Part two of our novel is titled Cosette, but does not begin with her. The first book of part two is titled āWaterlooā, presumably a reference to the location and the famous battle that took place there in 1815, several years before our story. It was a surprising twist then when the first chapter featured a jump to 1861 and an autobiographical sketch of a recent time when Hugo found himself stumbling onto the famed Waterloo battlefield.
I think I can follow the general flow that brought us here, and it may not be completely random. As our last book wound down we got a couple of references to Napoleon. If we add those to some other references scattered across the first part of the novel we have had this backdrop of the run up to the French Revolution, the revolution itself, the aftermath of the revolution through Napoleonās defeat and on into the Bourbon Restoration. The backdrop itself is not detailed in any clear way, but it is present in the different attitudes and perspectives of some of the characters.
My take (and it may change as I read on, lol) at this point is that Hugo is stopping here to talk about Napoleonās defeat and the aftermath directly to try and frame up some of the events that will unfold through the rest of the book as well as providing a better frame for the attitudes and emotions our characters will be navigating.
If Iām honest I would rather continue on with the story or jump back to a Cosette POV, but Iām going to trust the process and see where Hugo takes us. Needless to say, this is NOT what I was expecting š.