Les Misérables, Book 4: The Gorbeau Hovel, Chapter 1 summary

What happens

1. The narrator follows an imagined traveler through a deserted-looking district to a large, shabby house with conflicting street numbers.
2. The house contains a steep staircase, damaged windows, dark passages, and rooms resembling animal stalls.
3. An anecdote explains how Louis XV changes Corbeau’s name to Gorbeau, which local tradition connects with the house.
4. Nearby streets and barriers carry associations with murders, condemned prisoners, and the scaffold.
5. Darkness makes the bleak boulevard frightening, while summer twilight brings elderly women who beg.
6. The railway and growing traffic reshape the neighborhood, and paving marks its increasing connection with Paris.

Quick check