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Notre-Dame de ParisNotre-Dame de Paris Reading Order
Notre-Dame de Paris (1831) by Victor Hugo — published in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame — is the novel that simultaneously saved Notre-Dame de Paris from demolition (Hugo's portrayal of the medieval cathedral was so vivid that it inspired the preservation movement that repaired and restored the building in the following decades), invented the historical novel in France, and created two of the most recognizable character archetypes in French culture: Quasimodo, the hunchbacked bellringer, and Esmeralda, the Romani dancer. Hugo wrote the novel to fulfill a contract he had signed in 1828 (for a 'book on the cathedral of Notre-Dame,' to be delivered in a year and a half) and then put off for three years; he finally wrote it in a burst in the winter of 1830–1831, reportedly sealing himself in with a bottle of ink. The novel is set in 1482 Paris and follows the fate of Esmeralda — condemned to death on trumped-up charges of witchcraft — as she is pursued by three men: the archdeacon Claude Frollo (who condemns her out of obsessive desire), the poet Gringoire (who marries her accidentally), and the mercenary Captain Phoebus (whom she loves hopelessly). Quasimodo, who loves Esmeralda from a distance and provides her sanctuary in the cathedral, is the novel's true moral center. The novel is also a meditation on the replacement of stone architecture by print culture ('this will kill that,' the archdeacon says, pointing from the book in his hand to the cathedral outside the window — books will destroy the cathedral as the primary medium of human thought) and one of the most important documents of Romantic medievalism.
Where to start
Notre-Dame de Paris (1831) — the Penguin Classics edition translated by John Sturrock (1978; revised 2004) is the standard English translation; the Oxford World's Classics edition translated by Alban Krailsheimer is also good. The novel is long and deliberately epic; the architectural descriptions and digressions are integral to the novel's argument about the relationship between architecture and print.
Complete Notre-Dame de Paris Book List
- 1Buy
Notre-Dame de Paris (Penguin Classics)
Victor Hugo (trans. John Sturrock)·2004·The standard English translation — Sturrock's version captures Hugo's rhetorical grandeur without archaic stiffness; the Penguin introduction is the best brief account of the novel's influence on the preservation of Notre-Dame and its place in French Romantic fiction. - 2Buy
Les Misérables
Victor Hugo·1862·Hugo's masterpiece and the natural companion to Notre-Dame de Paris — where Notre-Dame uses the medieval cathedral as its symbolic center, Les Misérables uses the sewer of Paris; both novels are epic meditations on justice, redemption, and the social excluded; reading both gives the full picture of Hugo's novelistic ambition. - 3Buy
The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne·1850·The American novel that is Notre-Dame de Paris' closest structural parallel — a Puritan community, a woman condemned by social hypocrisy, a man of spiritual authority consumed by secret desire; reading Notre-Dame alongside The Scarlet Letter shows the same moral architecture in two very different national contexts. - 4Buy
Ivanhoe
Walter Scott·1820·The historical novel that Hugo was developing — Scott's Ivanhoe (set in medieval England) is the immediate predecessor to Notre-Dame de Paris (set in medieval Paris); Hugo acknowledged his debt to Scott and Notre-Dame is in many ways the French response to Scott's Romantic medievalism. - 5Buy
The Name of the Rose
Umberto Eco·1980·The twentieth-century novel that most directly develops Notre-Dame de Paris' concern with medieval architecture and the conflict between scripture and human knowledge — Eco's monastery murder mystery uses the same elements (medieval architecture, books vs. stone as media, ecclesiastical corruption) in a postmodern register; the most important modern successor to Hugo's Gothic historical imagination.
Notre-Dame de Paris — Frequently Asked Questions
What is Notre-Dame de Paris (The Hunchback of Notre-Dame) about?
Notre-Dame de Paris (1831) by Victor Hugo follows Esmeralda, a Romani dancer who is condemned to death on false charges of witchcraft in 1482 Paris. Three men's obsessions drive her fate: the archdeacon Claude Frollo (who condemns her out of desperate, obsessive desire), the poet Gringoire (her accidental husband), and the mercenary Captain Phoebus (whom she loves hopelessly). Quasimodo, the hunchbacked bellringer who loves Esmeralda silently and provides her sanctuary in the cathedral, is the novel's moral center. The novel is also a meditation on the relationship between architecture and print culture, and its vivid portrayal of the cathedral inspired the preservation movement that saved it.
Did Hugo's novel save Notre-Dame de Paris?
Hugo's Notre-Dame de Paris (1831) played a significant role in inspiring the conservation of the medieval cathedral. When Hugo wrote the novel, Notre-Dame was in a state of considerable disrepair — it had been damaged during the Revolution, partially vandalized, and neglected; there was serious discussion of demolishing it. Hugo's vivid portrayal of the cathedral as a living embodiment of medieval civilization created popular enthusiasm for its preservation. The architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, who undertook the major restoration of Notre-Dame from 1844 to 1864 (adding the famous spire that collapsed in the 2019 fire), was directly inspired by the popular enthusiasm that Hugo's novel created.
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