A quick rundown of what we know about Amis and their families, book-canon specific, for people looking for fic reference!
Standard disclaimer: this is a reference, not a rulebook. Use it if it’s useful for you, ignore it if it isn’t!
Most of it’s from 3.4.1:
Their politics have nothing to do with their parents at all, in any direction:
“According to the flesh, their fathers were, or had been, Feuillants, Royalists, Doctrinaires; it hardly mattered; this earlier hurly-burly had nothing to do with them.” (FMA translation).
(according to the flesh=their biological fathers, not metaphorical, philosophical,etc)
Enjolras and Prouvaire are wealthy and only children
Courfeyrac avoids using the de that’s part of his family name, and which has traditionally indicated some kind of aristocracy (think Marquis de Lafayette)
Feuilly’s parents are either dead or totally vanished
Bossuet’s father is dead; very likely his mother too; he’s gotten and lost his inheritance already
Bahorel’s managed to get his parents’ respect, somehow, and : “He said of them: ‘They are peasants and not bourgeois; which explains their intelligence.’ “
Later, in Preliminary Gayeties, we have Grantaire claiming his father despised him because Grantaire is bad at math. There’s no way of knowing how accurate this is; all the above claims about the other Amis’ folks are bolstered by the narration in some way, but we only have Grantaire’s word on the math thing, and he’s an arguably unreliable narrator at the point where he says it. But there it is!
And that’s it! Let me know if anyone needs specific quotes, wants more era reference, possible Real History background info on anything, etc.
These are the canon mentions; I’ve kept speculation to a minimum, and made my best guess as to chronology when Hugo gets confusing.
So ! Starting in 1828! (3.4) -1828: Marius leaves Gillenormand’s house, meets Bossuet and Courfeyrac. Spends some while getting to know the Amis (it was way more than ONE meeting; he was hanging out with them and walking around town with them in various groups for a while). Exactly how long this all was is vague; at any rate it comes to an end with the Napoleon debate, and Marius stops going to the cafe Musain while he has his crisis of (political) faith.
-Marius stops living in the hotel Porte-Saint-Jacques with Courfeyrac, because it’s too expensive. Courfeyrac helps Marius sell his old clothes and find work; enough to keep living.
1828 (-1831) -Marius moves into the Gorbeau house. During this time, he sees Enjolras and the others only very rarely; he sees Courfeyrac the most, and he sees Courfeyrac once or twice a month. (3.5.3, 3.5.5).
– 1830 -the July Revolution “satisfies” Marius politically. Presumably, the Amis participated; but we hear nothing else about their particular involvement. -Marius is running away from women because he’s self-conscious and thinks they’re laughing at him. Courfeyrac teases him for it. -Marius isn’t running away from Cosette in the Garden, because he doesn’t think of her as a woman. Hugo is being problematic. (ETA: And Courfeyrac IS running away from Cosette in the garden, because he doesn’t want to flirt with her. Since Cosette is 14 here and Courfeyrac is in his 20s, I am okay with that, but it can still be considered kinda ??)
-1831
-Marius first falls in love with Cosette. Courfeyrac sees him out on the street in his new clothes. – Marius has dinner with Courfeyrac and some friends, and invites Courfeyrac out to the theater; the next day he has lunch with Courfeyrac, Prouvaire, and some of their friends. September -Marius, looking for Cosette, goes to the Bal de Sceaux with Courfeyrac, Prouvaire, Grantaire and Bossuet. Aside from that, he’s living “ more alone than ever.” (3.8.1) Winter -The Gorbeau Raid. Bossuet and Courfeyrac see Marius on the street, but Courfeyrac vetoes the idea of following him. Following the raid itself, Marius moves in with Courfeyrac, now living in the Rue de Verrerrie, the better to revolution (and having moved out of the Latin Quarter–we aren’t told just when.).Sometime between then and Spring of 1832, Marius starts borrowing money from Courfeyrac; Courfeyrac never asks about it.
1832 (ETA before someone thinks I just forgot:Enjolras and His Lieutenants happens in here, with the mention of Marius as having stopped coming around/being too distracted. Left it out at first because they don’t actually interact there, but here it is JUST IN CASE.)
Spring- Marius is still living with Courfeyrac, and now he’s visiting Cosette. Marius makes a habit of staying out at odd hours; Courfeyrac is at home enough to notice it.
June- Welp.
(speculation on the Amis and what they’re up to in this gap is another post! I will get to it.:D)
Sharing this with everyone else in the Les Miserables community who might find such resources useful, and who has not yet encountered this book. 😉 I mean, hey, this book was published in 1837. It has descriptions of places, prices of things, routes, statistics, faculties, subjects and lecturers at the schools and academies…
les misérables + main places || (pictures are not mine)
la place de la bastille: square in paris where “la prison de la bastille” stood until its destruction in 1789 during the french revolution. in the novel, it’s the site of napoleon’s elephant.
la rue des filles du calvaire (trad. the street of the ordeal’s daughters/girls): marius’s grandfather’s house. it’s situated in the north-east of the 3rd arrondissement of paris.
l’église saint-paul saint-louis: church where marius and cosette were married. situated in the marais quarter of paris (4th arrondissement).
rue de la verrerie: marius & courfeyrac’s apartment.
“la barricade de la liberté”: also the corinthe. situated rue mondétour and rue rambuteau. it’s where the barricade was built in the novel.
quai des gesvres: place where javert committed suicide. in the novel, he didn’t jump from a bridge but from an embankment. from his point of view, we can see notre-dame in the background.
café musain: doesn’t exist anymore. it was situated boulevard saint-michel.
rue plumet: exist under another name now: “rue oudinot”. where jean valjean lived while raising cosette. number #55 doesn’t exist: the musical invented it. it’s hard to tell where valjean’s house could have been situated.
(ETA: And Courfeyrac IS running away from Cosette in the garden, because he doesn’t want to flirt with her. Since Cosette is 14 here and Courfeyrac is in his 20s, I am okay with that, but it can still be considered kinda ??)
eirenical17 