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Although the medieval Paris is the background for this novel, it is closely linked to the French people’s lives and struggles of 1830s. This work is filled with the full-bodied modern atmosphere. The background of this novel also reveals the beauty and ugliness. The ugliness of the medieval society is witnessed by Hugo. The social turbulence makes Hugo disappointed with the capitalist society which is set up by the Bourgeois enlightenment thinkers. Under the dark autocracy, the writers are not allowed to criticize the reality. The social repression makes the writers change their creation to their heart. So the darkness and absolute monarchy of French society combine the romantic art with the ugliness perfectly. It undertakes the critical force of romanticism. And this novel Notre-Dame de Paris reflects this point through the form of tragedy.
2 The contrast of the figures in Notre-Dame de Paris
In the system of characters’ comparison, Gypsy Esmeralda undoubtedly is the central figure. Claude Frollo, Quasimodo, Pierre Gringoire and Phoebus are in a secondary position of this system. They show their own moral characters and personalities by their love to Esmeralda of different extents, different style and different natures, thereby it make a sharp contrast with Esmeralda.
2.1 The contrast between Esmeralda and Quasimodo
Esmeralda (born Agnes), the novel's main protagonist, is a beautiful young gypsy who is naturally compassionate and kind. She is the center of the human drama within the story. A popular focus of the citizens' attentions, she experiences their changeable attitudes, being first adored as an entertainer, and then hated as a witch, before being lauded again for her dramatic rescue by Quasimodo. When the King finally decides to put her to death, he does so in the belief that the Parisian mob wants her dead. She is loved by both Quasimodo and Claude Frollo, but falls deeply in love with Captain Phoebus, a handsome soldier who she believes will rightly protect her but who simply wants to seduce her. She is the only character to show the hunchback a moment of human kindness: as he is being whipped for punishment and jeered by a horrid rabble, she approaches the public stocks and gives him a drink of water. Because of this, he falls fiercely in love with her, even though she is too disgusted by his ugliness even to let him kiss her hand.
Quasimodo is the bell-ringer of Notre Dame, and a barely verbal hunchback. Despite the novel's English title, he is not the main protagonist of the story. Ringing the church bells has made him deaf. Abandoned as a baby, he was adopted by Claude Frollo. Quasimodo's life within the confines of the cathedral and his only two outlets - ringing the bells and his love and devotion for Frollo - are described. He ventures outside the Cathedral rarely, since people despise and shun him for his appearance. The notable occasions when he does leave are his taking part in the Festival of Fools - during which he is elected the Pope of Fools due to his perfect hideousness - and his subsequent attempt to kidnap Esmeralda, his rescue of Esmeralda from the gallows, his attempt to bring Phoebus to Esmeralda, and his final abandonment of the cathedral at the end of the novel. It is revealed in the story that the baby Quasimodo was left by the Gypsies in place of Esmeralda, whom they abducted.
Esmeralda and Quasimodo are the representatives of truth, kindness and beauty in this novel. The contrast of these two figures shows that the contrast between ugliness and beauty is in the appearance and the beauty is interlinked in the heart.
The bell-ringer Quasimodo looks ugly, even can be said that he is scary. The reason why this novel picks him to be the king of the fool is his appearance. In this novel, he is described as “His whole person was a grimace. A huge head, bristling with red hair; between his shoulders an enormous hump, a counterpart perceptible in front; a system of thighs and legs so strangely astray that they could touch each other only at the knees, and, viewed from the front, resembled the crescents of two scythes joined by the handles; large feet, monstrous hands.” He is regard as a giant who have been broken and badly put together again by others.