Javert really isn’t alert all the time. And it’s kind of adorable.
I mean, during Fantine’s arrest he is so shocked about the whole situation that he just stands there for a moment and doesn’t snap out of it before he hears the sound of the latch when Fantine tries to leave. And at that point he has momentarily forgotten all about Madeleine being there and that the Mayor already said that Fantine is free to go.
Again at the barricades, when Javert is working undercover. He has been observing the revolutionaries like a hawk, and when he’s done doing that, he just sits down and spaces out. He “doesn’t seem to see anything that’s going on”, doesn’t even notice Gavroche circling around him, and when Enjolras finally asks who he is, he just kind of startles awake.
Javert is a daydreamer pass it on.
Well he is described as a “melancholy dreamer,” so …
Okay so the other day I was casually rereading the brick again and at one point Javert says he was an adjutant guard.
Here is the definition of that courtesy of Google:
1. a military officer who acts as an administrative assistant to a senior officer.
a person’s assistant or deputy.
According to Wikipedia is corresponds roughly with a staff sergeant or a warrant officer.
Another site said that when addressing the adjutant guard the senior officer would say “mon adjutant” so basically “my assistant”
Anyways basically this means that yes brick Javert would have worn that guard outfit with the snazzy hat (no, not the bicorn; the other one):
But also it means he was some other guard’s assistant and I find that really interesting?? Like, he becomes a temporary assistant/bodyguard for the (then) secretary to the Prefect of Police later, which is why he is in M-sur-M … Does he have like this network of officials that give him referrals?
Also on a sort of unrelated note I found out that the gendarmerie, which was pretty much like the military force charged with police duties in the civilian population, kind of had a rivalry going with the local police (because they would sometimes have to fight over whose jurisdiction something fell under maybe??) And also the symbol of the gendarmerie was a flaming grenade. Silver laurel leaves seem to be a theme in the French Police (I think they’re worn on the collar?).
So is Javert actually higher ranking than a regular police officer? I had always thought he actually ranked below them, being given risky spy missions and such, but now I’m thinking the opposite. It does say he has subordinates in the brick.
what she means:
i wonder if people understand javert is supposed to be one of "les miserables" aka the miserable of society. he's as much a victim of society as any of the other character in the novel. do they know javert was never meant to be a villain, but another victim? is it willful misinterpratation im order to have an easy villain to blame the tragedies on? he is described as a fanatic, but always with the best possible human traits: his sin lies within his error, and hugo describes it as being pitiful and miserable; it caused him to kill himself as soon as he realised it. why simplify him to a villain when he was never written as such? the villain in les miserables is society itself, and how it ruins the people who live in it. javert is one of les miserables why make him the villain i dont
[download full audio. if you want to trade it, please credit it as fall of man trading’s master. full cast list here. please do not share outside of tumblr]
Another thing for the consideration of let-it-be-extraordinary and hatarlakrits: Hayden Tee’s ‘Stars’ from yesterday. Listen out for his soft wonder when he looks up and notices the stars at the end of “the flame the sword” leading into “stars in your multitudes”.