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”.
“Twenty times he had been tempted to throw himself upon Jean Valjean, to seize him and to devour him, that is to say, arrest him.”—victor hugo pulling the fastest NO HOMO i have ever seen (via fungii)