Her ‘sort-of’ playwright philosopher ‘husband’ Pierre Gringoire – whom she does not love – provides some comic relief to the story. The story centres around, not only Paris and the grand cathedral, but a young gypsy dancer, a ‘dazzling vision’ called Esmeralda. The Notre-Dame Cathedral is an ‘edifice of the transition’ from the Roman to the Gothic architecture, described by Hugo as ‘the pointed species grafted upon the circular.’ From the cathedral is a bird’s eye view of the ‘very illogical’ streets of Paris – the City, the University, and the Town. The themes are political and religious, historical, and ghoulish. It is winter, January 1482, sixteen years after the great plague in which 40,000 souls died in the city of Paris. The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) is set in Paris in 1482, primarily in the Notre-Dame Cathedral. Hence, it’s time to re-read Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. In the Victor Hugo museum is an exhibition, from 10 June to 21 November 2021, called Dans L’Intimité du Genie – In the Intimacy of Genius – with Hugo’s paintings, drawings, engravings, and artwork. Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre-Dame.
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