Ninety-Three (1874) is the final novel of Victor Hugo. As a work of historical fiction, the story is set during the period of conflict between the newly formed French Republic and the Royalists who sought to reverse the gains of the revolution. Praised for its morality and honest depiction of the horrors of war, Ninety-Three influenced such wide-ranging political thinkers as Joseph Stalin and Ayn Rand. “The soldiers forced cautiously. Everything was in full bloom; they were surrounded by a quivering wall of branches, whose leaves diffused a delicious freshness. Here and there sunbeams pierced these green shades.” Advancing through the countryside, a band of Republican soldiers discovers a family of refugees, a mother and two children who fled for their lives during the insurrection of Royalists in Brittany. Taken in, they are swept up in an attack by the merciless Marquis de Lantenac, a counterrevolutionary leader who has just landed with a unit of Royalist troops. Separated from her children, Michelle is protected by a local beggar who hides her from Lantenac and his men. Meanwhile, Robespierre, Marat, and Danton have sent Commander Gauvain from Paris to stamp out the Royalist threat in Brittany, knowing all too well that Lantenac is his distant relative. As families are torn apart in the name of political struggle, as mercy gives way to death and betrayal, Hugo examines the human cost of war without losing sight of the gravity of the historical moment. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Victor Hugo’s Ninety-Three is a classic work of French literature reimagined for modern readers.
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) was a French poet and novelist. Born in Besançon, Hugo was the son of a general who served in the Napoleonic army. Raised on the move, Hugo was taken with his family from one outpost to the next, eventually setting with his mother in Paris in 1803. In 1823, he published his first novel, launching a career that would earn him a reputation as a leading figure of French Romanticism. His Gothic novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1831) was a bestseller throughout Europe, inspiring the French government to restore the legendary cathedral to its former glory. During the reign of King Louis-Philippe, Hugo was elected to the National Assembly of the French Second Republic, where he spoke out against the death penalty and poverty while calling for public education and universal suffrage. Exiled during the rise of Napoleon III, Hugo lived in Guernsey from 1855 to 1870. During this time, he published his literary masterpiece Les Misérables (1862), a historical novel which has been adapted countless times for theater, film, and television. Towards the end of his life, he advocated for republicanism around Europe and across the globe, cementing his reputation as a defender of the people and earning a place at Paris’ Panthéon, where his remains were interred following his death from pneumonia. His final words, written on a note only days before his death, capture the depth of his belief in humanity: “To love is to act.”
