Victor Hugo
Writer
Victor-Marie Hugo was one of France's most distinguished writers: a poet, dramatist and novelist of the romantic school of the 19th century. His most famous works in English are his two epic novels, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) and Les Misérables (1862), both of which have been adapted many times for stage and screen. He was exiled in 1851 by Napoleon III, but returned to France in 1870 in triumph, and his final years marked by public veneration.Extra credit: Hugo's character Quasimodo -- the Hunchback of Notre Dame -- has been played on-screen by Anthony Quinn (1956), Anthony Hopkins (1982), Charles Laughton (1939), and most famously by Lon Chaney (1923).
Other 19th-century literary giants include Charles Dickens, Alexandre Dumas, Mark Twain and Jane Austen.
Four Good Links
Victor Hugo
Brief bit on Hugo, and Les Misérables in e-text
Books and Writers
Tidy summation of Hugo's career, plus a list of selected works
Les Misérables
Official page of the Broadway show
Victor Hugo 2002
From France (and in French) a nifty celebration of his bicentennial
Vital Stats
Birth
Birthplace
Death
Best Known As
The author of Les Misérables
