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1-Page Summary of Les Miserables
Overall Summary
Les Misérables opens with a man called the Bishop of Bienvenu, who is known for his kind and good heart. He shows this through his charity work and charitable acts. One day, a mysterious person arrives in town looking for food and shelter. Everyone turns him away because they know he’s an ex-convict named Jean Valjean. The only person to help him was the Bishop of Bienvenu, whom he met by chance at night when everyone else rejected him. The next morning, however, Valjean steals from the bishop because he’s overcome by guilt over stealing from such a kind soul. When caught red handed, however, the bishop lies about giving it to him as a gift so that Valjean will be free again despite breaking the law once more. This leaves Jean Valjean utterly bewildered about how someone can do something so good yet against all laws and logic (this foreshadows his later conversion). Later on in Paris after being released from jail thanks to Javert (the policeman), he decides to steal some silverware off of two women but comes across Gavroche instead (a young boy) who points out that those are not theirs but rather belongs to someone rich nearby which upsets Jean even further due to his own past with stealing things belonging to others (which we find out later on during flashbacks).
The novel takes place in Paris, where Fantine is a poor woman who has come to the city from the provinces. She meets a young man named Felix Tholomyes and falls in love with him. He’s not serious about her, but she doesn’t realize this until it’s too late. After he leaves her pregnant, she must find someone to take care of Cosette while she works at an assembly line factory job. She finds Madame Thenardier and asks if she can leave Cosette with her for six months while Fantine works every day at a faraway factory job that pays very little money. Madame agrees to watch over Cosette for several months, but then demands more money because of all the work involved in taking care of Cosette. Meanwhile, Fantine becomes increasingly desperate because she can barely afford food or rent on what little income she makes from working long hours on an assembly line production line (which would be similar to modern-day sweatshops). Her financial struggles eventually lead her into prostitution so that she can pay off Madame Thenardier’s ever-increasing debts due to their daughter being used as slave labor by Thenardier himself—who refuses to let anyone else touch his treasure trove of cash cows—and his wife Eponine and Azelma: two children whom they have adopted solely for monetary gain through child slavery/exploitation themselves…
One day Fantine was detained after a dandy provoked her to attack him. The police inspector Javert brought her to the mayor, Madeleine, who had transformed M.-sur-M. from a poor village into a thriving factory town through new industrial methods he invented. He was known for his generosity and kindness, his constant good works, his faith—and his commitment to the Bishop of D— whose death he mourned profoundly. After hearing Fantine’s tale, Javert’s shock made him let this woman go. He has been suspicious of Madeleine ever since he saw him achieve a herculean feat by lifting up an overturned cart off of Fauchelevent and saving his life. Jean Valjean is now wanted because another theft against Savoyard boy occurred in Arras where Champmathieu (Valjean) lives in town with other criminals like himself under assumed names; however, it turns out that Champmathieu is none other than Madeleine as well!
A man named Jean Valjean is convicted of stealing a loaf of bread for his sister’s hungry children. He is sentenced to five years in prison, but he escapes and becomes a convict who lives by the docks where ships are moored. One day, he nearly falls into the sea while cleaning one ship. Another convict rescues him from drowning and then dies himself after falling overboard. The authorities declare that this second convict has been killed, but he survives as well and travels to Montfermeil, where he comes across Cosette on her way home with an enormous bucket full of water at night. She leads him back to her house and shows him how she was mistreated there by Thenardier until Valjean buys her a doll which changes their opinion of him completely. They pay off Thenardier so that they can take Cosette away with them to Paris where they live happily together for several months before moving out again when Fauchelevent dies.
