute freedom for drama and poetry in general. “Down with all rules and patterns! he exclaims in the Manifesto. The poet's advisers, he says, must be nature, truth, and his own inspiration; besides them, the only laws obligatory for the poet are those that in each work follow from his plot.

In the Preface to Cromwell, Hugo defines the main theme of all modern literature - the image of the social conflicts of society, the image of the intense struggle of various social forces that have rebelled against each other.

The main principle of his romantic poetics is the depiction of life in its contrasts.-Hugo tried to substantiate even before the "Foreword" in his article about the novel by W. Scott "Quentin Dorward". “Isn't there,” he wrote, “life a bizarre drama in which good and evil, beautiful and ugly, high and low are mixed—the law that operates in all creation?”

The principle of contrasting oppositions in Hugo's poetics was based on his metaphysical ideas about the life of modern society, in which the determining factor in development is allegedly the struggle of opposite moral principles - good and evil - existing from eternity.

Hugo devotes a significant place in the "Preface" to the definition of the aesthetic concept grotesque, considering it a distinctive element medieval poetry and modern romantic. What does he mean by this term? “The grotesque, as opposed to the sublime, as a means of contrast, is, in our opinion, the richest source that nature opens up to art.”

Hugo contrasted the grotesque images of his works with the conditionally beautiful images of epigone classicism, believing that without the introduction of phenomena both sublime and base, both beautiful and ugly, it is impossible to convey the fullness and truth of life in literature. With all the metaphysical understanding of the category “grotesque” Hugo's substantiation of this element of art was, nevertheless, a step forward on the path of bringing art closer to the truth of life.

Hugo considered the work of Shakespeare to be the pinnacle of the poetry of modern times, because in Shakespeare's work, in his opinion, a harmonious combination of elements of tragedy and comedy, horror and laughter, the sublime and the grotesque was realized, and the fusion of these elements constitutes the drama, which “is a creation typical of third age of poetry, for modern literature".

Hugo the romantic proclaimed free, unrestricted fantasy in poetic creativity.. He believed the playwright had the right to rely on legends, and not on true historical facts, to neglect historical accuracy. In his words, “one should not look for pure history in drama, even if it is 'historical'. She recounts legends, not facts. This is a chronicle, not a chronology.”

In the Preface to Cromwell, the principle of a truthful and multifaceted reflection of life is persistently emphasized. Hugo speaks of "truthfulness" ("le vrai") as the main feature of Romantic poetry. Hugo argues that the drama should not be an ordinary mirror, giving a flat image, but a concentrating mirror, which “not only does not weaken the colored rays, but, on the contrary, collects and condenses them, turning the flicker into light, and the light into flame.” Behind this metaphorical definition lies the desire of the author to actively choose the most characteristic bright phenomena of life, and not just copy everything he sees. The principle of romantic typification, which boils down to the desire to choose from life the most catchy, unique features in their originality, images, phenomena, made it possible for romantic writers to effectively approach the reflection of life, which favorably distinguished their poetics from the dogmatic poetics of classicism.

Features of a realistic comprehension of reality are contained in Hugo's reasoning about “local color”, by which he understands the reproduction of the true situation of the action, the historical and everyday features of the era chosen by the author. He condemns the widespread fashion to hastily apply strokes of "local color" to the finished work. The drama, in his opinion, should be saturated from the inside with the color of the era, it should appear on the surface, "like the juice that rises from the root of a tree into its very last leaf." This can be achieved only through a careful and persistent study of the depicted era.

Hugo advises the poets of the new, romantic school to portray a person in the inseparable connection of his external life and inner world, requires a combination in one picture of the "drama of life with the drama of consciousness."

Romantic sense of historicism and the contradiction between the ideal and reality was refracted in a peculiar way in Hugo's worldview and work. He sees life as full of conflicts and dissonances, because there is a constant struggle between two eternal moral principles - Good and Evil. And the screaming ones are called to convey this struggle "antitheses"(contrasts) - the main artistic principle of the writer, proclaimed in the “Preface to Cromwell”, in which images of the beautiful and the ugly are contrasted, whether he draws. he pictures of nature, the soul of man or the life of mankind. The element of Evil, the “grotesque” rages in history, images of the collapse of civilizations, the struggle of peoples against bloody despots, pictures of suffering, disasters and injustice pass through all of Hugo’s work. And yet, over the years, Hugo increasingly strengthened his understanding of history as a rigorous movement from Evil to Good, from darkness to light, from slavery and violence to justice and freedom. This historical optimism, unlike most romantics, Hugo inherited from the enlighteners of the 18th century.

Attacking the poetics of the classic tragedy, Hugo rejects the principle of the unity of place and time, which is incompatible with artistic truth. The scholasticism and dogmatism of these "rules," Hugo argues, hinder the development of art. However, he retains unity of action, that is, the unity of the plot, as consistent with the “laws of nature” and helping to give the development of the plot the necessary dynamics.

Protesting against the affectation and pretentiousness of the style of the epigones of classicism, Hugo stands up for simplicity, expressiveness, sincerity of poetic speech, for enriching its vocabulary by including folk sayings and successful neologisms, because “language does not stop in its development. The human mind is always moving forward, or, if you prefer, changing, and language is changing along with it.” Developing the position on language as a means of expressing thought, Hugo notes that if each era brings something new to the language, then "each era must also have words expressing these concepts."

Hugo's style is characterized by the most detailed descriptions; long digressions are not uncommon in his novels. Sometimes they are not directly related to the storyline of the novel, but almost always they are distinguished by poetic or educational value. Hugo's dialogue is lively, dynamic, colorful. His language is replete with comparisons and metaphors, terms related to the profession of heroes and the environment in which they live.

The historical significance of the “Preface to Cromwell” lies in the fact that Hugo dealt a crushing blow to the school of followers of classicism with his literary manifesto, from which she could not recover. Hugo demanded the depiction of life in its contradictions, contrasts, in the clash of opposing forces, and thus brought art closer, in fact, to a realistic display of reality.

Chapter 3

ROMAN-DRAMA "THE CATHEDRAL OF NOTHER DOMEN OF PARIS"

The July Revolution of 1830, which overthrew the Bourbon monarchy, found an ardent supporter in Hugo. There is no doubt that Hugo's first significant novel, Notre Dame de Paris, begun in July 1830 and completed in February 1831, also reflected the atmosphere of the social upsurge caused by the revolution. Even more than in Hugo's dramas, Notre Dame Cathedral embodies the principles of advanced literature formulated in the preface to Cromwell. The aesthetic principles set forth by the author are not just a theorist's manifesto, but the foundations of creativity deeply thought out and felt by the writer.

The novel was conceived in the late 1820s. It is possible that the impetus for the idea was the novel by Walter Scott "Quentin Dorward", where the action takes place in France in the same era as in the future "Cathedral". However, the young author approached his task differently than his famous contemporary. Back in an 1823 article, Hugo wrote that “after the picturesque but prose novel of Walter Scott, another novel must be created, which will drama and epic at the same time picturesque, but also poetic, filled with reality, but at the same time ideal, truthful. This is exactly what the author of Notre Dame was trying to accomplish.

As in dramas, Hugo turns to history in Notre Dame; this time it was the late French Middle Ages, Paris at the end of the 15th century that attracted his attention. Romantic interest in the Middle Ages largely arose as a reaction to the classicist focus on antiquity. The desire to overcome the neglect of the Middle Ages, which spread thanks to the writers of the Enlightenment of the 18th century, for whom this time was a kingdom of darkness and ignorance, played a role here, useless in the history of the progressive development of mankind. And, finally, almost mainly, the Middle Ages attracted romantics with their unusualness, as opposed to the prose of bourgeois life, the dull everyday existence. Here one could meet, romantics believed, with solid, great characters, strong passions, exploits and martyrdom in the name of convictions. All this was still perceived in an aura of some mystery associated with the insufficient study of the Middle Ages, which was replenished by an appeal to folk traditions and legends, which had special significance for romantic writers. Subsequently, in the preface to the collection of his historical poems “The Legend of the Ages”, Hugo paradoxically states that the legend should be equated in rights with history: “The human race can be considered from two points of view: from historical and legendary. The second is no less true than the first. The first is no less conjectural than the second.” The Middle Ages appears in Hugo's novel in the form of a legend-history against the backdrop of a masterfully recreated historical flavor.

The basis, the core of this legend is, in general, unchanged for the entire creative path of the mature Hugo, the view of the historical process as an eternal confrontation between two world principles - good and evil, mercy and cruelty, compassion and intolerance, feelings and reason. The field of this battle and different eras attracts Hugo's attention to an immeasurably greater extent than the analysis of a specific historical situation. Hence the well-known over-historicism, the symbolism of Hugo's heroes, the timeless nature of his psychologism. Hugo himself frankly admitted that history as such did not interest him in the novel: “The book has no claims to history, except perhaps for a description with a certain knowledge and a certain care, but only overview and in fits and starts, the state of morals, beliefs, laws , the arts, finally civilization in the fifteenth century. However, this is not the point of the book. If she has one merit, it is that she is a work of imagination, whimsy and fantasy.”

It is known that for the descriptions of the cathedral and Paris in the 15th century, the image of the mores of the era, Hugo studied considerable historical material and allowed himself to show off his knowledge, as he did in his other novels. Researchers of the Middle Ages meticulously checked Hugo's “documentation” and could not find any serious errors in it, despite the fact that the writer did not always draw his information from primary sources.

Nevertheless, the main thing in the book, to use Hugo's terminology, is "whimmy and fantasy", that is, that which was entirely created by his imagination and, to a very small extent, can be connected with history. The widest popularity of the novel is ensured by the eternal ethical problems posed in it and fictional characters of the foreground, who have long since passed (primarily Quasimodo) into the category of literary types.

3.1. Story Organization

The novel is built on a dramatic principle: three men achieve the love of one woman; the gypsy Esmeralda is loved by the archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral, Claude Frollo, the bell ringer of the cathedral, the hunchback Quasimodo, and the poet Pierre Gringoire, although the main rivalry arises between Frollo and Quasimodo. At the same time, the gypsy gives her feelings to the handsome but empty nobleman Phoebe de Chateauper.

Hugo's novel-drama can be divided into five acts. In the first act, Quasimodo and Esmeralda, not yet seeing each other, appear on the same stage. This scene is the Place de Greve. Here Esmeralda dances and sings, here a procession passes, with comic solemnity carrying the pope of jesters Quasimodo on a stretcher. The general merriment is confused by the grim menace of the bald man: “Blasphemy! Blasphemy!” Esmeralda's bewitching voice is interrupted by the terrible cry of the recluse of Roland's tower: “Will you get out of here, Egyptian locust?” The game of antitheses closes on Esmeralda, all plot threads are drawn to her. And it is no coincidence that the festive bonfire, illuminating her beautiful face, illuminates the gallows at the same time. This is not just a spectacular contrast - it is the beginning of the tragedy. The action of the tragedy, which began with the dance of Esmeralda on the Greve Square, will end here - with her execution.

Every word spoken on this stage is performed tragic irony. The threats of the bald man, the archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral Claude Frollo, are not dictated by hatred, but by love, but such love is even worse than hatred. Passion turns a dry scribe into a villain, ready to do anything to take possession of his victim. In a cry: "Sorcery!" - a harbinger of Esmeralda's future troubles: rejected by her, Claude Frollo will relentlessly pursue her, put her on trial by the Inquisition, doom her to death.

Surprisingly, the curses of the recluse are also inspired by great love. She became a voluntary prisoner, grieving for her only daughter, stolen many years ago by gypsies. Invoking heavenly and earthly punishments on Esmeralda's head, the unfortunate mother does not suspect that the beautiful gypsy is the daughter she is mourning. Curses will come true. At the decisive moment, the tenacious fingers of the recluse will not allow Esmeralda to hide, they will detain her out of revenge for the entire gypsy tribe, who deprived her mother of her beloved daughter. To enhance the tragic intensity, the author will force the recluse to recognize her child in Esmeralda - by memorable signs. But also recognition will not save the girl: the guards are close, tragic denouement inevitable.

In the second act, the one who yesterday was a “triumphant” - the pope of jesters, becomes “condemned” (again, a contrast). After Quasimodo was punished with whips and left at the pillory to be mocked by the crowd, two people appear on the stage of the Place de Greve, whose fate is inextricably linked with the fate of the hunchback. First, Claude Frollo approaches the pillory. It was he who picked up the once ugly child thrown into the temple, raised him and made him the bell ringer of Notre Dame Cathedral. Since childhood, Quasimodo has been accustomed to reverence for his savior and now expects him to come to the rescue again. But no, Claude Frollo passes by, treacherously lowering his eyes. And then Esmeralda appears at the pillory. Between the fates of the hunchback and the beauty there is an initial connection. After all, it was him, the freak, that the gypsies put in the manger from which they stole her, the lovely little one. And now she is climbing the stairs to the suffering Quasimodo and, the only one from the whole crowd, taking pity on him, gives him water. From that moment on, love awakens in Quasimodo's chest, full of poetry and heroic self-sacrifice.

If in the first act voices are of particular importance, and in the second - gestures, then in the third - looks. The point of intersection of views becomes the dancing Esmeralda. The poet Gringoire, who is next to her in the square, looks at the girl with sympathy: she recently saved his life. The captain of the royal shooters, Phoebe de Chateauper, with whom Esmeralda fell in love at the first meeting, looks at her from the balcony of a Gothic house - this is a look of voluptuousness. At the same time, from above, from the north tower of the cathedral, Claude Frollo looks at the gypsy - this is a look of gloomy, despotic passion. And even higher, on the bell tower of the cathedral, Quasimodo froze, looking at the girl with great love.

In the fourth act, the dizzying swing of antithesis swings to the limit: Quasimodo and Esmeralda must now switch roles. Once again the crowd has gathered on the Greve Square - and again all eyes are fixed on the gypsy. But now she, accused of attempted murder and witchcraft, is waiting for the gallows. The girl was declared the murderer of Phoebe de Chateauper - the one whom she loves more than life. And it is confessed by the one who actually wounded the captain - the true criminal Claude Frollo. To complete the effect, the author makes Phoebus himself, who survived after being wounded, see the gypsy woman bound and going to execution. "Phoebus! My Phoebus!” - Esmeralda shouts to him "in a fit of love and delight." She expects that the captain of the shooters, in accordance with his name (Phoebus - "the sun", "the beautiful shooter who was a god"), will become her savior, but he cowardly turns away from her. Esmeralda will be saved not by a beautiful warrior, but by an ugly, outcast ringer. The hunchback will go down the steep wall, snatch the gypsy from the hands of the executioners and lift her up - to the bell tower of Notre Dame Cathedral. So, before ascending the scaffold, Esmeralda, a girl with a winged soul, will find a temporary refuge in heaven - among singing birds and bells.

In the fifth act, the time comes for the tragic denouement - the decisive battle and execution on the Greve square. Thieves and swindlers, inhabitants of the Parisian Court of Miracles, besiege Notre Dame Cathedral, and Quasimodo alone defends it heroically. The tragic irony of the episode lies in the fact that both sides are fighting each other to save Esmeralda: Quasimodo does not know that the army of thieves has come to free the girl, the besiegers do not know that the hunchback, protecting the cathedral, is protecting the gypsy.

“Ananke” - rock - with this word, read on the wall of one of the towers of the cathedral, the novel begins. At the behest of fate, Esmeralda will give herself away by shouting the name of her beloved again: “Phoebus! To me, my Phoebus!” - and thereby destroy himself. Claude Frollo will inevitably fall into that “fatal knot” with which he “pulled the gypsy” himself. Fate will force the pupil to kill his benefactor: Quasimodo will throw Claude Frollo off the balustrade of Notre Dame Cathedral. Only those whose characters are too small for tragedy will avoid tragic fate. The author will say with irony about the poet Gringoire and the officer Phoebus de Chateaure: they “ended tragically” - the first will just return to dramaturgy, the second will marry. The novel ends with the antithesis of the petty and the tragic. The usual marriage of Phoebus is opposed to a fatal marriage, a marriage in death. Many years later, decrepit remains will be found in the crypt - the skeleton of Quasimodo, hugging the skeleton of Esmeralda. When they want to separate them from each other, Quasimodo's skeleton will become dust.

Romantic pathos appeared in Hugo already in the very organization of the plot. The history of the gypsy Esmeralda, the archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral Claude Frollo, the ringer Quasimodo, the captain of the royal shooters Phoebus de Chateauper and other characters associated with them is full of secrets, unexpected turns of action, fatal coincidences and accidents. The fates of the characters are bizarrely crossed. Quasimodo tries to steal Esmeralda on the orders of Claude Frollo, but the girl is accidentally rescued by a guard led by Phoebus. For the attempt on Esmeralda Quasimodo is punished. But it is she who gives the unfortunate hunchback a sip of water when he stands at the pillory, and with her good deed transforms him.

There is pure romantic, instant break of character: Quasimodo turns from a rough animal into a man and, having fallen in love with Esmeralda, objectively finds himself in a confrontation with Frollo, who plays a fatal role in the life of a girl.

The fates of Quasimodo and Esmeralda are closely intertwined in the distant past. Esmeralda in childhood was stolen by gypsies and among them received her exotic name (Esmeralda in Spanish means “emerald”), and they left an ugly baby in Paris, who was later taken up by Claude Frollo, naming him in Latin (Quasimodo translated as “unfinished”), but also in France Quasimodo is the name of the Red Hill holiday, in which Frollo picked up the baby.

3.2. The system of characters in the novel

The action in the novel "Notre Dame Cathedral" takes place at the end of the 15th century. The novel opens with a picture of a noisy folk festival in Paris. Here is a motley crowd of townspeople and townswomen; and Flemish merchants and artisans who came as ambassadors to France; and the Cardinal of Bourbon, also university students, beggars, royal archers, the street dancer Esmeralda, and the fantastically ugly bell-ringer of Quasimodo Cathedral. Such is the wide range of images that appear before the reader.

As in other works of Hugo, the characters are sharply divided into two camps. The democratic views of the writer are also confirmed by the fact that he finds high moral qualities only in the lower classes of medieval society - in the street dancer Esmeralda and the ringer Quasimodo. Whereas the frivolous aristocrat Phoebus de Chateauper, the religious fanatic Claude Frollo, the noble judge, the royal prosecutor and the king himself embody the immorality and cruelty of the ruling classes.

“Notre Dame Cathedral” is a romantic work in style and method. In it you can find everything that was characteristic of Hugo's dramaturgy. It also has exaggerations and play with contrasts, and poetization of the grotesque, and an abundance of exceptional situations in the plot. The essence of the image is revealed by Hugo not so much on the basis of character development, but in opposition to another image..

The system of images in the novel is based on the one developed by Hugo theory of the grotesque and the principle of contrast. The characters line up in clearly marked contrasting pairs: the freak Quasimodo and the beautiful Esmeralda, also Quasimodo and the outwardly irresistible Phoebus; an ignorant ringer - a learned monk who knew all the medieval sciences; Claude Frollo also opposes Phoebus: one is an ascetic, the other is immersed in the pursuit of entertainment and pleasure. The gypsy Esmeralda is opposed by the blond Fleur-de-Lys, the bride of Phoebe, a rich, educated girl and belonging to the high society. The relationship between Esmeralda and Phoebus is also based on the contrast: the depth of love, tenderness and subtlety of feeling in Esmeralda - and the insignificance, vulgarity of the foppish nobleman Phoebus.

The internal logic of Hugo's romantic art leads to the fact that the relationship between sharply contrasting characters acquires an exceptional, exaggerated character.

Quasimodo, Frollo and Phoebus all three love Esmeralda, but in their love each appears as an antagonist of the other. Phoebus needs a love affair for a while, Frollo burns with passion, hating Esmeralda as the object of his desires. Quasimodo, on the other hand, loves the girl selflessly and disinterestedly; he confronts Phoebus and Frollo as a man devoid of even a drop of selfishness in his feeling and, thereby, rises above them. Embittered by the whole world, the hardened freak Quasimodo, love transforms, awakening in him a good, human beginning. In Claude Frollo, love, on the contrary, awakens the beast. The opposition of these two characters determines the ideological sound of the novel. As conceived by Hugo, they embody two basic human types.

This is how a new plan of contrast arises: the external appearance and internal content of the character: Phoebus is beautiful, but internally dull, mentally poor; Quasimodo is ugly in appearance, but beautiful in soul.

In this way, the novel is constructed as a system of polar oppositions. These contrasts are not just an artistic device for the author, but a reflection of his ideological positions, the concept of life. The confrontation between the polar principles seems to Hugo's romance eternal in life, but at the same time, as already mentioned, he wants to show the movement of history. According to the researcher of French literature Boris Revizov, Hugo considers the change of eras - the transition from the early Middle Ages to the late, that is, to the Renaissance period - as a gradual accumulation of goodness, spirituality, a new attitude to the world and to ourselves.

In the center of the novel, the writer put the image of Esmeralda and made her the embodiment of spiritual beauty and humanity. Creation romantic image contribute to the bright characteristics that the author gives the appearance of his characters already at their first appearance. Being a romantic, he uses bright colors, contrasting tones, emotionally rich epithets, unexpected exaggerations.. Here is a portrait of Esmeralda: “She was short in stature, but she seemed tall - her slim figure was so slender. She was swarthy, but it was not difficult to guess that during the day her skin shone with that wonderful golden hue that is inherent in Andalusian and Roman women. The girl danced, fluttered, spun ... and every time her radiant face flashed, the look of her black eyes blinded you like lightning ... Thin, fragile, with bare shoulders and slender legs occasionally flashing from under her skirt, black-haired, fast, like a wasp , in a golden corsage tightly fitting the waist, in a colorful puffy dress, shining with her eyes, she truly seemed to be an unearthly creature.

A gypsy woman singing and dancing in the squares is a superlative degree of beauty. However, this lovely girl is full of contradictions. She can be confused with an angel or a fairy, and she lives among swindlers, thieves and murderers. The radiance on her face is replaced by a “grimace”, sublime singing - by comic tricks with a goat. When a girl sings, she "seems either crazy or queen."

According to Hugo, the formula for the drama and literature of modern times is "everything is in antithesis." It is not for nothing that the author of The Council praises Shakespeare because “he stretches from one pole to the other”, because in his “comedy bursts into tears, laughter is born from sobs”. The principles of Hugo the novelist are the same - a contrasting mixture of styles, a combination of “the image of the grotesque and the image of the sublime”, “terrible and buffoonish, tragedy and comedy”.

The love of freedom and democracy of Victor Hugo are expressed in the image of the bell ringer Quasimodo - the lowest in the class, feudal hierarchy, outcast, moreover, ugly, ugly. And again this “lower” being turns out to be a way of evaluating the entire hierarchy of society, all the “higher ones”, because the power of love and self-sacrifice transforms Quasimodo, makes him a Man, a Hero. As the bearer of true morality, Quasimodo rises above all above the official representative of the church, Archdeacon Claude Frollo, whose soul is mutilated by religious fanaticism. The ugly appearance of Quasimodo is a grotesque technique common to the romantic Hugo, a spectacular, catchy expression of the writer's conviction that it is not the appearance that colors a person, but his soul. The paradoxical combination of a beautiful soul and an ugly appearance turns Quasimodo into romantic hero into an exceptional hero.

The appearance of Quasimodo, the bell ringer of Notre Dame Cathedral, it would seem, is embodied grotesque- No wonder he is unanimously elected pope of jesters. “A real devil! - says one of the students about him. - Look at him - a hunchback. He will go - you see that he is lame. Look at you - crooked. If you talk to him, he's deaf." However, this grotesque is not just a superlative degree of outward ugliness. The facial expression and figure of the hunchback not only frighten, but also surprise with its inconsistency. “... It is even more difficult to describe the mixture of anger, amazement and sadness that was reflected on the face of this man.” Sadness - that's what contradicts the terrible appearance; in this sadness lies the secret of great spiritual possibilities. And in the figure of Quasimodo, despite the repulsive features - a hump on the back and chest, dislocated hips - there is something sublime and heroic: "... some formidable expression of strength, agility and courage."

Even in this intimidating figure, there is a certain attraction. If Esmeralda is the embodiment of lightness and grace, then Quasimodo is the embodiment of monumentality, commanding respect for power: “there was some formidable expression of strength, agility and courage in his whole figure - an extraordinary exception to the general rule that requires that strength, like beauty , flowed from harmony ... It seemed that it was a broken and unsuccessfully soldered giant. But in an ugly body there is a sympathetic heart. With his spiritual qualities, this simple, poor man opposes both Phoebus and Claude Frollo.

The clergyman Claude, an ascetic and alchemist, personifies a cold rationalistic mind that triumphs over all human feelings, joys, affections. This mind, which takes precedence over the heart, inaccessible to pity and compassion, is an evil force for Hugo. The focus of the good beginning opposing her in the novel is Quasimodo's heart, which is in need of love. Both Quasimodo and Esmeralda, who showed compassion for him, are complete antipodes of Claude Frollo, since in their actions they are guided by the call of the heart, an unconscious desire for love and goodness. Even this elemental impulse makes them immeasurably higher than Claude Frollo, who tempted his mind with all the temptations of medieval learning. If in Claude the attraction to Esmeralda awakens only the sensual principle, leads him to crime and death, perceived as retribution for the evil he has committed, then Quasimodo's love becomes decisive for his spiritual awakening and development; the death of Quasimodo at the end of the novel, in contrast to the death of Claude, is perceived as a kind of apotheosis: it is the overcoming of the ugliness of the body and the triumph of the beauty of the spirit.

The romantic principle of reflecting life triumphed in the characters, conflicts, plot, and landscape of Notre Dame Cathedral. exceptional characters in extraordinary circumstances. Circumstances are so extreme that they take on the appearance of irresistible fate. So, Esmeralda dies as a result of the actions of many people who want only the best for her: a whole army of vagabonds attacking the Cathedral, Quasimodo, the defending Cathedral, Pierre Gringoire, leading Esmeralda outside the Cathedral, and even her own mother, detaining her daughter until the appearance of soldiers. But behind the capricious play of fate, behind its seeming randomness, one sees the regularity of the typical circumstances of that era, which doomed to death any manifestation of free thought, any attempt by a person to defend his right. Quasimodo remained not just a visual expression of the romantic aesthetics of the grotesque - the hero, tearing Esmeralda out of the predatory clutches of "justice", raising his hand to the representative of the church, became a symbol of rebellion, a harbinger of revolution.

3.3. Image of Notre Dame Cathedral

and its inextricable connection with the images of the main characters of the novel

There is a “character” in the novel that unites all the characters around him and winds almost all the main plot lines of the novel into one ball. The name of this character is placed in the title of Hugo's work - Notre Dame Cathedral.

In the third book of the novel, completely dedicated to the cathedral, the author literally sings a hymn to this wonderful creation of human genius. For Hugo, the cathedral is “like a huge stone symphony, a colossal creation of man and people ... a wonderful result of the combination of all the forces of the era, where from each stone splashes the fantasy of the worker, taking hundreds of forms, disciplined by the genius of the artist ... This creation of human hands is powerful and abundant, like creation God, from whom it seems to have borrowed a dual character: diversity and eternity ... "

The cathedral became the main scene of action, the fate of Archdeacon Claude is connected with it and Frollo, Quasimodo, Esmeralda. The stone statues of the cathedral become witnesses of human suffering, nobility and betrayal, just retribution. Telling the history of the cathedral, allowing us to imagine how they looked in the distant 15th century, the author achieves a special effect. The reality of stone structures, which can be observed in Paris to this day, confirms in the eyes of the reader the reality of the characters, their destinies, the reality of human tragedies.

The fates of all the main characters of the novel are inextricably linked with the Cathedral both by the external event outline and by the threads of internal thoughts and motives. This is especially true of the inhabitants of the temple: the archdeacon Claude Frollo and the ringer Quasimodo. In the fifth chapter of the fourth book we read: “... A strange fate befell the Cathedral of Our Lady in those days - the fate of being loved so reverently, but in completely different ways by two such dissimilar creatures as Claude and Quasimodo. One of them - like a half-man, wild, obedient only to instinct, loved the cathedral for its beauty, for harmony, for the harmony that this magnificent whole radiated. Another, endowed with an ardent imagination enriched with knowledge, loved in it its inner meaning, the meaning hidden in it, loved the legend associated with it, its symbolism lurking behind the sculptural decorations of the facade - in a word, loved the mystery that has remained for the human mind from time immemorial Cathedral of Notre Dame".

For Archdeacon Claude Frollo, the Cathedral is a place of dwelling, service and semi-scientific, semi-mystical research, a receptacle for all his passions, vices, repentance, throwing, and, in the end, death. The clergyman Claude Frollo, an ascetic and scientist-alchemist, personifies a cold rationalistic mind, triumphant over all good human feelings, joys, affections. This mind, which takes precedence over the heart, inaccessible to pity and compassion, is an evil force for Hugo. The base passions that flared up in Frollo's cold soul not only lead to the death of himself, but are the cause of the death of all the people who meant something in his life: the younger brother of the archdeacon Jean dies at the hands of Quasimodo, the pure and beautiful Esmeralda dies on the gallows, issued by Claude to the authorities, the pupil of the priest Quasimodo voluntarily puts himself to death, first tamed by him, and then, in fact, betrayed. The cathedral, being, as it were, an integral part of the life of Claude Frollo, here also acts as a full-fledged participant in the action of the novel: from its galleries, the archdeacon watches Esmeralda dancing in the square; in the cell of the cathedral, equipped by him for practicing alchemy, he spends hours and days in studies and scientific research, here he begs Esmeralda to take pity and bestow love on him. The cathedral, in the end, becomes the place of his terrible death, described by Hugo with amazing power and psychological authenticity.

In that scene, the Cathedral also seems to be an almost animated being: only two lines are devoted to how Quasimodo pushes his mentor from the balustrade, the next two pages describe Claude Frollo’s “confrontation” with the Cathedral: “The bell ringer retreated a few steps behind the back of the archdeacon and suddenly, in in a fit of rage, rushing at him, pushed him into the abyss, over which Claude leaned ... The priest fell down ... The drainpipe, over which he stood, delayed his fall. In desperation, he clung to her with both hands... An abyss yawned beneath him... In this terrible situation, the archdeacon did not utter a word, did not utter a single groan. He only writhed, making superhuman efforts to climb up the gutter to the balustrade. But his hands glided over the granite, his feet, scratching the blackened wall, searched in vain for support... The archdeacon was exhausted. Sweat rolled down his bald forehead, blood oozed from under his nails onto the stones, his knees were bruised. He heard how, with every effort he made, his cassock, caught in the gutter, cracked and tore. To complete the misfortune, the gutter ended in a lead pipe, bending according to the weight of his body ... The soil gradually left from under him, his fingers slid along the gutter, his hands weakened, his body became heavier ... He looked at the impassive statues of the tower, hanging like him over the abyss, but without fear for oneself, without regret for him. Everything around was made of stone: right in front of him were the open mouths of monsters, below him - in the depths of the square - the pavement, above his head - Quasimodo weeping.

A man with a cold soul and a stone heart in the last minutes of his life found himself alone with a cold stone - and did not wait for pity, compassion, or mercy from him, because he himself did not give anyone any compassion, pity, or mercy.

The connection with the Cathedral of Quasimodo - this ugly hunchback with the soul of an embittered child - is even more mysterious and incomprehensible. Here is what Hugo writes about this: “Over time, strong bonds tied the bell ringer with the cathedral. Forever estranged from the world by the double misfortune weighing on him - a dark origin and physical deformity, closed from childhood in this double irresistible circle, the poor fellow was accustomed to not noticing anything that lay on the other side of the sacred walls that sheltered him under his canopy. While he grew and developed, the Cathedral of Our Lady served for him either as an egg, or a nest, or a house, or a homeland, or, finally, a universe.

There was undoubtedly some mysterious, predetermined harmony between this being and the building. When, still quite a baby, Quasimodo, with painful efforts, skipped through the gloomy vaults, he, with his human head and bestial body, seemed to be a reptile, naturally arising among the damp and gloomy slabs...

So, developing under the shadow of the cathedral, living and sleeping in it, almost never leaving it and constantly experiencing its mysterious influence, Quasimodo eventually became like him; he seemed to have grown into the building, turned into one of its constituent parts ... It can almost be said without exaggeration that he took the form of a cathedral, just as snails take the form of a shell. It was his dwelling, his lair, his shell. Between him and the ancient temple there was a deep instinctive affection, a physical affinity...”

Reading the novel, we see that for Quasimodo the cathedral was everything - a refuge, a home, a friend, it protected him from the cold, from human malice and cruelty, he satisfied the need of a freak outcast by people in communication: “Only with extreme reluctance did he turn his gaze to of people. The cathedral was quite enough for him, populated with marble statues of kings, saints, bishops, who at least did not laugh in his face and looked at him with a calm and benevolent look. The statues of monsters and demons also did not hate him - he was too similar to them ... The saints were his friends and guarded him; the monsters were also his friends and guarded him. He poured out his soul before them for a long time. Squatting in front of a statue, he talked to her for hours. If at this time someone entered the temple, Quasimodo ran away, like a lover caught serenade.

Only a new, stronger, hitherto unfamiliar feeling could shake this inseparable, incredible connection between a person and a building. This happened when a miracle entered the life of the outcast, embodied in an innocent and beautiful image. The name of the miracle is Esmeralda. Hugo endows this heroine with all the best features inherent in the representatives of the people: beauty, tenderness, kindness, mercy, innocence and naivety, incorruptibility and fidelity. Alas, in a cruel time, among cruel people, all these qualities were rather shortcomings than virtues: kindness, naivety and innocence do not help to survive in a world of malice and self-interest. Esmeralda died, slandered by Claude, who loved her, betrayed by her beloved, Phoebus, not saved by Quasimodo, who worshiped and idolized her.

Quasimodo, who managed, as it were, to turn the Cathedral into the “murderer” of the archdeacon, earlier with the help of the same cathedral - his integral “part” - tries to save the gypsy, stealing her from the place of execution and using the cell of the Cathedral as a refuge, i.e., a place where where criminals pursued by law and power were inaccessible to their persecutors, behind the sacred walls of the asylum, the condemned were inviolable. However, the evil will of the people turned out to be stronger, and the stones of the Cathedral of Our Lady did not save the life of Esmeralda.

3.4. Romantic historicism

In French romantic literature, Notre Dame Cathedral was an outstanding work of the historical genre. By the power of creative imagination, Hugo sought to recreate the truth of history, which would be an instructive instruction for the present.

Victor Hugo managed not only to give color to the era, but also to expose the social contradictions of that time. In the novel, a huge mass of disenfranchised people opposes the dominant handful of nobility, clergy and royal officials. Characteristic is the scene in which Louis XI stingily calculates the cost of building a prison cell, ignoring the plea of a prisoner languishing in it.

It is not for nothing that the image of the cathedral occupies a central place in the novel. The Christian Church played an important role in the system of serfdom. One of the main characters - the archdeacon of the cathedral Claude Frollo - embodies the gloomy ideology of the churchmen. A severe fanatic, he devoted himself to the study of science, but medieval sciences were closely associated with mysticism and superstition. A man of extraordinary intelligence, Frollo soon felt the impotence of this wisdom. But religious prejudices did not allow him to go beyond it. He experienced "the horror and amazement of the altar server" before printing, as well as before any other innovation. He artificially suppressed human desires in himself, but could not resist the temptation that the gypsy girl aroused in him. The fanatical monk became violent, cynical and rude in his passion, revealing to the end his baseness and hardness of heart.

The novel was permeated with a new anti-clerical trend for Hugo. The gloomy image of the Cathedral appears in the novel as a symbol of Catholicism, which has suppressed man for centuries. The cathedral is a symbol of the enslavement of the people, a symbol of feudal oppression, dark superstitions and prejudices that hold the souls of people captive. Not without reason, in the darkness of the cathedral, under its arches, merging with bizarre marble chimeras, deafened by the rumble of bells, Quasimodo lives alone, the “soul of the cathedral”, whose grotesque image personifies the Middle Ages. In contrast, the charming image of Esmeralda embodies the joy and beauty of earthly life, the harmony of body and soul, that is, the ideals of the Renaissance, which replaced the Middle Ages. The breaking of epochs passes through destinies, through the hearts of the heroes in the “Cathedral”.

It is no coincidence that Esmeralda is compared with the Mother of God throughout the entire novel. Light emanates from her, giving her features “the perfect tenderness, which Raphael later caught in the mystical fusion of virginity, motherhood and divinity.” So the author metaphorically suggests: the deity of the new time is freedom, in the image of Esmeralda - the promise of future freedom.

The image of the awakening people is embodied in Quasimodo. The scene in which Esmeralda gives a drink to Quasimodo, who is suffering at the pillory, is full of secret meaning: this people languishing in slavery receives a life-giving sip of freedom. If, before meeting Esmeralda, the hunchback was, as it were, one of the stone monsters of the cathedral, not quite a man (in accordance with the Latin name given to him - Quasimodo, “almost”, “as if”), then, having fallen in love with her, he becomes almost superhuman. The fate of Quasimodo is a guarantee that the people will also become the creator of history, the People with a capital letter.

What is destroying Esmeralda and Quasimodo? Their rock is the Middle Ages. An aging, obsolete era, feeling the approach of its end, the more fiercely pursues a new life. The Middle Ages takes revenge on Esmeralda for being free, and on Quasimodo for freeing himself from the power of the stone. The laws, prejudices, habits of the Middle Ages are killing them.

In the understanding of the author of the novel, the people are not just a dark ignorant mass, a passive victim of the oppressors: they are full of creative forces and the will to fight, the future belongs to them. Although he did not paint a broad picture of the popular movement in 15th-century France, he saw in the common people that irresistible force which, in continuous uprisings, showed indomitable energy, achieving the desired victory.

While he has not yet woken up, still crushed by feudal oppression, "his hour has not yet struck." But the storming of the cathedral by the Parisian people, so vividly depicted in the novel, is only a prelude to the storming of the Bastille in 1789 (it is no coincidence that King Louis XI lives in this castle), to a revolution that will crush feudalism. This “hour of the people” is unambiguously predicted to the king by the envoy of free Flanders, “the Ghent stocker Koppenol, beloved by the people”:

“When the sounds of the tocsin rush from this tower, when the cannons rumble, when the tower collapses with an infernal roar, when the soldiers and townspeople rush at each other with a growl in mortal combat, then this hour will strike.”

For all the diversity and picturesqueness of the pictures of folk life in Notre Dame Cathedral, Hugo did not idealize the Middle Ages, as many writers of romanticism did, he truthfully showed the dark sides of the feudal past. At the same time, his book is deeply poetic, full of ardent patriotic love for France, its history, its art, in which, according to the writer, the freedom-loving spirit of the French people lives.

3.5. Conflict and problems of the novel

In any historical epoch, through all its various contradictions, Hugo distinguishes between the struggle of two main moral principles. His characters—both in Notre Dame and still more in later novels—are not only vivid, lively characters, socially and historically colored; their images grow into romantic symbols, become carriers of social categories, abstract concepts, and ultimately the ideas of Good and Evil.

In the “Notre Dame Cathedral”, built entirely on spectacular “antitheses”, reflecting the conflicts of the transitional era, the main antithesis is the world of good and the world of evil. "Evil" in the novel is concretized - it is the feudal order and Catholicism. The world of the oppressed and the world of the oppressors: on the one hand, the royal castle of the Bastille, the haven of the bloody and insidious tyrant, the noble house of Gondelorier, the abode of “elegant and inhuman” ladies and gentlemen, on the other, the Parisian squares and slums of the “Court of Miracles”; where the underprivileged live. The dramatic conflict is built not on the struggle between royalty and feudal lords, but on the relationship between folk heroes and their oppressors.

The royal power and its support, the Catholic Church, are shown in the novel as a force hostile to the people. This determines the image of the prudently cruel King Louis XI and the image of the gloomy fanatic Archdeacon Claude Frollo.

Outwardly brilliant, but in fact empty and heartless, the society of the nobility is embodied in the image of Captain Phoebus de Chateauper, an insignificant veil and rude martinet, who can only seem like a knight and hero to Esmeralda's loving gaze; like the archdeacon, Phoebus is incapable of selfless and selfless feeling.

The fate of Quasimodo is exceptional in terms of the heap of terrible and cruel, but it (terrible and cruel) is due to the era and position of Quasimodo. Claude Frollo is the embodiment of the Middle Ages with its gloomy fanaticism and asceticism, but his atrocities are generated by that distortion of human nature, for which the religious obscurantism of medieval Catholicism is responsible. Esmeralda is the poetized “soul of the people”, her image is almost symbolic, but the personal tragic fate of a street dancer is the fate of any real girl from the people, possible under these conditions.

Spiritual greatness and high humanity are inherent only to outcast people from the lower classes of society, it is they who are the true heroes of the novel. The street dancer Esmeralda symbolizes the moral beauty of the people, the deaf and ugly ringer Quasimodo symbolizes the ugliness of the social fate of the oppressed.

Criticism has repeatedly noted that both characters, Esmeralda and Quasimodo, are persecuted, disenfranchised victims of an unfair trial, cruel laws in the novel: Esmeralda is tortured, sentenced to death, Quasimodo is easily sent to the pillory. In society, he is an outcast, an outcast. But having barely outlined the motive for the social assessment of reality (as, by the way, in the depiction of the king and the people), the romantic Hugo focuses his attention on something else. He is interested in the clash of moral principles, the eternal polar forces: good and evil, selflessness and selfishness, beautiful and ugly.

Expressing sympathy for the "suffering and destitute", Hugo was full of deep faith in the progress of mankind, in the final victory of good over evil, in the triumph of the humanistic principle, which will overcome world evil and establish harmony and justice in the world.

ROMANTIC PRINCIPLES IN V. HUGO'S NOVEL

"Cathedral of Notre Dame of Paris"

INTRODUCTION

Victor Hugo's novel Notre Dame de Paris remains a true example of the first period in the development of romanticism, a textbook example of it.

In his work, Victor Hugo created unique romantic images: Esmeralda is the embodiment of humanity and spiritual beauty, Quasimodo, in whose ugly body a sympathetic heart is found.

Unlike the heroes of literature of the 17th-18th centuries, Hugo's heroes combine contradictory qualities. Making extensive use of the romantic technique of contrasting images, sometimes deliberately exaggerating, turning to the grotesque, the writer creates complex ambiguous characters. He is attracted by gigantic passions, heroic deeds. He extols the strength of his character as a hero, rebellious, rebellious spirit, ability to deal with circumstances. In the characters, conflicts, plot, landscape of Notre Dame Cathedral, the romantic principle of reflecting life, exceptional characters in extraordinary circumstances, triumphed. The world of unbridled passions, romantic characters, surprises and accidents, the image of a brave person who does not shy away from any dangers, this is what Hugo sings in these works.

Hugo claims that there is a constant struggle between good and evil in the world. In the novel, even more clearly than in Hugo's poetry, the search for new moral values was outlined, which the writer finds, as a rule, not in the camp of the rich and those in power, but in the camp of the destitute and despised poor. All the best feelings, kindness, sincerity, selfless devotion are given to the foundling Quasimodo and the gypsy Esmeralda, who are the true heroes of the novel, while the antipodes, standing at the helm of secular or spiritual power, like King Louis XI or the same archdeacon Frollo, are distinguished by cruelty, savagery indifference to human suffering.

It is significant that it was precisely this moral idea of Hugo's first novel that F. M. Dostoevsky highly appreciated. Offering Notre Dame Cathedral for translation into Russian, he wrote in a preface published in 1862 in the journal Vremya that the idea of this work is “the restoration of a dead person crushed by unjust oppression of circumstances ... This idea is the justification of the humiliated and all outcast pariahs of society. “Who does not come to mind,” Dostoevsky wrote further, that Quasimodo is the personification of the oppressed and despised medieval people ... in which love and a thirst for justice finally wake up, and with them the consciousness of their truth and their still untouched infinite forces.

Chapter 1.

ROMANTICISM AS A LITERARY TREND

1.1 Cause

Romanticism as an ideological and artistic trend in culture appeared at the end of the 18th century. Then the French word romantique meant "strange", "fantastic", "picturesque".

In the 19th century, the word "Romanticism" becomes a term for a new literary movement, the opposite of Classicism.

The event that served as an impetus for realizing the inconsistency of the ideas of the 18th century and for changing the worldview of people in general was the Great French Bourgeois Revolution of 1789. Instead of the expected result of "Freedom, Equality and Fraternity", it brought only hunger and devastation, and with them disappointment in the ideas of the enlighteners. Disappointment in the revolution as a way to change social life caused a sharp reorientation of social psychology itself, a turn of interest from the external life of a person and his activities in society to the problems of the spiritual, emotional life of the individual.

In this atmosphere of doubt, changes in views, assessments, judgments, surprises, at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, a new phenomenon of spiritual life, romanticism, arose.

1.2. Main distinguishing features

Romantics were sure that “here and now” is an ideal, i.e. a more meaningful, rich, fulfilling life is impossible, but they did not doubt its existence, this so-called romantic duality. It was the search for the ideal, the pursuit of it, the thirst for renewal and perfection that filled their lives with meaning.

Chapter 2

VICTOR HUGO AND HIS WORK

Romantic principles of Victor Hugo

The main principle of his romantic poeticsdepicting life in its contrasts Hugo tried to substantiate even before the "Preface" in his article on the novel

As in dramas, Hugo turns to history in Notre Dame; late French Middle Ages, Paris at the end of the 15th century. Romantic interest in the Middle Ages largely arose as a reaction to the classicist focus on antiquity. The desire to overcome the neglect of the Middle Ages, which spread thanks to the writers of the Enlightenment of the 18th century, for whom this time was a kingdom of darkness and ignorance, played a role here, useless in the history of the progressive development of mankind. Here one could meet, romantics believed, with solid, great characters, strong passions, exploits and martyrdom in the name of convictions. All this was still perceived in an aura of some mystery associated with the insufficient study of the Middle Ages, which was replenished by an appeal to folk traditions and legends, which had special significance for romantic writers. The Middle Ages appears in Hugo's novel in the form of a legend-history against the backdrop of a masterfully recreated historical flavor.

The novel is built according to the dramatic principle y: three men seek the love of one woman; the gypsy Esmeralda is loved by the archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral, Claude Frollo, the bell ringer of the cathedral, the hunchback Quasimodo, and the poet Pierre Gringoire, although the main rivalry arises between Frollo and Quasimodo. At the same time, the gypsy gives her feelings to the handsome but empty nobleman Phoebe de Chateauper.

Hugo's novel-drama can be divided into five acts. In the first act, Quasimodo and Esmeralda, not yet seeing each other, appear on the same stage. This scene is the Place de Greve. Here Esmeralda dances and sings, here a procession passes, with comic solemnity carrying the pope of jesters Quasimodo on a stretcher. The general merriment is confused by the grim menace of the bald man: “Blasphemy! Blasphemy!” Esmeralda's bewitching voice is interrupted by the terrible cry of the recluse of Roland's tower: “Will you get out of here, Egyptian locust?” The game of antitheses closes on Esmeralda, all plot threads are drawn to her. And it is no coincidence that the festive bonfire, illuminating her beautiful face, illuminates the gallows at the same time. This is not just a spectacular contrast - this is the plot of a tragedy. The action of the tragedy, which began with the dance of Esmeralda on the Greve Square, will end here - with her execution.

Every word uttered on this stage is full of tragic irony. In the first act, voices are of particular importance, and in the second - gestures, then in the third - looks. The point of intersection of views becomes the dancing Esmeralda. The poet Gringoire, who is next to her in the square, looks at the girl with sympathy: she recently saved his life. The captain of the royal shooters, Phoebe de Chateauper, with whom Esmeralda fell in love at the first meeting, looks at her from the balcony of a Gothic house - this is a look of voluptuousness. At the same time, from above, from the north tower of the cathedral, Claude Frollo looks at the gypsy - this is a look of gloomy, despotic passion. And even higher, on the bell tower of the cathedral, Quasimodo froze, looking at the girl with great love.

Romantic pathos appeared in Hugo already in the very organization of the plot. The history of the gypsy Esmeralda, the archdeacon of Notre Dame Cathedral Claude Frollo, the ringer Quasimodo, the captain of the royal shooters Phoebus de Chateauper and other characters associated with them is full of secrets, unexpected turns of action, fatal coincidences and accidents. The fates of the characters are bizarrely crossed. Quasimodo tries to steal Esmeralda on the orders of Claude Frollo, but the girl is accidentally rescued by a guard led by Phoebus. For the attempt on Esmeralda Quasimodo is punished. But it is she who gives the unfortunate hunchback a sip of water when he stands at the pillory, and with her good deed transforms him.

There is a purely romantic, instant breakdown of character: Quasimodo turns from a rude animal into a man and, having fallen in love with Esmeralda, objectively finds himself in a confrontation with Frollo, who plays a fatal role in the girl's life.

“Notre Dame Cathedral” is a romantic work in style and method. In it you can find everything that was characteristic of Hugo's dramaturgy. It contains both exaggerations and a game of contrasts, and poetization of the grotesque, and an abundance of exceptional situations in the plot. The essence of the image is revealed in Hugo not so much on the basis of character development, but in opposition to another image.

The system of images in the novel is based on the theory of the grotesque developed by Hugo and the principle of contrast. The characters line up in clearly marked contrasting pairs: the freak Quasimodo and the beautiful Esmeralda, also Quasimodo and the outwardly irresistible Phoebus; an ignorant ringer - a learned monk who knew all the medieval sciences; Claude Frollo also opposes Phoebus: one is an ascetic, the other is immersed in the pursuit of entertainment and pleasure. The gypsy Esmeralda is opposed by the blond Fleur-de-Lys, the bride of Phoebe, a rich, educated girl and belonging to the high society. The relationship between Esmeralda and Phoebus is also based on the contrast: the depth of love, tenderness and subtlety of feeling in Esmeralda - and the insignificance, vulgarity of the foppish nobleman Phoebus.

The internal logic of Hugo's romantic art leads to the fact that the relationship between sharply contrasting characters acquires an exceptional, exaggerated character. Thus, the novel is built as a system of polar oppositions. These contrasts are not just an artistic device for the author, but a reflection of his ideological positions, the concept of life.

It is not for nothing that the image of the cathedral occupies a central place in the novel. The Christian Church played an important role in the system of serfdom.

Romanticism in foreign literature
V. Hugo (1802-1885)
"Notre Dame Cathedral" (1831)

"A tribune and a poet, he thundered over the world like a hurricane, rousing in life everything that is beautiful in the human soul."

M. Gorky

In 1952, by decision of the World Peace Council, all progressive mankind celebrated the 150th anniversary of the birth of the great French poet, writer and playwright, public figure V. Hugo. The wounds of World War II were still bleeding. In the heart of Paris stood the pedestal of the monument to Hugo, broken by the Nazis - the bronze statue of the writer was destroyed by the Nazis - but the voice of Hugo, which did not stop during the years of the occupation of France, called with a new layer of compatriots, all people of good will to fight for peace, for the destruction of wars of conquest.
“We want peace, we want it passionately. But what kind of world do we want? Peace at any cost? Not! We do not want a world in which the hunched would not dare to raise their foreheads, our goal is freedom! Freedom will bring peace." Hugo will say these words in 1869, speaking in Lausanne at the "Congress of Friends of the World", of which he will be elected chairman. to the struggle for the liberation of the oppressed, he will devote his whole life, his work.
Hugo was born in 1802 in Besançon. His father, Joseph Hugo, the son of a craftsman, the grandson and great-grandson of the cultivators, at the age of fifteen, together with his brothers, left to fight for the revolution. He participated in the suppression of the rebellion in Wanda, was wounded many times. Under Napoleon he became a brigadier general. Until the end of his days, he was mistaken in assessing Napoleon, considering him the defender of the revolution.
Hugo's mother was from the Vendée, hated Napoleon, idolized the Bourbon monarchy. Only in his youth did Victor free himself from the influence of his mother, with whom he lived after his parents separated. When his mother died, - Victor - he was 19 years old - like Marius from Les Misérables, he settles in an attic, lives in poverty, but writes poetry, his first novels, tries to understand the true alignment of forces in the country, draws closer to the Republicans.
Hugo was a participant in the revolution of 1848. From the rostrum of the Constituent Assembly, he delivered a fiery speech in defense of the republic. December 2, 1851, having learned about the coup d'état committed by the big bourgeoisie, who decided to restore the monarchy again, now led by Emperor Louis - Napoleon III. Hugo, along with his comrades, organized a resistance committee. He called for a fight, issued proclamations, led the construction of barricades, every minute risking being captured and shot ... A reward of 25 thousand francs was appointed for Hugo's head. His sons were in prison. But only when the defeat of the Republicans became obvious, Hugo, under a false name, crossed the French border. The 19-year period of exile of the great poet and writer began. But even in exile, he continued to fight. V. Hugo's pamphlet "Napoleon the Small" and the cycle of poems "Retribution" thundered throughout Europe and for all time nailed Louis-Napoleon III to the pillory.
Living on the rocky island of Guernsey, located in the English Channel, Hugo is at the center of all significant events. He corresponded with Kossuth and Giuseppe Mazzini, organized fundraising for the armament of Garibaldi's detachments, Herzen invited him to collaborate in the Bell. In 1859, the writer delivers an open letter to the US government, protesting against the death penalty of John Brown ...
E. Zola wrote later that for his 20-year-old peers, Hugo seemed to be "a supernatural being, chained with an ear, who continued to sing his songs in the midst of storm and bad weather." V. Hugo was the head of the French romantics. He was considered their ideological leader not only by writers, but also by artists, musicians, and theater workers.
In the 1920s, in those distant times when romanticism was affirmed in art, in Hugo's small modest apartment in Paris on Rue Notre Dame de Champs, young people gathered on certain days, many of whom were destined to become outstanding figures of world culture. Alfred de Musset, Prosper Merimee, A. Dumas, E. Delacroix, G. Berlioz have been here. After the revolutionary events of the 1930s, one could see A. Mickiewicz and G. Heine at Hugo's meetings. Members of the Hugo circle rebelled against the reaction of the nobility, which during the period of restoration and popular uprisings established itself in many countries of Europe, and at the same time challenged the spirit of money-grubbing, the cult of money, which was spreading more and more in France and finally won under the king-banker Louis Philippe.
On the eve of the revolution of 1830, Hugo began writing the novel Notre Dame Cathedral. This book became the artistic manifesto of the Romantics.
__________________________ _______________
After a short pause, music begins to sound in the classroom - the beginning of Beethoven's 5th symphony. In the mighty sound of the entire orchestra, a short, clearly rhythmic motive will sound - the motive of fate. It will repeat itself twice. The theme of the main party grows out of it, the theme of the struggle, impetuous, dramatically intense. It is opposed by another theme - a broad, naive, but also energetic and courageous, full of confidence in its strength.
When the music subsides, the teacher reads the beginning of the first part of the first chapter of Hugo's Notre Dame Cathedral: Three hundred and forty-eight years, 6 months and 19 days ago, the Parisians woke up to the sound of all the bells ... It was not easy to get into that day in a large hall, considered in at that time the largest room in the world ... ".
Let's try to do it and get into it together with the heroes of the novel.
And now “we are stunned and blinded. Above our heads is a double lancet vault, finished with wooden carvings, painted with golden lilies on an azure field; under our feet is a floor paved with white and black marble slabs.
The palace shone with all its splendor. To consider it in detail, however, we fail: the crowd, which keeps coming, interferes. We are drawn into the whirlpool of its movement, we are squeezed, squeezed, we are suffocating, curses and lamentations are heard from all sides against the Flemings ... Cardinal of Bourgon, the chief judge ..., guards with whips, cold, heat ... "
(“Notre Dame Cathedral”, book 1 ch. 1, pp. 3-7)
And all this is to the unspeakable amusement of schoolchildren and servants, who incite the crowd with their jokes, mockery, and sometimes even blasphemy.
So, slowly, begins the story of V. Hugo. Time passes slowly, the wait is still long, because the mystery begins only at noon and the writer here, in the Palace of Justice, will introduce us to many characters who will play their role in the novel.
Now the Palace is festive, filled to overflowing with people, but very little time will pass, and a wrong court will be repaired here, beautiful young Esmeralda will be tortured, accused of witchcraft and murder and sentenced to the gallows. All this will come later...
And now we hear the roar of the crowd. He sometimes falls silent when the eyes of all turn now to the handsome cardinal in the box in a magnificent purple robe, then to the king of the beggars in picturesque tatters, Ito to the Flemish ambassadors, especially to that broad-shouldered one whose leather jacket and felt hat unusually stands out among the silk surrounding him and velvet. But the roar of the crowd becomes formidable when it forces the actors to begin the mystery without waiting for the arrival of the late cardinal, or explodes with brief approval of the arrogant antics of the Flemish ambassador, the hosiery Jacques Coppenol, who rebuffed the cardinal and declared in a thunderous voice that he was not some kind of secretary council of foremen, as the cardinal presented him, but a simple hosiery. “No more, no less than a hosiery! Why is it bad?
In response, there was an explosion of laughter and applause: after all, Koppenol was a commoner, like those who greeted him ...
But attention! We are waiting for a meeting with the main characters. Let's name them. Thus begins the conversation about the novel. Quasimodo, Esmeralda, Claude Frollo and Phoebe de Chateauper.
When Quasimodo first appeared during the competition of freaks claiming to be the pope of jesters, his appearance shocked everyone: “It is difficult to describe this four-sided nose ... and despite this ugliness, there was some formidable expression of strength, agility and courage in his whole figure!”
We will also hear the name of Esmeralda for the first time in the Palace of Justice. One of the young mischievous people, perched on the windowsill, suddenly shouted: Esmeralda! This name had a magical effect. Everyone who remained in the hall of the palace rushed to the windows in order to see better, climbed the walls, poured out into the street. Esmeralda was dancing in the square by the big fire. "She was small in stature ... she truly seemed to be a perfect being." The eyes of the entire crowd were riveted to her, all mouths gaped. But "among the thousands of faces, an extraordinary youthful ardor, a thirst for life and an undertaking passion sparkled." So we met with another main character of the novel - Archdeacon Kolod Frollo.
Captain Phoebe de Chateaupe first appears at the moment when Esmeralda will cry for help, fighting off two men who tried to cover her mouth. This will happen late at night on one of the dark streets of Paris, along which the young dancer will return home. One of the people who attacked her was Quasimodo.
And suddenly a rider appears from around the corner of the house, it was Captain Phoebus de Chateauper, armed from head to toe, the head of the royal shooters.
Hugo does not give us a portrait of the captain - here it was impossible, the action unfolds rapidly.
But Hugo will still choose the time and try to give us a portrait of Phoebus. He will talk about him in the scene at Fleur de Lis, the captain's bride. The society will be stiff, boring, and the writer will give us his impressions of the bored groom: “He was a young man, ... and success was easy. However, - notes Hugo, - he combined all this with huge claims to elegance, panache and good looks. Let the reader figure it out for himself. I'm just a historian."
So Phoebus rode in time: Quasimodo and Claude Frollo almost kidnapped Esmeralda. This scene is one of the most important in the composition of the novel. Here for the first time four of our heroes meet, here their destinies are connected, their paths cross.
Phoebe de Chateaupe. What role will he play in the novel?
Esmeralda, freed by Phoebus, will love him. And handsome Phoebus? He was not able to not only love, but also protect the girl at a critical moment. “There are hearts in which love does not grow,” says Quasimodo Hugo. Phoebus sold Esmeralda. But was there a person among the heroes who could love Esmeralda as deeply and selflessly as she knew how to love. Students will name Quasimodo and tell about his selfless love, about how Quasimodo saved Esmeralda from inevitable death, hid her in the Cathedral, how he gently nursed the exhausted girl.
And guessing that Esmeralda loves Phoebe, despite the fact that he himself passionately loves her, he selflessly stood all day at the door of the Fleur de Lis mansion to bring Phoebe to Esmeralda and thereby make her happy, and they will tell about the death of Quasimodo.
The essence of a person is tested by his deeds and his attitude towards other people. But most of all, the spiritual value of a person is manifested in his ability to selflessly and selflessly love.
Love, the ability to love, is a precious gift that not all people possess. Only the generous of heart are worthy of this gift. True love that visited this person makes him beautiful.
And so V. Hugo's novel ends. The last two chapters are titled: Bra Phoebe and The Marriage of Quasimodo. In the chapter specially dedicated to Phoebus, there is only one line about him: “Phoebe de Chateauper also ended tragically: he got married.” In the chapter dedicated to Quasimodo, the writer said that after the execution of Esmeralda, Quasimodo disappeared. It's been about 1.5 or 2 years. Once in the crypt of Montfaucon, a terrible place where the corpses of the executed were dumped, without giving them to the ground, people appeared. And here is Monfaucone ... among the corpses ... he crumbled to dust. (Book XI, ch. IV, p. 413)
This concludes our first journey with the characters through the pages of Hugo's novel. But before we leave, let's get back to the music, to the sounds of which we started our journey. Did you recognize the author? Can you name the work? And most importantly, think about why exactly this music was taken as an epigraph to our meeting with Hugo's novel. The introduction from Beethoven's Fifth Symphony sounds again.

Lesson 2

VICTOR HUGO
"Cathedral of Notre Dame of Paris"
“Here time is the architect and the people are the bricklayer”
V.Hugo

The second lesson is preceded by that epigraph. When the music stops, the teacher (or student) reads an excerpt from the chapter "Paris from a bird's eye view"
“Paris of the 15th century was a city - a giant ... .. - this is his breath; and now the people are singing
Surprisingly picturesque from the pages of the book presents us with a visible and sounding image of medieval Paris. We admired its dazzling beauty from a bird's eye view. But down there, on its streets and squares, in the terrible dungeon of the prison, and in the royal cell in one of the towers of the Bastille, events were unfolding that steadily led to a tragic denouement.
In the last lesson, traveling with the main characters through the pages of the book, we traced the fate of some of them.
Have we named all the heroes?
The protagonist of the work is the people who act in the novel as an active force and, according to Hugo, ultimately determine the course of history.
etc.................

The novel "Notre Dame Cathedral", created on the verge of sentimentalism and romanticism, combines the features of a historical epic, a romantic drama and a deeply psychological novel.

History of the creation of the novel

"Notre Dame Cathedral" is the first historical novel in French (the action, according to the author's intention, takes place about 400 years ago, at the end of the 15th century). Victor Hugo began nurturing his idea as early as the 1820s, and published it in March 1831. The prerequisites for the creation of the novel were the rising interest in historical literature and in particular in the Middle Ages.

In the literature of France of that time, romanticism began to take shape, and with it romantic tendencies in cultural life in general. So, Victor Hugo personally defended the need to preserve ancient architectural monuments, which many wanted to either demolish or rebuild.

There is an opinion that it was after the novel "Notre Dame Cathedral" that the supporters of the demolition of the cathedral retreated, and an incredible interest in cultural monuments and a wave of civic consciousness arose in society in the desire to protect ancient architecture.

Characteristics of the main characters

It is this reaction of society to the book that gives the right to say that the cathedral is the true protagonist of the novel, along with people. This is the main place of events, a silent witness to dramas, love, life and death of the main characters; a place that, against the backdrop of the transience of human lives, remains just as motionless and unshakable.

The main characters in human form are the gypsy Esmeralda, the hunchback Quasimodo, the priest Claude Frollo, the military Phoebe de Chateauper, the poet Pierre Gringoire.

Esmeralda unites the rest of the main characters around her: all of the listed men are in love with her, but some are selflessly, like Quasimodo, others are furious, like Frollo, Phoebus and Gringoire, experiencing carnal attraction; the gypsy herself loves Phoebe. In addition, all the characters are connected by the Cathedral: Frollo serves here, Quasimodo works as a bell ringer, Gringoire becomes a priest's apprentice. Esmeralda usually performs in front of the Cathedral Square, and Phoebus looks out the windows of his future wife, Fleur-de-Lys, who lives near the Cathedral.

Esmeralda is a serene child of the streets, unaware of her attractiveness. She dances and performs in front of the Cathedral with her goat, and everyone around from the priest to street thieves give her their hearts, revering her like a deity. With the same childish spontaneity with which a child reaches for shiny objects, Esmeralda gives her preference to Phoebus, a noble, brilliant chevalier.

The external beauty of Phoebus (coincides with the name of Apollo) is the only positive feature of an internally ugly military man. A deceitful and dirty seducer, a coward, a lover of booze and foul language, only in front of the weak is he a hero, only in front of the ladies is he a cavalier.

Pierre Gringoire, a local poet forced by circumstances to plunge into the thick of French street life, is a bit like Phoebus in that his feelings for Esmeralda are a physical attraction. True, he is not capable of meanness, and loves both a friend and a person in a gypsy, setting aside her feminine charm.

The most sincere love for Esmeralda is nourished by the most terrible creature - Quasimodo, the bell ringer in the Cathedral, who was once picked up by the archdeacon of the temple, Claude Frollo. For Esmeralda, Quasimodo is ready for anything, even to love her quietly and secretly from everyone, even to give the girl to an opponent.

Claude Frollo has the most complex feelings for the gypsy. Love for a gypsy is a special tragedy for him, because it is a forbidden passion for him as a clergyman. Passion does not find a way out, so he either appeals to her love, then repels, then pounces on her, then saves her from death, and finally, he himself hands the gypsy to the executioner. The tragedy of Frollo is caused not only by the collapse of his love. He turns out to be a representative of the passing time and feels that he is becoming obsolete along with the era: a person receives more and more knowledge, moves away from religion, builds a new one, destroys the old. Frollo holds the first printed book in his hands and understands how he disappears without a trace into the centuries along with handwritten folios.

Plot, composition, problematics of the work

The novel is set in the 1480s. All the actions of the novel take place around the Cathedral - in the "City", on the Cathedral and Greve squares, in the "Court of Miracles".

In front of the Cathedral they give a religious performance (the author of the mystery is Gringoire), but the crowd prefers to watch Esmeralda dance in the Place Greve. Looking at the gypsy, Gringoire, Quasimodo, and Father Frollo fall in love with her at the same time. Phoebus meets Esmeralda when she is invited to entertain a company of girls, including Phoebus' fiancee, Fleur de Lis. Phoebus makes an appointment with Esmeralda, but the priest also comes to the appointment. Out of jealousy, the priest wounds Phoebus, and Esmeralda is blamed for this. Under torture, the girl confesses to witchcraft, prostitution and the murder of Phoebus (who actually survived) and is sentenced to be hanged. Claude Frollo comes to her in prison and persuades her to run away with him. On the day of the execution, Phoebus watches the execution of the sentence along with his bride. But Quasimodo does not allow the execution to take place - he grabs the gypsy and runs to hide in the Cathedral.

The entire "Court of Miracles" - a haven of thieves and beggars - rushes to "liberate" their beloved Esmeralda. The king found out about the rebellion and ordered the gypsy to be executed at all costs. As she is being executed, Claude laughs a devilish laugh. Seeing this, the hunchback rushes at the priest, and he breaks, falling from the tower.

Compositionally, the novel is looped: at first, the reader sees the word "rock" inscribed on the wall of the Cathedral, and plunges into the past for 400 years, at the end, he sees two skeletons in a crypt outside the city, which are intertwined in an embrace. These are the heroes of the novel - a hunchback and a gypsy. Time has erased their history to dust, and the Cathedral still stands as an indifferent observer of human passions.

The novel depicts both private human passions (the problem of purity and meanness, mercy and cruelty) and people's (wealth and poverty, isolation of power from the people). For the first time in European literature, the personal drama of the characters develops against the backdrop of detailed historical events, and private life and historical background are so interpenetrating.

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