{"id":6564,"date":"2019-08-09T17:10:43","date_gmt":"2019-08-09T15:10:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/?p=6564"},"modified":"2025-09-12T15:12:21","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T13:12:21","slug":"victor-hugo-im-exil-laurent-paturaud-und-esther-gil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/2019\/08\/victor-hugo-im-exil-laurent-paturaud-und-esther-gil\/","title":{"rendered":"Victor Hugo: Im Exil \u2022 Laurent Paturaud und Esther Gil"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

I love the great novels of the world-famous French authors, above all the literary heavyweight Victor Hugo, who will forever remain in my memory for Les Mis\u00e9rables<\/em> (which I reviewed here<\/a>). For political reasons, Victor Hugo had to flee France and chose the Channel Island of Jersey as his first place of exile, later moving to the neighboring island of Guernsey. It was there that the wonderful book Toilers of the Sea<\/em> was written, which is set on Guernsey, and which I really enjoyed and also reviewed on lesestunden<\/a>. When I discovered the graphic novel Victor Hugo: Im Exil<\/em> in the Splitter Verlag catalogue, it was immediately clear that I had to read it. In this post, you can see what awaits you with this graphic novel.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

In 1843, shortly after her marriage, Victor Hugo\u2019s daughter L\u00e9opoldine drowned together with her husband when their boat capsized on the Seine. A tragedy that stands at the center of this graphic novel, whose story begins ten years later on the island of Jersey. During a s\u00e9ance, Victor Hugo\u2019s deceased daughter appears to him, urging him to uncover the truth behind her death. Despite the dangers, Victor Hugo returns to France to confront his past. While the drama surrounding his daughter\u2019s death is true, the search for an explanation for this tragedy is purely fictional.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The whole setting\u2014Paris, the Channel Islands, 19th-century France\u2014is very familiar to me from numerous novels, so I was very curious to experience these places visually. The mostly dark but clear and expressive illustrations really matched my imagination, especially of Paris, with its old houses and narrow streets. I found the drawings of the Channel Islands and the sea particularly beautiful\u2014conveyed very authentically and atmospherically powerful. That\u2019s exactly how I imagine the rough sea, but also the vastness of the ocean, as Victor Hugo stands on the coast gazing into the distance\u2014this is depicted repeatedly and effectively throughout.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The story itself moves at a rather moderate pace and doesn\u2019t really have any action scenes. But I had expected that\u2014the plot isn\u2019t designed for it. There are, of course, moments with a bit more movement, but what I especially liked were the dialogues and the delicate drawings of the various locations, as well as of Victor Hugo\u2019s beautiful lover. After all, he was said to have had quite a few affairs.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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The political situation of that time under the rule of Napoleon III is beautifully depicted (that was the little Napoleon, not the real Napoleon Bonaparte), who, after the February Revolution of 1848, seized power, declared himself president for life, and was a declared opponent of Victor Hugo. There\u2019s also a subplot that illustrates the morals of the time through an example and provides a look at how ruthless the country\u2019s political elite was. I especially enjoyed this political aspect of the graphic novel, as these were very turbulent times for France\u2014and for all of Europe\u2014because much of what defines modern democracies today finds its roots in the French Revolution and the years that followed.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Laurent Paturaud is a French illustrator who also drew the comic series Succubus<\/em>, which was also published by Splitter Verlag. I really liked his illustrations and felt that he stayed very true to the historical references in his characters and settings, which lends the book a strong sense of authenticity. In a detailed appendix, the reader learns more about the creation of the book and can also view numerous concept sketches\u2014an extra that I always love in comics and graphic novels, as it provides an insight into the creative process, and in the end, each book is truly a small work of art in itself.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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Conclusion: <\/strong>This graphic novel tells a fictional story set during Victor Hugo\u2019s time in exile and portrays his search for the causes of his daughter\u2019s death. Embedded in a historical context, the story entertains the reader well and tells a narrative that, while not emotionally overwhelming, finds its strength particularly in the beautifully and authentically drawn settings and characters. I especially liked Jersey as the backdrop and the political references to this turbulent era in which France found its path to democracy and, in doing so, swept all of Europe along with it. This graphic novel is a must-read for anyone who, like me, has devoured the great novels of that time and wants to take a visual journey into post-revolutionary France.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Book Information: <\/strong>Victor Hugo: Im Exil \u2022 Laurent Paturaud and Esther Gil \u2022 Splitter Verlag \u2022 120 pages \u2022 ISBN 9783962193003<\/p>\r\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I love the great novels of the world-famous French authors, above all the literary heavyweight Victor Hugo, who will forever remain in my memory for Les Mis\u00e9rables (which I reviewed here). For political reasons, Victor Hugo had to flee France and chose the Channel Island of Jersey as his first place of exile, later moving … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Victor Hugo: Im Exil \u2022 Laurent Paturaud und Esther Gil”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6961,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"slim_seo":{"title":"Victor Hugo: Im Exil \u2022 Laurent Paturaud und Esther Gil - lesestunden","description":"Ich liebe die gro\u00dfen Romane der weltbekannten franz\u00f6sischen Autoren, allen voran dem literarische Schwergewicht Victor Hugo, der alleine f\u00fcr Die Elenden (die ic"},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"_slim_seo_primary_term_category":0,"_slim_seo_primary_term_post_tag":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[158,20],"tags":[202,201,203],"class_list":["post-6564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-graphic-novel-and-comic","category-reviews","tag-esther-gil","tag-laurent-paturaud","tag-splitter"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/victor_hugo_im_exil_beitrag_neu.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6564"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6564\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11096,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6564\/revisions\/11096"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}