Notre-Dame de Paris

Written by Victor Hugo

Narrated by LibriVox Community

Dès 1828 Hugo avait conçu Note Dame de Paris et se rend plusieurs fois à la cathédrale. Il ressuscite le Paris d'autrefois avec sa cathédrale. Notre-Dame de Paris retrace la destinée tragique au Moyen Âge d'une jeune bohémienne, Esméralda, victime du désir qu'elle inspire à trois hommes. Convoitée par l'archidiacre Frollo, elle est enlevée sur son ordre par le sonneur de cloches difforme de Notre-Dame, Quasimodo, puis est sauvée par le beau capitaine Phoebus dont elle s'éprend. Mais Frollo, jaloux, poignarde Phoebus, et n'intervient pas lorsque Esméralda est accusée de ce meurtre. Elle est emprisonnée, puis délivrée, cette fois, par Quasimodo, épris d'elle, qui l'entraîne au sein de l'inviolable cathédrale. Les truands de la cour des Miracles, inquiets de sa disparition, assaillent l'édifice, et livrent, sans s'en douter, Esméralda à son pire ennemi, Frollo. Arrêtée, la jeune fille sera pendue sous l'oeil cynique de ce dernier. Quasimodo, enfin édifié sur son «bienfaiteur» Frollo, le précipite du haut des tours de Notre-Dame, et se laisse ensuite mourir dans les bras d'Esméralda dans le charnier où elle repose. ( adapté de http://romantis.free.fr/Victor hugo/html/notdadep.html)

• Language: Français
• Publisher: LibriVox
• Release date: Aug 25, 2014

Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) was a French poet and novelist. Born in Besançon, Hugo was the son of a general who served in the Napoleonic army. Raised on the move, Hugo was taken with his family from one outpost to the next, eventually setting with his mother in Paris in 1803. In 1823, he published his first novel, launching a career that would earn him a reputation as a leading figure of French Romanticism. His Gothic novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) was a bestseller throughout Europe, inspiring the French government to restore the legendary cathedral to its former glory. During the reign of King Louis-Philippe, Hugo was elected to the National Assembly of the French Second Republic, where he spoke out against the death penalty and poverty while calling for public education and universal suffrage. Exiled during the rise of Napoleon III, Hugo lived in Guernsey from 1855 to 1870. During this time, he published his literary masterpiece Les Misérables (1862), a historical novel which has been adapted countless times for theater, film, and television. Towards the end of his life, he advocated for republicanism around Europe and across the globe, cementing his reputation as a defender of the people and earning a place at Paris’ Panthéon, where his remains were interred following his death from pneumonia. His final words, written on a note only days before his death, capture the depth of his belief in humanity: “To love is to act.”