#Jean Valjean's father

[combeferres-mothematics]

Jean Valjean marrying a Jeanne, and having a son named Jean reminds me of Frances Laurens marrying Francis Henderson, and having a son named Francis

#Amrev #frances laurens #Francis Henderson #I think that was his name but I could be remembering wrong #it's 3 am here so I probably shouldn't trust my brain on this one #Francis Henderson jr #Jean Valjean #Jean Valjean's mother #Jean Valjean's father #Les mis

[lesmisscraper]

Tumblr now got the Cat Boop o Meter but almost 12 years ago, Les Mis already had one.

#Les miserables #les mis #My Post #Cosette #The Lark #Jean Valjean #Father and daughter #Owl and Wren #Marius #Lark and Booby #Boop #We already had this almost 12 years ago! #Boop o Meter #2012 film #I meemed a Meme #April Fool's Day #Meme

[ueinra]

#les miserables #les mis #jean valjean #Father's Day #and there are still many fatherly things that I haven't put

[secretmellowblog]

Jean Valjean’s issues as a parent are so sad and complicated? Because unlike in adaptations, in the book he’s not abusive at all, and has a deep horror at the idea of taking away Cosette’s freedom/agency. But at the same time—

Jean Valjean is a deeply lonely person who relies on a single young child to fill all of his loneliness. He loves Cosette, and she loves him, but he turns that mutual love into his only reason to live. He relies on his daughter to be the Sole Thing That Gives His Life Meaning. He’s utterly desperate for family and companionship and he throws all of that desperation onto Cosette.

He is sweet, loving, gentle, kind, and willing to support Cosette in whatever choices she makes, and to give her the freedom to do whatever she wants. But if she uses her freedom to choose a life outside of the little world he’s built for her…. he will allow her to make that choice, but he’ll do it while spiraling into self-destructive loneliness and despair.

He refuses to communicate honestly with his daughter about his traumatic past or her own, instead papering over uncomfortable truths with polite nothings. He doesn’t tell her things she has the right to know, under the pretext of protecting her, but more to protect himself and his own feelings.

He is a traumatized person who (as a result of his utter isolation) unintentionally puts his young daughter into the role of his caretaker— so that this 15-year-old-girl has to struggle to help her father through severe PTSD symptoms and self-destructive behaviors that he does not explain and that she has no way to understand.

It’s such a complicated, difficult relationship with no easy answers. Jean Valjean and Cosette genuinely love each other, and take care of each other, and their relationship saves both of their lives— but their relationship is also still flawed and unhealthy, in so many painful nuanced ways that are hard to actually solve.

#Les mis #Jean Valjean #this is why I dislike adaptations that are all #‘Valjean is an abusive/overprotective father who needs to learn to Let Cosette Go’ #‘and in the end he lets cosette go. yay the end’ #it’s so oversimplifying? #it’s replacing this really hard weird complex moral dilemma #with a basic stock trope #but that’s another post #anyway #emo #lm 4.3.1

[peetas-left-leg]

Ibuprofen is great for pain but you know what's a better medicine??? Somebody lives aus where Valjean ends up kind of adopting Enjolras after the barricades

#this is me asking for recs bc i believe I've read everything under that description #les mis #les miserables #jean valjean #enjolras #i just want valjean to have a reason to live and enjolras to actually live lmao #and i may or may not be projecting onto enjolras while wanting to have a father figure #yes I'm in my 20s yes i want and old man to see me and say 'must protect'

[alilsakurablossom]

what ive gleaned from 'how jean can become champ'

#javert #father madeleine #monsieur madeleine #jean valjean #the brick #book 6 part 2 #stevie rambles #les miserbales #les mis

[homosexualjavert]

Hi Javert ! Have you met Monsieur Fauchelevent daughter, Cosette yet ?

I’ve met her.

She seems… pleasant.

#she reminds me of her… father #inspector javert #jean valjean #les miserables #valvert #javert #cosette #les mis

[catholic-character-tournament]

Round 4 - Catholic Character Tournament

Propaganda below ⬇️

Paul

he's like if renfield from dracula was cool youth pastor.

He's also a priest, who essentially becomes a vampire due to an "angel" and tries to convert the entire town. He also runs an Alcoholics Anonymous group. I love him

Listen you've probably gotten this guy idk how many times but JUST IN CASE, I submitted him. He's a priest who fell in love and had a lesbian daughter. He becomes a vampire after his money-laundering fundie simp sent him to the Holy Land. He's so torn up over his lover having dementia and God allowing so much overwhelming death that he decides he's going to try to Cure Death Forever but oh boy is it a slippery slope and the man is surrounded by enablers.

so i binged watch the chosen (it's a drama series but it's the bible) and I needed to balance or else Id be insane so I watched midnight mass. It was good. Fuck this rat. I loved the ending though -- op

Jean

Everything he does is motivated by the grace shown to him by the bishop. I also like him. He’s a strong old man which white hair. Or Hugh Jackman, which is also a cool thing to be.

His whole conflict over the course of the show is do I follow God and be a good man or do I follow the law. He doesn’t like, break the law all the time, but he will if it’s to appease a higher mission i.e he’s wanted by the police but he evades arrest to save an orphan

There’s a lot of talk about god in Les Mis. In the musical, Valjean has plenty of songs where he’s praying or talking to God.

#father paul hill #midnight mass #cct polls #tumblr tournament #tumblr bracket #tumblr polls #polls #r4 #jean valjean #les miserables #les mis #victor hugo

[obi-wann-cannoli]

Happy Fathers Day to Colonel Pontmercy (and to Jean Valjean while we’re at it)

#les mis letters #nina has thoughts #also a huge fuck you to m gillenormand #and tholomyes #yes I k so Jean valjean isn’t in this chapter #also what a chapter for Father’s Day #3.3.2

[alphazed]

Cosette and Jean Valjean!!

They're so cute I can'ttt

#les mis #les miserables #jean valjean #fanart #cosette #they're so cute #he is a father your honor

[dolphin1812]

Cosette!

There's a strong implication that the Rue Plumet house is an opportunity for romance, both through earlier descriptions of the garden (the emphasis on youth, weddings, love, etc) and lines like this:

"The convent is a compression which must last the whole life, if it is to triumph over the human heart. On leaving the convent, Cosette could not have found anything sweeter or more dangerous than the house in the Rue Plumet. It was the commencement of solitude with the commencement of liberty, a closed garden, but a sharp, kind, rich, voluptuous, and odorous nature; there were the same dreams as in the convent, but glimpses could be caught of young men,—it was a grating, but it looked on the street."

Most obviously, the passage mentions that Cosette could see young men through the grating, but the language used to describe the garden ("voluptuous") feels quite sensual. Romance would also be the specific subject Jean Valjean and the nuns couldn't/wouldn't prepare her for; if the nuns ever had experience with that, they swore it off when they became nuns, and Jean Valjean has never experienced romance ("Jean Valjean had never loved anything [. . . . ] [He] had never been father, lover, husband, or friend" - LM 2.4.3). I think Hugo centers romance and relationships for young women in a way that's uncomfortable (even if it's unfortunately realistic in some ways, given that they were financially very important [the struggle of having enough money if unmarried as a woman] and risky because of social pressures [like Fantine being ostracized because she had a child without being married]). Part of the discomfort is also from the way these societal expectations of gender blend with Hugo's ideas, like his notion that Cosette is especially lost because she doesn't have a mother to guide her with the combined experience of being a "virgin" and a "wife." Still, it's true that romance would be difficult for Cosette because she doesn't have someone to easily communicate with on the subject. Jean Valjean is the only person she has right now, and it's not a topic he's very aware of. Rather than the framing here, then, it's a bit more sympathetic if we take it as another instance of the importance of a broad network of social support. Romance would not be as dangerous to Cosette if she had a variety of people to learn from, just as it would have been safer for Fantine if she had had people to fall back on after being abandoned or if people had advised her more directly in the first place about what to expect from a student-grisette romance.

The house is also mixed for Cosette in that it contains remnants of a cage. The convent is the true "compression," so she's free now that she's no longer there. Still, the psychological cage might remain; we don't know if she'll break free of it. The grating is part-cage as well, giving her more freedom than the convent but still constraining her. She can see the world now, but she's not fully in it, either.

Most importantly, Cosette is still a child! Hugo's speculating on her future here, but Cosette just wants to find interesting insects! Her love of searching for creatures feels like a return to the gamins, who do the same when playing; it's a shared trait that defines them as children, regardless of their different backgrounds. They're all still young, so they play.

Her love for her father is so sweet. I adore that she tries to fight against Jean Valjean's total lack of self-esteem by demanding that he treat himself better, or else she'll treat herself the same way:

""Father, I feel very cold in your room; why don't you have a carpet and a stove?"

"My dear child, there are so many persons more deserving than myself who have not even a roof to cover them."

"Then, why is there fire in my room and everything that I want?"

"Because you are a woman and a child."

"Nonsense! then men must be cold and hungry?""

Cosette knows that Valjean would never make her suffer, so if she makes herself live like him, she won't actually live badly. He'll just raise his own standard of living to make sure she's comfortable. Valjean's love for Cosette is one of his main defining traits, but she really loves him, too, and it's great to see that expressed!

I also love that their bond transcends societal expectations and is unique to them. In the passage above, for instance, Cosette questions gendered expectations over what men, women, and children should respectively tolerate, rejecting the idea that women and children should be prioritized over men. Part of it is certainly that she knows her father could be living more comfortably, but it's also because she loves him and doesn't want him to suffer needlessly based on any justification, whether it be others' poverty or gender. She sees Jean Valjean as both her father and mother as well, calling him "father" and imagining him like this:

"When she thought at night before she fell asleep, as she had no very clear idea of being Jean Valjean's daughter, she imagined that her mother's soul had passed into this good man, and had come to dwell near her. When he was sitting down she rested her cheek on his white hair, and silently dropped a tear, while saying to herself, "Perhaps this man is my mother!""

It's especially moving because Valjean sees himself in a similar way, feeling that he is her father because she needed one just as he needed a child, but also "[feeling] pangs like a mother" upon adopting her (LM 2.4.3). Fantine is ever-present in their relationship (and Cosette's dream was both beautiful and sad), but not entirely in an upsetting way. Valjean's feelings are unclear, and Cosette loves her mother, but in a vague way, since she doesn't remember her. But in a spiritual/religious way, Valjean and her mother's spirits have merged to her, preserving what she's heard about her mother's love and combining it with her lived experience of love. It's very sweet, and it makes sense that she would imagine her mother this way after such a religious upbringing.

Unfortunately, the metaphorical prison of the convent and the cage of the grating aren't the only dark shadow in this chapter. The last line is a bit ominous. For context, here it is in English and in French:

"The poor wretch, inundated with an angelic joy, trembled; he assured himself with transport that this would last his whole life; he said to himself that he had not really suffered enough to deserve such radiant happiness, and he thanked God in the depths of his soul for having allowed him—the wretched—to be thus loved by this innocent being."

"Le pauvre homme tressaillait inondé d'une joie angélique; il s'affirmait avec transport que cela durerait toute la vie; il se disait qu'il n'avait vraiment pas assez souffert pour mériter un si radieux bonheur, et il remerciait Dieu, dans les profondeurs de son âme, d'avoir permis qu'il fût ainsi aimé, lui misérable, par cet être innocent."

Jean Valjean is still a "misérable," and he defines his worth through suffering. He's happy with Cosette, which is wonderful! But he also thinks he doesn't deserve her, even if she clearly thinks otherwise. His joy, then, is in constant tension with his status as a misérable, and while Cosette tries to help - she's making him live decently! - she also doesn't know why he has this mindset. Jean Valjean has love, but he still carries the logic of the prison system with him, and by that logic, he will never "deserve" happiness.

#les mis letters #lm 4.3.4 #cosette #jean valjean #I just want them to stay happy and accept that they're happy #but Jean Valjean's lack of self-worth is ever-present :( #I love Cosette so much though #she's so funny as a child and she loves her father so much

[jackgoodfellow]

#lemme know if i missed anything #I probably won't update it but I might #alt-text #image description #not art #see jack talk #Sweeney Todd #the count of monte cristo #les mis #les miserables #jean valjean #edmond dantes #benjamin barker #that last picture of The Count of Monte Cristo is actually Thomas Alexandre Dumas - the fascinating father of the author #who was clearly the inspiration for the character and I'm never going to shut up about the fact that this character is supposed to be Black #and YET IN EVERY MOVIE HE IS WHITE. FUCK OFF #acab #also as far as I can tell so far Les Mis is the most acab book out of all of these. just cuz javert is the most acab character of all time. #javert #he's the perfect cop! and into the seine he goes! psshoooooooo-SPLAT! #i love the character of javert #autistic. gay. furry. irredeemable bastard (unless you count the fan fiction). #acab stands for all cops are bastards. all these characters relate to criticism of an unjust legal system and those complicit in its evil #that said i haven't finished monte cristo yet

[lesmisscraper]

Valjean and Cosette's small talk, returning from the well in the forest. Volume 2, Book 3, Chapter 7.

Clips from <Il cuore di Cosette>.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday!

#Les miserables #les mis #My Post #Cosette #The Lark #Poor Lark #Jean Valjean #Father and daughter #Owl and Wren #The Dark Forest #When Two Anxious Hearts First Met #Eponine #Azelma #Thenardier Sisters #Mirror Ladies #Mme. Thenardier #Tw:Child abuse #When I first read the Brick it was a really shocking thing that a child around 7 to 8 years old playing with a knife not a toy one. #One with the Actual Blade on it. #And only the Thenardier Girls could play and get the best things. #I really don't like them they're like the Cinderella's two stepsisters and stepmother. #Still... #Merry Christmas Cosette! #No matter how you may be treated. #But you're the most Happiest Girl Today! #The Miracle of Christmas #Christmas #The Brick #Il cuore di Cosette #Christmas Post

[ueinra]

He always had his pockets full of money when he went out; but they were empty on his return. When he passed through a village, the ragged brats ran joyously after him, and surrounded him like a swarm of gnats. […] The children loved him because he knew how to make charming little trifles of straw and cocoanuts.

— Les Misérables, I.V.III Illustrated by Rene Giffey (French comic, 1949)

#les miserables #les mis #jean valjean #giffey comic #comics #He is sooooo father

[vivalamusaine]

TORONTO LES MIS WAS SO GOOD HOLY SHIT WE GOT RAPID DOG JAVERT, WE GOT AWKWARD MARIUS, WE GOT JEAN VALJEAN WITH THE PIPES SENT FROM HEAVEN ABOVE, WE GOT LOVELORN GRANTAIRE WITH AN ANGRY AND HEARTBROKEN DRINK WITH ME, AND WE GOT COSETTE HELPING EPONINE UP AND BEING SOFT TOGETHER AFTER THE ATTACK ON RUE PLUMMET?????

#obsessed with this adaptation #im in awe #they added music and dialogue that worked so well #jean valjean did a small on my own reprise???? #this might be my favorite adaptation #grantaire was twirling his coat tails and at one point gave javert a massage #also holy shit enjolras and gavroche friendship #AND WOMEN ON THE BARRICADE #THEY CHANGED THE LINE TO FATHERS AND MOTHERS WITH CHILDREN LEAVE NOW #this was my dream cast #i am blessed #i spent 90 bucks of merch lol

[the-wanderer]

I love the found family trope, but also found fathers - men who never expected to become fathers, but through fate and circumstances then adopt a child, and turn out to be an absolutely GREAT Father!

Cosette x Jean Valjean

Geralt x Ciri

Din Djarin x Grogu

{Reblog with yours}

#found father #found family #father #fatherhood #unexpected father #cosette #jean valjean #les mierables #les miserables bbc #geralt and ciri #Geralt #the Witcher #ciri #Cosette and Jean valjean #din djarin #Grogu #din Grogu #din djarin and grogu #the mandalorian