Les Misérables, Book 2: The Fall, Chapter 1 summary

What happens

1. An exhausted traveler enters D——, visits the town hall, and asks for food and lodging at Jacquin Labarre’s inn.
2. Labarre sends a boy to the town hall, identifies the traveler as Jean Valjean, and orders him out.
3. A fishmonger alerts another tavern keeper, who also expels him; children throw stones, and the prison refuses him lodging.
4. A householder threatens him with a gun, and a dog drives him from a kennel he mistakes for shelter.
5. He leaves town, finds the countryside desolate, returns, and lies on a stone bench.
6. The Marquise de R—— gives him four sous and directs him to a small house beside the Bishop’s palace.

In this chapter

What to notice

Jean Valjean’s claim sums up his exhaustion and repeated rejection. The woman answers by showing him a door he has not tried.

Quick check