The Saviour :: Pointed Mercy - Deeply compassionate and deeply passionate of his beliefs.
Marius Pontmercy :: Mercy is the only member who is entirely based on the movie character rather than the book character (hence actually being a member of The Friends). For reasons. Like unmitigated loathing for book!Marius. Unmitigated.
The Chief :: Terrible Charm - The inspired leader; severe, a great and terrible beauty.
Enjolras :: Mostly from the book, adjusted to incorporate some elements from the movie - largely his entirely fabricated deep and abiding affection for Marius. And perhaps a touch of vulnerability.
Adapted Book Introduction: Enjolras, named first - later we will see why - was an only son and was rich. He was a charming young man, capable of being terrible. He was angelically beautiful. He was Antinous, wild. You would have said, seeing the thoughtful reflection of his eye, that he had already, in some preceding existence, been through the revolutionary apocalypse. He knew its tradition like an eyewit ness. He knew every little detail of that great thing. A pontifical and warrior nature, strange in a youth. He was officiating and militant; from the immediate point of view, a soldier of democracy; above the movement of the time, a priest of the ideal. He had a deep eye, slightly red lids, thick underlip, readily disdainful, and a high forehead. Much forehead in a face is like much sky in a horizon. Like certain young men early in this century and late in the last, who became illustrious in early life, he had an exceedingly youthful look, as fresh as a young girl's, though he had moments of pallor. Already a man, he still seemed a child. His twenty-two years appeared as seventeen; he was serious, he did not seem to know that there was a being on earth called woman. He had one passion only, justice; one thought only, to remove all obstacles. He was severe in his pleasures. Before anything but the Republic, he chastely dropped his eyes. He was the marble lover of liberty. His speech was roughly inspired and had the tremor of a hymn. He would spread his wings unexpectedly and astonish you by his soaring. Woe to the love affair that should venture to intrude on him! Had any grisette of the Place Cambrai or the Rue Saint-Jean-de Beauvais, seeing this college boy's face, the body of a page, long fair lashes, blue eyes, that hair flying in the wind, rosy cheeks, pure lips, exquisite teeth, felt a desire to taste all this dawn, and tried her beauty on Enjolras, a surprising and terrible look would have suddenly shown her the great gulf, and taught her not to confuse Beaumarchais's dashing cherubino with this fearsome cherubim of Ezekiel.
The Guide :: Illumination - Tender, serious, believer, motivator; he keeps them all afloat.
Combeferre :: Mostly from the book, but incorporates the exasperation that can happen when that derpy Marius is an important part of your movement that the movie introduces.
Adapted Book Introduction: Beside Enjolras who represented the logic of the Revolution, Combeferre represented its philosophy. Between the logic of the Revolution and its philosophy, there is this difference - that its logic could conclude in war, while its philosophy could only end in peace. Combeferre completed and corrected Enjolras. He was lower and broader. His desire was to instill into all minds the broad principles of general ideas; his motto was "Revolution, but civilization"; and he spread the vast blue horizon around the steep mountain. Hence, in all Combeferre's views, there was something attainable and practicable. Revolution with Combeferre was more possible than with Enjolras. Enjolras expressed its divine right and Combeferre its natural right. More than Enjolras, Combeferre lived the life of the world in general. Combeferre was gentle, as Enjolras was severe, from natural purity. He loved the word "citizen," but he preferred the word "man." He declared that the future was in the hands of the schoolmaster and busied himself with questions of education. He was learned, purist, precise, polytechnical, a hard student, and at the same time given to musing, "even chimeric," said his friends. Enjolras was a chief; Combeferre was a guide. You would have preferred to fight with the one and march with the other. Not that Combeferre was incapable of fighting; he did not refuse to grapple with an obstacle, and to attack it by main strength and by explosion, but gradually, by the teaching of axioms and the promulgation of positive laws, to put the human race in harmony with its destinies, pleased him better; and of the two lights, his inclination was rather toward illumination than conflagration. A fire would cause a dawn, undoubtedly, but why not wait for the break of day? A volcano illuminates, but the morning enlightens still better. Combeferre, perhaps, preferred the pure radiance of the beautiful to the flaming glory of the sublime. A light disturbed by smoke, an advance purchased by violence, only half satisfied this tender and serious mind. A headlong plunge of a nation into the truth, a 1793, startled him; but stagnation repelled him still more, he felt putrefaction in it and death... In short, he wanted neither halt nor haste. While his tumultuous friends, chivalrously devoted to the absolute, adored and asked for splendid revolutionary adventures, Combeferre inclined to let progress do her work - the good progress, cold, perhaps, but pure; methodical, but irreproachable; phlegmatic, but imperturbable. ''The good must be innocent," he repeated incessantly.
The Centre :: Take the Watch - A people's buck - and a ladies' buck if you know what he means.
Courfeyrac :: Book, mostly. With the schmoozing dialed all the way up to its natural conclusion. The fifteen mistresses part is not a fabrication. May include the movie-manufactured big-bro relationship with Gavroche if it plays out that way.
Adapted Book Introduction: Courfeyrac had a father whose name was M. de Courfeyrac. Courfeyrac did not wish to be backward, and called himself simply Courfeyrac. Concerning Courfeyrac, we might almost stop here, and merely say: for Courfeyrac, see Tholomyes. Courfeyrac did have that youthful animation that we might call a diabolic beauty of mind. In later life, this dies out, like the playfulness of the kitten, and all that grace ends, on two feet in the bourgeois, and on four paws in the mouser. This type of mind is transmitted from generation to generation of students, passed from hand to hand by the successive crops of youth, quasi cursores, nearly always alike, so that, as we have just indicated, any person who has listened to Courfeyrac in 1828 would have thought he was hearing Tholomyes in 1817. Except that Courfeyrac was a splendid fellow. Beneath the apparent similarities of the outer vivacity, there was great dissimilarity between Tholomyes and him. The latent man existing in each was in the first altogether different from what it was in the second. There was in Tholomyes an attorney, and in Courfeyrac a knight-errant. Enjolras was the chief, Combeferre was the guide, Courfeyrac was the center. The others gave more light, he gave more heat; the truth is that he had all the qualities of a center - roundness and radiance.
The Hypochondriac :: Ail - The healer fancies himself the patient, but remains the happiest of all.
Joly :: Book. Movie doesn't add anything that's especially different.
Adapted Book Introduction: Joly was studying medicine. He was two years younger than Bossuet. Joly was a young hypochondriac. What he had learned from medicine was to be a patient rather than a physician. At twenty-three, he thought himself in poor health and spent his time looking at his tongue in a mirror. He declared that man is a magnet, like the needle, and in his room he placed his bed with the head to the south and the foot to the north, so that at night his circulatory system would not be counteracted by the global magnetic current. In stormy weather, he took his pulse. Nonetheless, the gayest of all. All these inconsistencies, young, finicky, sickly, joyful, got along very well together, and the result was an eccentric agreeable person whom his comrades, prodigal with consonants, called Jolllly. "You can soar on four L's," [ailes, wings] said Jean Prouvaire. Joly had the habit of rubbing his nose with the end of his cane, an indication of a sagacious mind. [...] [Bossuet] as we know, lived more with Joly than elsewhere. He had a place to lay his head as the bird has a branch. The two friends shared everything, even to some degree Musichetta [a mistress]. They were what, among the Chapeau Brothers, are called bini [in a pair].
The Romantic :: Just Prevail - A hopeless romantic; a gentle soul who cultivates - flowers, amongst helpful things.
Jean Prouvaire :: Book.
Adapted Book Introduction: Jean Prouvaire was still a shade more subdued than Combeferre. He called himself Jehan, from that momentary little fancy that mingled with the deep and powerful movement giving rise to the study of the Middle Ages, then so necessary. Jean Prouvaire was addicted to love; he cultivated a pot of flowers, played the flute, wrote poetry, loved the people, pitied woman, wept over child hood, confused the future and God in the same faith, and blamed the Revolution for having cut off a royal head, that of Andre Chenier. His voice was usually delicate, but at times suddenly masculine. He was well read, to the point of erudition, and almost an orientalist. Above all, he was good, and, a very natural thing to one who knows how near goodness comes to grandeur, in poetry he preferred the grand. He was fond of strolling in fields of wild oats and bluebells and paid almost as much attention to the clouds as to passing events. His mind had two aspects - one facing man, the other, God; he studied, or he contemplated. All day he pondered over social questions: wages, capital credit, marriage, religion, liberty of thought, liberty of love, education, punishment, misery, association, property, production and distribution, the lower enigma that covers the human anthill with a shadow; and at night he gazed at the stars, those enormous beings. Like Enjolras, he was rich, and an only son. He spoke gently, bowed his head, cast down his eyes, smiled with embarrassment, dressed badly, had an awkward air, blushed at nothing, was very timid. Still, intrepid.
SEEKING!
The Generous :: (Feuilly)
Feuilly :: Looking for a suitable applicant! Maybe Zikwa, for the communal compassion and slight outsider look? Hopefully not Acha, as we're saving that for Gavroche, of the core characters.
Adapted Book Introduction: Feuilly was a fan-maker, an orphan, who arduously earned three francs a day, and who had one thought only, to deliver the world from its bonds. He had still another preoccupation-to teach himself, which he also called deliverance. He had taught himself to read and write; all that he knew, he had learned on his own. Feuilly had a generous heart. He had a wide embrace. This orphan had adopted the people. Being without a mother, he had meditated on his mother country. He was not willing for there to be any man on earth without a country. Within himself he nurtured, with the deep instinct of the man of the people, what we now call the idea of nationality. He had learned history expressly to base his indignation on a knowledge of its cause. In this youthful group of utopians particularly interested in France, he represented the outside. His specialty was Greece, Poland, Hungary, Rumania, and Italy. He spoke these names incessantly, to the point and beside the point, with the tenacity of the just cause. This poor workingman had made himself the teacher of justice, and she rewarded him by making him great. For in fact there is eternity in just causes.
SEEKING!
The Bold :: (Bahorel)
Bahorel :: Looking for a suitable applicant! Book has him as more of a bruiser, movie as more of a scrapper. Kiokote? Kimeti? Totoma? Flexible - just hopefully not Acha, as we're saving that for Gavroche, of the core characters.
Adapted Book Introduction: Bahorel was a creature of good humor and bad company, brave, a spendthrift, prodigal almost to the point of generosity, talkative almost to eloquence, bold almost to insolence; the best possible stock for the devil; with rash waistcoats and scarlet opinions; a wholesale blusterer, that is to say, enjoying nothing so much as a quarrel unless it were a riot, and nothing so well as a riot unless it were a revolution; always ready to break a flagstone, then tear up a street, then demolish a government, to see the effect it made; a student of the eleventh year. He had taken a sniff at the law but was not studying it. Whenever he passed by the law school, which rarely happened, he buttoned up his overcoat, and took hygienic precautions. In his studies he saw subjects for ditties, and in his professors opportunities for caricatures. Doing nothing, he ate up rather a large allowance, something like three thousand francs. His parents were country people, in whom he had succeeded in instilling a respect for their son. He said of them, "They are peasants and not bourgeois, which explains their intelligence." Bahorel, a capricious man, was very partial to several cafes; the others had habits, he had none. He loafed. To err is human, to loaf is Parisian. Ultimately, a penetrating tum of mind and more of a thinker than he seemed. He served as a bond between the Friends of the ABC and some other groups that were still formless, but were to take shape later.
SEEKING!
The Luckless :: (Bossuet)
Bossuet :: Looking for a suitable applicant! Could perhaps be named Luckless? Emphasised to be bald in the book, but the movie gave him a Beatles mop, so... uh. Flexible, but ideally bare-headed: perhaps Kimeti, hornless-Kimeti even, or Totoma? Hopefully not Acha, as we're saving that for Gavroche, of the core characters. Important note is that he's meant to be extremely close to Ail.
Adapted Book Introduction: In this conclave of young heads there was one bald member. The bald member of the club was son of Lesgle, or Legle, and signed his name Legle (de Meaux). His comrades, for the sake of brevity, called him Bossuet. Bossuet was a cheery fellow who was unlucky. His specialty was to succeed at nothing. On the other hand, he laughed at everything. At twenty-five he was bald. His father had died owning a house and some land; but he, the son, had found nothing more urgent than to lose this house and land in bad speculation. He had nothing left. He had considerable knowledge and wit, but he always miscarried. Everything failed him, everything deceived him; whatever he built up collapsed on him. If he split wood, he cut his finger. If he had a mistress, he soon discovered that he had also a friend [i.e. the 'mistress' turns out to be a transvestite]. Some misfortune was constantly happening to him; hence his joviality. Rarely astonished, since he was always expecting some accident, he took bad luck with serenity and smiled at the vexations of fate like one who hears a jest. He was poor, but his fund of good humor was inexhaustible. He soon reached his last sou, never his last burst of laughter. Met by adversity, he would greet that old acquaintance cordially, had a pat on the back for catastrophe; he was familiar enough with fate to call it by its nickname. "Good morning, evil Genius," he would say. These persecutions of fortune had made him inventive. He was very resourceful. He had no money but found means, when it pleased him, to go to "reckless expense." Bossuet was slowly making his way toward the legal profession. Bossuet never had much lodging, sometimes none at all. He sometimes stayed with one, sometimes another, most often with Joly. [...] Laigle de Meaux, as we know, lived more with Joly than elsewhere. He had a place to lay his head as the bird has a branch. The two friends shared everything, even to some degree Musichetta [a mistress]. They were what, among the Chapeau Brothers, are called bini [in a pair].
SEEKING!
The Skeptic :: (Grantaire)
Grantaire :: Looking for a suitable applicant! Could perhaps be named Grandeur? Grander? Emphasised to be extremely ugly in the book, but the movie failed to understand the literary importance of a foil, so looks are your-mileage-may-vary, just not even-better-looking-than-most-of-these-guys. Any breed, just not Acha as we're saving that for Gavroche, of the core characters. Important note is that he's supposed to be deeply but also deeply unrequitedly attached to Charm.
Adapted Book Introduction: Among all these passionate hearts and all these undoubting minds there was one skeptic. How did he happen to be there? Through juxtaposition. The name of this skeptic was Grantaire, and he usually signed with the rebus: R [grand-R]. Grantaire was a man who took great care not to believe anything. He was actually one of the students who had learned most during their stay in Paris; he knew the good places for everything. To top it off, a great drinker. He was particularly ugly; the prettiest shoe-stitcher of that time, annoyed by his ugliness, had declared, "Grantaire is impossible"; but Grantaire's self-esteem was not disconcerted. He stared tenderly at every woman, appearing to say about all of them: If only I wanted to; and trying to make his comrades believe that he was in general demand. All those words - rights of the people...humanity, civilization, religion, progress - were very nearly meaningless to Grantaire. Skepticism, that dry rot of the intellect, had not left one entire idea in his mind. He lived in irony. This was his axiom: The one certainty is a full glass. He ridiculed all dedication under all circumstances. A rover, a gambler, a libertine, and often drunk, he annoyed these young thinkers by incessantly singing "I loves the girls and I loves good wine" to the tune of "Vive Henri IV." Still, this skeptic had fanaticism; it was for a man: Enjolras. Grantaire admired, loved, and venerated Enjolras. A phenomenon often seen. A skeptic adhering to a believer is as simple as the law of complementary colors. What we lack attracts us. Grantaire, crawling with doubt, loved to see faith soaring in Enjolras. He needed Enjolras. Instinctively, he admired his opposite. Beside Enjolras Grantaire became somebody again. On his own, he was actually composed of two apparently incompatible elements. His mind dispensed with belief, yet his heart could not dispense with friendship. A thorough contradiction; for an affection is a conviction. This was his nature. There are men who seem born to be the opposite, the reverse, the counterpart. Grantaire, a true satellite of Enjolras, lived in this circle of young people; his delight was to see these forms coming and going in the haze of wine. He was tolerated for his good humor. Enjolras, being a believer, disdained this skeptic, and being sober, scorned this drunkard. He granted him a bit of haughty pity. Grantaire was an unaccepted Pylades. Always treated rudely by Enjolras, harshly repelled, rejected, yet returning, he said of Enjolras, "What a fine statue!"
