One of Victor Hugo's most famous novels, "The Man Who Laughs," alongside "Les Misérables" and "The Hunchback of Notre-Dame," is undoubtedly one of the masterpieces of 19th-century French literature. It seems to have everything: an atmosphere of mystery, magnificent pages dedicated to English history, a shipwreck, a child abandoned under mysterious circumstances, ruthless bandits, a strange document found in a sealed bottle on the seashore, a blind beauty, a misanthropic benefactor, a pet wolf, and a romantic hero (the influence of his image on subsequent art is hard to overestimate; one only needs to recall, for example, the Joker with his eerie grin). Gwynplaine's appearance is horrific: a "mouth stretching to his ears," a misshapen nose, and a face "that one could not look at without laughing," yet his life path, full of incredible adventures, will not leave any reader indifferent.
In this edition, the novel is accompanied by magnificent illustrations by French artists Georges Rochegrosse and Daniel Vierge.
Author: Victor Hugo
Illustrations: Antoine Georges Rochegrosse, Daniel Vierge
Translation: Benedikt Livshits
Pages: 704 (offset). Hardcover
Dimensions: 217x145x36 mm
Series: Foreign Literature. Big Books
