The Care and Feeding of Bricks

[9430]

Yes, that's why I get kind of frustrated with the Julie Rose and end up making loads of annotations because of the odd way she translates sometimes. But it is useful when comparing to the source material.

[collectingbees]

I have two editions. I am quite fond of them both, but I would really love an edition with illustrations.

[Marianne]

My Shelf o' Bricks:



Left to right: Fahnestock/Macafee (falling apart and held together by duct tape), Wilbour, Wraxall, Julie Rose, an abridged version translated by Henry Williams, a silly kids' version in French, the French Pocket Classiques edition, and the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade edition. And Graham Robb's biography of Hugo hanging' out on the right.

[Frédérique]

Oh, the Julie Rose is ... one of the larger Bricks I've seen so far. Less Brick, more cement block. (Aww! A little flag!)

[collectingbees]

Woah, that is an awesome shelf! My bricks are torn up as well! ;P

One thing that I will give Julie Rose, is that she has a lot of footnotes, which I appreciate. I have spent hours just reading all of the footnotes. I don't like her translations on the argot, though.

[Ulkis]

I just noticed you have "A Place of Greater Safety" there. Mine has a different cover. Argh, that book. (For those of you who haven't read it/heard of it, it is a sucky book about Danton, Robespierre, and Desmoulins and their ~deep thoughts~. Mine is also still on my shelf, because I'm too lazy to take it to the used book shop.)

(Also, apologies to anyone who likes the book . . . I just saw it recommended a lot so I was pretty surprised about how much I was bored by it.)

[silverwhistle]

It can go on your Nintendo? That's actually kind of awesome. Everyone else is like, "Mario Kart race!" and you could be all like, "Anyone up for a spot of Les Misérables?" It could be handy at parties.
Is it the unabridged edition and everything? It seems like a huge book to go on a little game system.

I'm afraid I read that as "Marius Kart Race!" Which conjures some very, very strange images…

[silverwhistle]

I have a whacking great red 19C French hardback with illustrations and gilt-edges and gilding on cover (and stains on the back, which is why I could afford it!), and the Norman Denny (second copy: first is down at my parents' house and is falling apart, but it was an ex-library paperback to begin with, so it wasn't my fault!). I also have the Gustave Brion-illustrated French pdf. I regard Denny as a quick (by Hugo-standards!) summary/reference/refresher, before going back to the French.

[silverwhistle]

Re: literal care and feeding of…
May I just note (and praise) the existence of book leather preservation and cleaning wax? If your Brick is old and has a leather spine, a good feed and polish will help keep it flexible, non-flaky, and shiny. Apply, let it soak in, then buff with a duster.

[hazellwood]

This is my Brick, as of ten minutes ago. As you can see, I have treated it with the love, care, and respect a book of its caliber deserves. ((There are little sticky notes all over the convent and barricade sections but you can't really see them in that picture due to the cover.))

[basiatione]

I say that is precisely the sort of love your book deserves -- clearly it was very well-read, and that's what matters most! Do you think you'll repair it, or just buy a new one?

I myself have two copies, even though I've only read the book once. I have the Julie Rose translation in hardcover (which is what I read) and I also have the same paperback as hazellwood...had. I'll definitely read it eventually, too, if only to see how the translation differs.

Someday I'd like to get a more august edition (or two), but for now I think what I've got is pretty serviceable!

[Valancy]

I have three versions... One, the unabridged Finnish translation which is actually five volumes. Took me ages to hunt it down in a used book shop and now I'm very happy to own it, even though the language is painfully outdated at times (it's from the 1920s and Finnish literature language is so young that in older books the language ends up being a bit weird sometimes) and it's actually still not completley unabridged, it randomly cuts out little parts here and there.

Then there's the Finnish abridged, which is the standard edition you usually find in shops and libraries. The Finnish abridged is not as short as the English abridged, it runs at about 700 pages, so it manages to give you a pretty good idea of what kind of a writer Hugo is, including lots and lots of details, little incidents and ramblings, but just shortening them. For example Waterloo is there but shortened, the description about the Bishop is there and shortened, some sections like the one on convents are cut, and there are details that get cut. For example I didn't learn about Cosette's real first name before I got the unabridged, and Feuilly's description is only one paragraph because they decided to cut out all the nationalism stuff. So there is a lot of awesomeness you miss out on if you only have the abridged, therefore I nowadays never read it, but it's not like they try to squeeze the story into 300 pages and make you miss out on everything that makes it uniquely Les Mis. A decent solution that will probably get more people to actually read the book when they won't be scared by the length. However, I wish the unabridged was more widely available.

And then I have it in French, a two-volume paperback with notes. I'm not too happy with the notes, they're always on things I'm not interested in knowing and never on the things I want to know. I should get the Pléiade edition some time, but for the time being I'm too poor and will make do with what I have.

They're all in reasonably good condition, even the 90-year-old second-hand unabridged. And I've read it lots of times, so shows you what good long-lasting books they made back then. Sometimes anyway. I normally never mark my books, but I've got underlined parts (in
pencil) all over the barricades and revolution/insurrection stuff, because I wrote a huge essay about it in high school. I'm thinking of going over it carefully with the eraser, because I hate having markings in my books. They take my attention away from being able to drown into the story. And don't let me get into the subject of how much I hate markings in non-fiction books for studying that I got from the university library when I was still in the uni. I hate it when I've got someone else's underlinings and notes telling me what's supposed to be important! Nowadays I still sometimes have the problem when I get out books for novel research. That's one of the reason I try to use municipal library books whenever I can, because they're less likely to have markings all over the place than university library books.

Sorry for the digression.

[Rose In Misery]

(Also, apologies to anyone who likes the book . . . I just saw it recommended a lot so I was pretty surprised about how much I was bored by it.)

Oh, I was given that by my Mum who knows how much I love the Brick and thought I might like it, it being long and (arguably) about French history. I read up to about page 200 before deciding that I was bored with it. It's a shame because I quite like Hilary Mantel as an author. I suppose ever since reading the Brick I've had high expectations.

I only own the Norman Denny translation. If I had known it was abridged at the time, I would have probably tried to get another. I actually rather like it as a translation, I just wish Denny had been a little less "inventive" with bits and kept other bits in instead. I'm quite glad I read it first, though, because it's very readable and means I understand that "nuance gris de souris rassurée" means something along the lines of "a wary compromise" and not that Courfeyrac has been Grantaire's absinthe and is randomly talking about shades of mouse colour.

I also have the 2/3 of the French books lent to me by my friend's Mum. Admittedly, I can't read French to save my life but I know roughly whats happening in most of the chapters. And I just like reading it aloud. I think there's something very soothing about the French language.

[hazellwood]

I say that is precisely the sort of love your book deserves -- clearly it was very well-read, and that's what matters most! Do you think you'll repair it, or just buy a new one?

I am going to repair it and buy another one-- this one is so worn out I am worried it will fall completely apart if I am not careful. (It is nearly in half due to the amount of times I've read 'A Group Which Almost Became Historic' and another page fell off yesterday; some pages are half bound and half not.) Duct tape to the rescue! But I am sentimentally attached to it, so I couldn't bear to get rid of it.

Rose in Misery, I like the Norman Denny translation, but I can't stand the way it's abridged. I think he did a good job with translating the things he didn't cut out/change, though.

[Apollo'sCrown]

I say that is precisely the sort of love your book deserves -- clearly it was very well-read, and that's what matters most! Do you think you'll repair it, or just buy a new one?

I am going to repair it and buy another one-- this one is so worn out I am worried it will fall completely apart if I am not careful. (It is nearly in half due to the amount of times I've read the 'A Group Which Almost Became Historic' and another page fell off yesterday; some pages are half bound and half not.) Duct tape to the rescue! But I am sentimentally attached to it, so I couldn't bear to get rid of it.

Rose in Misery, I like the Norman Denny translation, but I can't stand the way it's abridged. I think he did a good job with translating the things he didn't cut out/change, though.

ME TOO. *for the A Group Which Almost Became Historic*

My Combeferre bit has pen scribble on it... because I carried it everywhere in high School. >.>;