Summer Reading Assignment: An Example of Storytelling

For this summer reading assignment, I read The Hunchback Of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. I choose The Hunchback of Notre-Dame because I have already read Victor Hugo's Les Miserables and I knew I liked his writing style. I roughly knew the plot due to the Disney movie, and I wanted to read the book to get the real deal, so to speak. Contrary to what most people would think, the book is not at all like the Disney movie rendition. The plot is thicker and more convoluted, the characters darker and more complex, plus there are a lot more characters crucial to the plot.


The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is a story about a gypsy (La Esmeralda), a priest (Archdeacon Claude Frollo), a captain (Phoebus), a poet (Gringoire) and of course the hunchbacked bell-ringer (Quasimodo). Hugo forms a twisted love triangle that is more like a diamond or a pentagon; all the men in the story centered around La Esmeralda. Their love comes in different forms, from infatuation to obsession. Gringoire is La Esmeralda's husband, according to the gypsy and thief underworld. Frollo fell in lust with La Esmeralda and convinces Quasimodo to help him kill her in the beginning of the book, then Captain Phoebus rescues La Esmeralda and she falls in love with him. Phoebus is also lustful after La Esmeralda, and he uses her love for him to try and seduce her. Quasimodo is also in love with La Esmeralda, but acts only as her protector while she hides in the towers of Notre-Dame.

It is a thoroughly confusing and twisted love affair, but I believe that is partly what makes the book an example of excellent storytelling. Love and lust are human emotions that we can all understand and relate to, and the characters are believable in their actions and we can empathize. We can also believe in the circumstances throughout the story due to the descriptiveness and sense of reality of the story. Hugo is also a wonderful narrator, bringing you into Paris in the late 1400s by his descriptions of the city, the architecture, as well as a full-blown history of the growth of the city. Due to the overall believability of the story and characters, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is an excellent novel, and its strength and life throughout the centuries proves that.

Hugo establishes the setting of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame through elaborate descriptions of Paris, in 1482 through to the 1882, when he wrote the book. He describes Paris through a bird's eye view, separating and explaining the three separate parts of the city and telling how each came to be. In addition to being accurate with the names of the buildings and more factual information, Hugo also describes Paris on a macro scale, giving an overview and general feel for the city and its inhabitants. He writes, "the spectator perceived immediately two long parallel streets, without break or interruption, crossing the three cities, nearly in a right line, from one end to the other, from south to north...incessantly pouring the people of the one into the other, connecting, blending, them together and converting the three into one." Just from this one sentence, he shows the busyness of Paris and the sheer size of the populace. By this alone, the reader not only knows the city as buildings, but also feels apart of the city, feels like one of those people walking on the streets.

The characters in The Hunchback of Notre-Dame also add to the complexity and believability of the story through their actions and relatability. These characters are simply human, with strengths and weaknesses just like us. They fall prey to their emotions and act irresponsibly yet understandably, especially Frollo when it comes to La Esmeralda. For example, when he stabs Phoebus after following him to the house where he is wooing La Esmeralda. Frolla is watching Phoebus and La Esmeralda through cracks in the wall when "an extraordinary commotion took place within him...the face of the unhappy man closely pressed against the crevices of the door [looked like] the face of a tiger looking through the bars of a cage at some jackal devouring a gazelle. His eye flamed like a candle through the chasms." Frollo falls prey to his rage and breaks into their room, stabbing Phoebus in the back and leaving La Esmeralda there to take the blame, which would seem cruel to leave the one you thought you loved in that situation, it a reaction we can all understand. That is what makes The Hunchback of Notre-Dame such a good book; the depth and quality of its characters.

Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is an example of excellent storytelling because of Hugo's great ability to write, the descriptiveness of Paris, the characters that are human in their choice and therefore able to be understood. Overall, those three characteristics create a world where we can fall into easily and leave our own world to enter Paris in the 1400s. The idea of suspension of disbelief is a necessary quality and characteristic for any piece of fiction, and the Paris of Notre-Dame, Quasimodo, Frollo, Phoebus and La Esmeralda is inviting and waiting for the reader to jump in and experience the story with the characters.

Top Ten Most Memorable Books

These are somewhat in order, but at the same time I just like the idea to counting down from 10 instead of counting up to 10.

10. The Circle of Magic series by Tamora Pierce. I love the idea that magic can be found in everyday, seemingly mindless and endless tasks, such as work with plants, metals, thread and the weather. When you look at your regular day to day activity, there really is an almost magical quality in the way certain things fit together that we will never understand. 

9. A Tree Grows In Brooklyn by Betty Smith. I read this book in middle school and even though I'm sure I would get something totally different out of it if I read it now, it still left a lasting impression on me. To read and experience a book that is somebody's life as they grow up, to see and understand what they are going through, and to realize that many situations can never change throughout the centuries for young girls/ women no matter where they are. 

8. The Dark Tower series by Stephen King. I read these books throughout the course of last year. The plot on the outside is simply an action/adventure/romance book, but it is far more than that. King deals with time paradoxes and time travel, as well as touching issues such as the end of our world due to wars and the environment. However, the most important thing that I got out of the book was his idea of karma and fate. 

7. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. As well as being an excellent musical, the actual story is mesmerizing and exciting, recounting the French Revolution through the eyes of lovers, and I know this is totally cheesy, it proves that love can withstand everything. 

6. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. I read this book on the plane ride to China spring of my sophomore year. This is an eerie novel that deals with afterlife and the ability for those who have died to influence and see everything and everyone they left behind. This book changed my view of what happens after we die, which wasn't hard to do because I didn't have a finite belief before reading this book. This book also deals with every day-to-day experiences and adversities, and I believe that everyone can relate to those. 

5. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I also read this on the school China trip, on the plane and in my room during down time. As much as a classic as this book is, I love the stories and adventures of Sherlock Holmes. He is utterly brilliant and the jumps and connections he makes are absolutely wonderful and ingenious. This book allows you to escape where you are and you can lose yourself in the book and adventure. 

4. Harry Potter books by J. K. Rowling. I knew these books would make this list. They are beautifully written and the characters are superb, and along with the allure of magic, the books are excellent. As I grew up reading the books and growing up with the characters, the troubles they have in their personal lives hit notes within me a lot of the time, and the strength and courage all the characters show in the face of adversity is inspiring. 

3. Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. While some may not pick their junior year ID book to put on this list, I definitely do. John Steinbeck is a wonderful, amazing writer. He is so descriptive, both in the settings of his novel and the characters. 

2. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. This story about a family of four sisters, and all that happens to them over the years hits your emotions hard. They are so sweet and it seems as though these things shouldn't be happening to them, and yet they do. This book teaches us how to live through adversity with grace and poise, always relying on those closest to you. 

1. Marry Poppins by P. L. Travers. All of them. These books, as well as being the basis for Disney's Mary Poppins, teach us all life lessons in manners and ethics through her wonderful stories. I was introduced to them by the act of bed time reading, and fell in love with them on the spot. We are brought back to a time when we were younger, the age of the children in the books, and remember what is was like to be that young, with no pre-conceived notions about how things should be. These books combine the magical with the reality, folk tales from all over the world with a British suburb into a wonderful story about a family with a nanny. 

Comments on Summer Reading: "The English Patient"

"Give me a map and I'll build you a city. Give me a pencil and I will draw you a room in South Cairo, desert charts on the wall. Always the desert was among us. I could wake and raise my eyes to the map of old settlements along the Mediterranean coast--Gazala, Tobruk, Mersa Matruh--and south of that the hand-painted wadis, and surrounding those the shades of yellowness that we invaded, tried to lose ourselves in."


The English Patient. A desert explorer who is being treated by a Canadian nurse in an abandoned Italian hospital. He slowly tells of his life in the desert and his love of the desert. The reason I chose this quote as an example of excellent storytelling is the descriptive nature of the quote. This quote is easily an example of the amount of detail of words that weave together the novel. There is just enough detail in his quote and that the reader can feel the patient's love and passion for the desert and exploring. The reader is left to his or her own imagination of the desert, which is the key for excellent storytelling. The words in the novel give parameters and meaning, but the reader fills in the detail, which is why everyone reads a book differently, sees characters differently, or sees settings differently. A good story lets readers add their own experiences to the story and lets readers help make the story their own, lets readers add a bit of themselves into the story. That is why The English Patient is such a good book. It is extremely detailed and amazingly descriptive. You can escape into the desert, or Cairo, or the abandoned Italian hospital, almost as though you are standing next to the characters themselves. That is what excellent storytelling is all about. Allowing others to escape into a land that you created and letting them help shape and experience your world for themselves.