Victor Hugo – One of the Greatest French Writers
Victor Hugo is considered to be one of the greatest French writers of all time. He was born Victor-Marie Hugo in Besançon in February 1802 and is most famous for his novel Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Victor Hugo Avenue in Paris is a lasting memorial to the French writer and looks amazing with its symmetrical tree lines when viewed from the top of the Arc de Triomphe. (Photo above)
Victor Hugo was vocal in his political views, publicly and passionately supporting Republicanism and actively critical of Absolutism. Gaining national hero status because of his literary works and outspoken criticism of Louis Napoleon, when he died in 1885, he was given a national funeral, his body then lay in state at the Arc de Triomphe and he was later interred in the Panthéon.
Victor Hugo – A Brief History
After the publication of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Hugo was elected to the French Academy.
His political views changed from being a Royalist when young to a Republican during the 1848 Revolution. He even risked death by execution when he attempted to rally Parisian workers against the New Emperor Napoleon III. Fearing for his safety at this time he fled to Brussels, Jersey and later Guernsey. While in Guernsey in enforced exile he wrote his famous work Les Misérables. What started as an enforced exile, was later a voluntary exile and seemed to be a voluntary act of pride for the writer.
His state of exile ended when he returned to Paris following the fall of the empire after the Franco-Prussian war and the proclamation of the Third Republic. On his return to Paris he resumed his role in politics by being elected to the National Assembly. Not too long after his election he resigned from the Assembly when his peers disagreed with his support for the democratic election of General Garibaldi in Italy.
Hugo spent his final years in Paris and sadly saw the passing of his wife and two sons before his own death in 1885.
