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The "Desert of Love" in Les Miserables
One of the poignant and recurrent themes in Hugo's book Les Miserables was called by one man the "desert of love." Love is seen throughout almost every chapter of Les Miserables. Whether it be between two people who are living or two people separated by death.
In the case of Cossette and Jean Valjean, they have the love of lovers, but in a completely pure way. Jean Valjean loves Cossette with all the love that he has and is truly happy up until his death. In first receiving Cossette, Valjean had never really experenced love. At night..."He would approach the bed where she slept, and would tremble there with delight; He felt inward yearnings,
like a mother, and knew not what they were. For it is something very incomprehensible and very
sweet, this grand and strange emotion of a heart in its first love." pg 161 lP3. He loved Cosette with a "desert of love, "unconditional that never stopped". When Jean Valjean found out about Cosette's love affair with Marius, he hated him. Yet because of the love he had for Cosette he
spared Marius his life and brought him to her. In the end when Jean Valjean doesn"t get to see Cosette he literally wastes away of sadness, but then gets the chance that her mother Faintine did not, to see her before his death.
Fantine shows her "desert of love" toward her daughter through her whole self-being. Because she knew that she would not yet be able to give her a proper life, she gave Cosette to the Thenardies to look after. She did not know that Cosette would be treated as a slave. When the
Thenardies kept asking for more money and Fantine cannot find it she sells herself in prositution. Not only is she involved in prostitution, she sells her beautiful hair and her prized (non-decayed teeth) her prettiest feature. Though Fantine is sick she developes a special friendship with Jean Valjean and asks on her deathbed to see her daughter one last time. When she realizes her Cosette
is not there she dies. After she died Valjean addressed her in a whisper. Most think he said he would take care of Cosette. "One thing is beyond doubt: the sister, the only witness of what passed, has often related that, at the moment when Jean Valjean whispered in the ear of Fantine,
she distinctly saw an ineffable smile beam on those pale lips and in those dim eyes full of the wonder of the tomb."pg 116
A final display of love is that of Marius and Cosette. It is similar to the love of Cosette and Jean Valjean, devoted and true, yet she loves him with a different part of her whole being. Their secret love affair at night is pure and sweet and draws the reader into their romance. They sat at night just holding each other, waiting for the day they would become one. "These two souls which held love as two clouds hold [next page]