FREE ESSAY ON VICTOR HUGO A FRENCH ROMANTICIST POET

VICTOR HUGO A FRENCH ROMANTICIST POET

Victor Hugo is a French Romanticist poet. He has written numerous dramatic plays, books,
and romantic poems. His poetry is best known and appreciated in France. In France Hugo is
haled as the leader of the French Romanticism Movement. Victor Hugo's poems "Once More to
Thee" and "Regret" reflect Hugo's remorse and wish for happiness as a result of his
uncaring and adulterous actions.
At a young age Victor Hugo married a young women named Adele. Their young love turned
sour when a critic fell in love with Adele and Hugo used it to blackmail him into giving
wonderful reviews of Hugo's newest poems and to promote his dramas and books with tons of
publicity and articles on them (Ionesco 25-26). Hugo proceeded to forbid Adele to leave
the house and considered it okay for him to cheat on her for the rest of his life
(Ionesco 26). Hugo had a twisted sense of love as is seen in this quote from the
Hugoliad, "His wife Adele he neglects completely using her only to arrange his theatrical
success. Absorbed as he was in his literary glory and Juliette Drouet he refuses to
notice that Sainte-Beuve is falling in love with his wife. He refuses to notice it even
when Sainte-Beuve intimates it to him" (Ionesco 25). Hugo carried on an affair with
Juliette Drouet for over 50 years to the knowledge and in sight of his wife, Adele
("Victor Hugo" 732). 
Victor Hugo's family influenced many of his early poems. When Hugo was in his early teens
his mother forced poetry on him (Ionesco 13). During a grave illness Hugo stayed with his
mother and she requested that he write a poem, when the poem was completed she promptly
stopped dying. Things that occurred in his family often 
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influenced his works. The conflicts between his loyalist mother and his Bonaparte father
strongly influenced many of his poems (Houston 1). His early works were also influenced
by the comradery and the sometimes rivalry between him and his two brothers (Houston 1).
Victor Hugo was born in the year of our lord 1802 ("Victor Hugo" 732). He was born in a
small French town known as Bescancon ("Victor Hugo" 732-733). Victor Hugo's father was
General Count Leopold Sigisbert Hugo (Ionesco 11).
Eugene Ionesco said this about the General "Victor Hugo's father was a sort of rough and
simple trooper, sufficiently devoid of scruples to abandon his wife and very young
children. Infatuated with a bogus Spanish countess, he went and set himself up in Spain,
where he governed a province in the name of Napoleon I (11)." Victor Hugo's mother packed
up herself and her children and left for Spain to try and take her husband back from this
fake countess (Ionesco 11). Sophie failed in her endeavor to win back her husband, so she
fled back to Paris and replaced General Count Leopold Sigisbert Hugo with another man
(Ionesco 11). She replaced him with a man in good favor with Napoleon, General Lahorie
(Ionesco 11). After obtaining Lahorie's love Sophie did not neglect Victor in the least,
in fact she began to guide his life once more, she forced him to turn away from the study
of Polytechnic which he was well suited to with his low intelligence and strong work
ethic (Ionesco 12). 
Victor Hugo's poems were strongly influenced by his adultery. After he believed his wife
had betrayed him his work had a strong melancholy tone ("Victor Hugo"[2] 165). 
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Ionesco speaks often of this effect on Hugo's poems "Hugo's poems spoke only of goodness
and forgiving but his life was anything but. He showed nothing but the opposites of what
he spoke of in his poems" (26). 
Victor Hugo's early literary understanding came from his father. "Leopold Hugo was
dominated by a crude sensuality, he nevertheless had a sort of flair that we might call
literary, though totally lacking in taste or discretion, a flair inherited and amplified
by Victor Hugo to proportions we well know" (Ionesco 12). Hugo had a falling out with his
father when he felt that he had abandoned him and his mother for a fling with a Spanish
countess. Hugo reconciled with his father before he died in the year 1828. This
relationship served to balance the loyalist fervor that he received from his mother. In
the years of 1829 to 1833 Hugo's work was erratic due to severe emotional difficulties
("Victor Hugo" 733). He received the literary ability from his biological father, however
his stepfather General Lahorie gave him the means to express himself, he taught him to
read and write. Hugo's mother affected his poetry more than anyone else due to the fact
that without her he would never have written any poetry in the first place. After his
mothers death in 1821 Hugo's poetry became more royalist in nature (734). This earned him
a royal pension and a place in the Legion of Honor (734).
Hugo's poetry is best defined by this quote, 
"Victor Hugo's poetry took many forms, from lyric to the epic to the 
elegiac. Along with this variety of forms, the range of the poets ideas 
expanded during his long career. From poems with political overtones, 
Hugo's poetry grew to exhibit tenets of romanticism. He wrote of more 
personal and intimate subjects such as family and love. He also wrote about 
mans relationship with the Creator. As Hugo matured, his themes became 
more philosophical and humanitarian and his self-appointed role became 
that of a poet-seer attempting to understand the mysteries of life and of 
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creation." ("Victor Hugo" 732)
Hugo's poetry often showed a wish for the revival of dead gods and the beauty they stood
for ("Victor Hugo" [2] 164) Victor Hugo once said "I believe in God far more than myself
........ I am more certain about the existence of God than myself" (161). The form of
Hugo's poetry was far more surprising than the content, he used alternative forms of
verse instead of the common form of the day Classical Alexandrine. He used forms of
verification such as octosyllabic lines. As his work progressed it began to show more
philosophical intent ("Victor Hugo" 735)
The poem "Regret" by Victor Hugo shows the melancholy attitude that was common in much of
his work after what he saw as his wife's betrayal. This is expressed in the line "Are we,
with many a grief to others known". This poem also expresses the mourning after his
father's death in the line "of that we mourn always". The poem Once More to Thee reflects
Hugo's conviction in the fact that God exists. This is shown in the line "A virgin pure,
to heaven thy soul brings". This poem also displays Hugo's melancholy attitude in the
line "When on my sorrows though hast shed thy light".
The poem "Regret" relates to Hugo's life in many ways. The poem shows his regret at his
wife's betrayal and his own slight regret that he is carrying on an affair in revenge for
what he believed that his wife had done wrong. "Regret" also reflects his life through
the fact that it speaks of "tender recollections" referring to his mother's love for him
and it says that they are "cherished long", this refers to his mother's death and how it
affected Hugo and how he thought often of her. 
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"Once More to Thee" also reflects his life. It contains references to God and show Hugo's
solid belief in God. This is shown in the lines "I seen to touch the temples sacred veil"
and "And say with Tobit to the Angel, 'Hail'". "Once More to Thee" also refers to his
mother. This is shown in the line "For all her days belong, O Lord, to thee".
"Regret" and "Once More to Thee" parallel in many ways. They both reference to Hugo's
sense of loss at his mother's death and they both refer to the perceived betrayal of his
wife. They both contain references to God and holy objects. They both refer to multiple
people, not objects or places, and their emotions.