Victor Hugo

In early 19th century France the paroled prisoner Jean Valjean seeks redemption, regains his social standing, and rises to the rank of mayor. He encounters a beautiful but desperately ill woman named Fantine and cares for her daughter, Cosette, after her death. All the while he is obsessively pursued by the policeman Javert, who vows to make him pay for the crimes of his past.

Three hundred and forty-eight years, six months, and nineteen days ago to-day, the Parisians awoke to the sound of all the bells in the triple circuit of the city, the university, and the town ringing a full peal. The sixth of January 1482, is not, however, a day of which history has preserved the memory. There was nothing notable in the event, which thus set the bells and the bourgeois of Paris in a ferment from early morning. It was neither an assault...

"Fighting between the newly formed French Republic and bands of Royalists has torn the countryside apart. Along the coast of Brittany, a formidable force led by the Marquis de Lantenac is starting to make gains against the Blues, threatening the Revolution itself. Sent by Danton and Robespierre, Gauvain must defeat Lantenac, a distant relative. Ninety-Three is a novel by Victor Hugo."--

Quasimodo ventures from his tower to the joyous festival of fools, but the crowd turns cruel and rejects him because of the way he looks. The gypsy Esmeralda rescues him and he finds himself battling to save the people and the city he loves--while reminding us to see people as they are rather than how they appear.

In medieval Paris, Quasimodo, the hunchbacked bellringer of Notre Dame Cathedral, struggles to save the gypsy dancer Esmeralda from being unjustly executed. Illustrated notes throughout the text explain the historical background of the story.

Academy award winner Charles Laughton stars as Quasimodo, the deformed bell-ringer of Notre Dame and Maureen O'Hara is Esmeralda, the beautiful gypsy he adores.