Lying in bed this morning I suddenly realized that I had yet to include a novel in my list of book summaaries. Before getting up I asked myself, what is one of my favorites stories of all time. Without a doubt Les Miserables would be on the short list.

I would have read this book in the 1960's and I still have my copy. It is beside me at the moment. I have not opened its pages since I first read it, but by the same token I have made sure that I never lost it. But I have just looked at the first few pages to see if I could determine when the book that I have was published. There is no such information on the inside. A quick check of Google and Wikipedia indicates that the novel itself was first published in 1862. Wikipedia gives a complete discussion of the novel as well as its adaptations as a play and movie. There is no need to repeat that information here. In fact, I have avoided reading this information, at least until I have completed this entry.

But in looking for a date of publication, I did read the Preface.

So long as there shall exist, by reason of law and custom, a socialo condemnation, which, in the face of civilisation, artificially creates hells on earth, and complicates a destiny that is devine, with human fatality; so long as the three problems of the age - the degradation of man by poverty, the ruin of woman by starvation, and the dwarfing of childhood by physical and spiritual night - are not solved; so long as, in certain regions, social asphyxia shall be possible; in other words, and from a yet more extended point of view, so long as ignorance and misery remain on earth, books like this cannot be useless.

Hauteville House, 1862.

Surprisingly, I have not seen the Broadway play, nor have I seen any of the movies, although I have seen much of the publicity about the play in the public media. I rarely remember the name of a character in a story after a few months, often even after a few days. Yet the name Jean Valjean is indelible in my memory. That says volumes about the novel.

Much of the detail is now gone, and even the major events are missing. I remember when the posters for the play of Les Miserables came out a few years ago that I was surprised that the main image was that of a little girl. I do remember the main story involved Jean Valjean and a police inspector. I also have this enduring image of JeanValjean as being one of the greatest heros of all time. His moral sense and personal integrity was enormous. I am sure that this has had a substantial influence on how I have lived my life, even though I would not be able to say that I have ever consciously thought of the novel when facing many of life's little difficulties.

Rereading the preface, I am confident, but not happy, that this novel will continue to be of value to its readers for many years to come. I plan to reread it.

Tags: novel, Les Miserables, Victor Hugo, France, history, Jean Valjean, integrity

Date	Title	Author	Date	Type
January 1	The Essence of Buddhism	Jo Durden Smith	2004	non-fiction: religion
January 2	Feynman's Rainbow	Leonard Mlodinow	2003	memoir: science
January 3	The Cathedral and the Bazaar	Eric S. Raymond	1999	non-fiction: technology
January 4	Les Miserables	Victor Hugo	1862	novel: France
January 5	Seven Types of Ambiguity	Elliot Perlman	2003	novel: Australia

My previous entry on Les Miserables was one of the first novels that I remember reading. This entry is on one of the last novels that I have read.

We spent three months in Australia last year. While in the Sydney domestic terminal waiting for our connecting flight to Ballina I spent a few minutes in a bookstore. One of the books I bought was a novel, Three Dollars, by Elliot Perlman. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I then tried to find his earlier novel, Seven Types of Ambiguity, in various bookstores along the north coast of New South Wales, but with no success. But when we were back in the Sydney, this time in the International terminal waiting for our flight back to Canada, I went into a bookshop and there it was. I enjoyed beginning it on the long flight home and finished it a few days later.

The structure and style of the novel reminded me of a Japanese short story which I have just pulled off my shelf. This is in a book, The Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories (1997) edited by Theodore W. Goossen. The short story is called "In a Grove" by Akutagawa Ryunosuke. Basically the story is about a investigation by the police into a murder and consists of a series of vignettes as told by various parties. Perlman's novel consists of a story as told by seven different participants in the tale. But Perlman's story is much richer and deeper and he explores the psychology driving the various characters. In the process he does a superb job of showing that objective truth is truly in the mind of the inividual. It reminds me of a North American native saying, "Do not criticise a man unless you have walked a mile in his moccassins".

Perlman's tale is fascinating. It begins with a fairly innocuous event, when a man kidnaps the son of his ex-girlfriend, but is captured by the police a few hours later while he is taking care of him. Each of the seven major sections of the novel carry the story forward but through their different eyes. The main characters include an out-of-work teacher, two succesful business men, a prostitute, the boy, the ex-girlfriend who is now the wife of one of the businesmen and a psychiatrist. All of their lives are tangled together in a fascinating web that unfolds as the story progresses. The reader sees both the movitations and characters of the different people in the story, but all of these people are embedded in the fabric of the modern urban culture of today. The story takes place in Australia but it could be any large Western city.

Here is an excerpt from the back cover:

At once a psychological thriller and a social critique, Seven Types of Ambiguity is a story of obsessive love in an age of obsessive materialism.

It's a story of impulse and paralysis, of empty marriages, lovers and a small boy, gambling and the market, of adult children and their parents, of poetry and prostitution, psychiatry and the law.

I will continue to keep my eyes peeled for more novels by this author.

Tags: novel, Elliot Perlman, Australia, psychology, social, culture