1.2.3-Kingedmundsroyalmurder

ClubNinetyThree 1.2.3
I am quite convinced that this is one of those chapters that will, in about a month and a half, make me go oh! and rush to reread. Hugo pretty much expects his audience to reread and reread again, and whether that is the convention of the time or his own arrogance I don’t know. However, at the moment I am only on the ‘read’ part of the cycle, and I don’t even have access to a fandom who’s at ‘reread again’ to clue me in to things, so I was kind of left blinking and going, “wait, what?” as the string of names whooshed over my head.

But I’m game for a challenge and I’ve got homework to avoid, so let’s do this.

The first thing to note is that this conversation is fleeting and impermanent. We’re told straight up that the wind swept the words into the darkness immediately. These are men talking to without any intention of being heard or recorded, opinions voiced for themselves rather than for posterity. I don’t know if that detail is recorded to cement the fact that this is how these men actually think, or just to reinforce the overall situation in which they find themselves (sailing through the fog, making no noise and pretending not to exist).

Also I will admit this right now: I can’t tell these two dudes apart. Hugo is very conservative with his dialog tags, and I keep losing track of who is saying what. It feels almost like a return to the role-centric naming that was going on back in 1.1 — these men have names, and god knows they talk about other people’s names, but their identities aren’t reinforced or brought into focus and they become stand-ins for Royalism in general the way that the soldiers back in 1.1 started as stand-ins for Republicanism (but then faded into being people. These men have names but aren’t individuals; the soldiers were individuals but rarely named. A comment by Hugo about the relative unimportance of Fancy Names when compared to personality/intrinsic humanity?)

Anyway, so these two are deeply dubious about the Peasant-who-isn’t. I don’t really blame them — I’m kind of dubious about him too, though I’m more worried about the possibility that he is someone who could casually murder children rather than the possibility that he isn’t. I do think it’s telling that, all their preoccupation about names and nobility notwithstanding, at the end of the day they still keep coming back to competence. They’re clear on the idea that a noble birth doesn’t guarantee competence, either on the battlefield or anyone else, they just haven’t made the next leap of logic to realize that competence does not require a noble birth. (Or, possibly more accurately, they have and they don’t like it so they pretend that they haven’t.)

Bird symbolism! Wouldn’t be Hugo without some bird symbolism. Lacking an eagle they have found a crow, though they would prefer a vulture. It’s interesting that they’re kind of going steadily downwards in status there. Eagles are all noble and kingly and have ties to the Classical world, while crows are duller and smaller and less well regarded (though smarter, which I don’t know if Hugo knew about — I don’t know when people figured out that corvids are phenomenal animals) and vultures are most commonly associated with being scavengers, not noble in the slightest. It relates to their later conversation about fathers killing sons — war is not glamorous or noble and requires commanders who can face it for what it is and not flinch in the face of atrocity. It requires zealots, really, and that works perfectly given that we’ve already been told that the crew of The Claymore are all fanatics.

Also Hugo really doesn’t like lawyers.

Basically what they’re looking for is this: “procureur; il faut ennuyer l’ennemi, lui disputer le moulin, le buisson, le fossé, le caillou, lui faire de mauvaises querelles, tirer parti de tout, veiller à tout, massacrer beaucoup, faire des exemples, n’avoir ni sommeil ni pitié.” They need someone who will be ruthless and tireless, who will give no quarter or ground until the war is won. Again, we were warned about this back in 1.2.1, though it doesn’t make it much less jarring to read.

Pilf noted that this is in direct contrast to the soldiers we met back in 1.1 who did act with mercy. I will add to that that they too were told not to; in adopting Michelle and her children they were, in some ways, acting against orders. Orders that were likely given by the Revolution’s equivalent of these two men here.

So I’ve no idea what Hugo himself thought of the British, but it can’t be a coincidence that his royalist zealots here are depending on a foreign power for victory. They certainly don’t intend it to mean that France has forsaken them and thus they must look to others for support, but I wonder if Hugo did.

Oh, so Gaston nicely massacred his enemies. Well that’s all right then. (Also whenever I see the name Gaston I can only picture the Beauty and the Beast one, which in this context is deeply entertaining.)

I choose to believe that the Joly here is the ancestor of the Amis’ Joly. It gives him a gruesome family history and potentially interesting path to revolution.

So wait, have we established that the duc de Chartres they’re talking about here is Louis Philipe? Because I can’t help but be amused when they’re talking about how he didn’t actually cower in the boat but they people should say he did anyway.

I think the interlude about the plays in Paris is really telling of how these two see the war. It’s an inconvenience, a serious setback but nothing more than a setback. They’ll be back in Paris by spring to see the plays. England will put the king back on the throne. The peasants are just savages upset over trifles. There is a natural order to things and it will reassert itself soon enough. There’s an irony there, given that we know how this will eventually all turn out and, if there’s one thing the French Revolution isn’t, it’s inconsequential. But they don’t have the benefit of hindsight and it is inconceivable to them that the world they know and approve of should fall at the hands of some incensed peasants. So why not plan to go back to Paris and see the theatre? Life, after all, will go on when this blows over.

And in keeping with that they need someone fierce who will massacre without mercy and spill copious amounts of blood so that the war can be done soon and things can go back to normal.

And then the conversation is cut off by an emergency, so we are spared more bad opinions!

Commentary
Pilferingapples I know, right?!? Hugo and his frigging PRESUMPTION, and his BEING DEAD RIGHT ABOUT IT. :P

THE CAPTAIN AND SECOND OFFICER THOUGH. I think even at this point there’s some massive denial in this conversation re: the endurance of the revolution, but I also think they are totally willing throw away HOW many lives for …

for

oh gad I just realized

THEY FIGHT FOR THE RIGHT TO AN OPERA NOW. I am DONE with these two, I am LEAVING.

Fizzygingr This is a flawless post and I’m just gonna second everything here.