Bienvenue à Marseille | 2025 The Count of Monte Christo, read-a-long

[AgualusasLover]

Following the success of the continuing Dickensalongs, Fallen Women and various other classics, please join The Count of Monte Christo read-a-long, kicking off on 1 January 2025.

The ultimate tale of revenge, with swashbuckling, chicanery and bare faced lies - The Count of Monte Christo has it all.

Editions: most important point is an unabridged version, coming in at just over 1,200 pages. This thread discusses the various translations – the Penguin Classics, trans by Robin Buss is very popular and the one I am reading but what you have already is likely fine and the nuances of translation are always fun to discuss.

What’s the best translation of The Count of Monte Cristo? • We Love Translations

I’ve been thinking about the best way to read-a-long. There have been red-alongs by the day, in chunks and every which way.

I think we have two options:

There are 118 chapter and my proposal is we do one a day, starting on 1 January, 2025. (W&P and all the Fallen Women books worked well this way)

We could also convene weekly e.g. no spoilers until Sunday and read it as it was released, in 18 parts c.65 pages per week. (I remember The Woman in White worked well this way and so do the Dickensalongs)

For now, I have assumed a chapter a day as it has served us well so far, if the majority strongly object, I have put placeholders in my copy breaking it down and can update in readiness for January.

Schmoop very handily has chapter by chapter breakdowns. Here is the Intro https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/count-of-monte-cristo/

MN meet up in Marseille 2025!

To be fair to Villefort, it's rather more nuanced than that. He does seem to want the marriage to show that old enmity between the families is over.

I don't think anyone else knows that his father was actually the assassin though.

This is the bit of the chapter that I was thinking of, @TonTonMacoute :

'A mysterious business,' said Villefort. 'The murderers have never been identified, although many people were suspected.'

Noirtier made such an effort that his lips were almost contracted into a smile.

'However,' Villefort went on, 'the guilty parties, those who know that they committed the crime and who may be subject to human justice in their lives and divine justice when they are dead, would be happy indeed to be in our place, with a daughter whom they could offer to Monsieur Franz d'Epinay, to extinguish even the merest glimmer of suspicion.'

Although Noirtier is the guilty party here and not Villefort himself, we have seen before how far Villefort has gone in order to preserve his own reputation. Every time he starts talking about 'justice', there's the dramatic irony of his own deliberate perversions of justice.

The French passage repeats 'soupcon' twice. I suspect (!) it's not just Villefort wanting his father to be free of suspicion; he wants to be free of suspicion himself, through association as it were.

Perhaps it's because it seems so deeply flawed as a strategy to me that I'm reading more into it.

If I was Noirtier I would take the view that I had nothing to lose at this point, and would confess to being the assassin.

In today's chapter, Villefort's reference to 'old rumours' that he has 'tried to suppress' is significant. He wants to erase all traces of shady dealings that reflect on his squeaky clean reputation. Seems far fetched!

Good point, Fuzzy. Tonton, I do agree that Villefort's strategy seems deeply flawed/farfetched. Maybe Franz's high social status is the primary reason Villefort is so keen on the marriage, and the hope of hushing up rumour is only secondary. But the novel does suggest that the desire to hush up rumour is also a motivation. (Plausibility does not seem to be a big concern for Dumas, as we have noted before, ha. The novel is full of unlikely coincidences.)

Noirtier is a great character though and I'm enjoying how he is managing to exercise power purely via expressions and eye movements! The grandfather / granddaughter relationship is also well done. The tough old man with a dodgy past and the beautiful, caring young woman are an unusual pairing, but that makes it all the more more effective.

It's also interesting to learn in today's chapter that Noirtier is really a Jacobin revolutionary at core, more than a pure Bonapartist. That shores up his left-wing credentials.

So I've just finished the Telegraph, which I believe is today's chapter.

So how would TCOMC know that Nortier killed Franz's father because I think that he does?

He's planing the seed of unfairness on the current Mme Villefort. Marital tensions are going to rise in that household!

And let's talk about Edouard, he's an evil little fella isn't he ? Every time he crops up he's engaging in cruel activities, in this chapter poisoning birds.

Is this supposed to be 'like father like son?'. He couldn't be more different from the lovely Valentine and her relationship with her grandfather makes me warm to Noirtier even though we know he's a murderer.

Really getting back into the story now, I didn't really engage with the Rome bit if I'm honest.

I’m not sure he does know that Noirtier killed Quesnel.. but maybe he has just joined the dots. He knows Villefort locked him up protecting his father (for the letter). If he had heard the rumours that Villefort alluded to, maybe he remembered that the address on the letter was round the corner from where Quesnel ended up in the Seine, and put two and two together. After all, he has had ten years to do some sleuthing..

Villefort is such an interesting character though. He has desperately wanted to do the right thing and be lauded for it, but the actions he has taken have been to protect his loved ones. They are terrible actions, but he is not entirely unsympathetic.

Noirtier is a great character though and I'm enjoying how he is managing to exercise power purely via expressions and eye movements!

The bit where Mme de Villefort asks if he would like her darling Édouard to come and visit him is priceless!

I think that I'm forgetting that this is just a rip snorting good yarn, and that quite a lot of things that happen are totally preposterous and don't really stand up to close inspection. Edmond does seem to have supernatural powers when it comes to finding people's weak spots.

I’m not sure about Villefort. I think as a young man, he was genuinely worried for his father, but he could have burnt the letter and let Edmond go. I assume he didn’t know if Edmond knew the contents or not and that led him where it did.

I read Valentine’s betrothal as a bit of an ‘up yours ’ to the old man, demonstrating his power, rather than a protective action - a sort of punishment for the stress and angst he must have lived as someone who wanted to prosper in France with a Bonapartist father.

Maybe I’ve read entirely too much into it.

I haven’t read the last few pages of messages - I’ve fallen about a week behind the rest of you, ‘cos… well, life stuff 🙄

I’ve popped up because I have a week off work next week, so will be getting caught up shortly, I’ll be damned if I get over half way through, just to flounder whilst the revenge is getting properly going! 👋

That makes sense, @AgualusasLover . There's no love lost between Villefort and his father, that's for sure.

I would read a good bit of Villefort fan fiction to be honest.

I will be back later with next week’s chapters.

we’ve also met almost everyone on my character chart, just one person/relationship has not been revealed, then I can share the diagram I found online which is really helpful.

I am sad to say I'm bowing out. I've fallen too far behind and I've lost the thread of it and don't know what's going on

Thanks for doing this though @AgualusasLover

Ah sorry to hear that @EineReiseDurchDieZeit - it is a particularly confusing read I think, with all the characters etc.

see you for the next one, hopefully.

We will miss you @EineReiseDurchDieZeit but enjoy your other reading!

Sooo…

Monday
How to rescue a Gardner from dormice who are eating his peaches
‘Not the same evening, as he had said, but the following morning …’

Tuesday
Ghosts
’At first sight, on the outside, the house in Auteuil had none of the splendour…’

Wednesday
Dinner (I’m sure we’ve all been waiting)
’it was clear that all the guests experienced the same feeling as they went into the dining room.’

Thursday
The Beggar
’The evening went on. Mme de Villefort …’

Friday
A Domestic Scene
’The three young men had separated …’

Saturday
Marriage Plans
’The day after this scene…’

Break

Ooh good chapter today! It’s all starting to come together…

Sets the scene nicely for the dinner party, modern soaps have nothing on this set up!

I enjoyed La Baronne Danglars virtual eye rolls at the stupid things her husband says.

Got muddled and read Tuesday's and Wednesday's chapters in the wrong order. Checked the chapter outline (thank you AgualusasLover) and put them the right way round and read them again.

These are very, very good! I really enjoyed the intrigue. Very satisfying.

All the best! Are you going to watch the film at some stage?

@FuzzyCaoraDhubh

Planning on it bug haven't found it for free yet

I am at exactly the right place and can't wait to read Dinner tomorrow (and then come here and have it all explained to me)

Loved the chapter title for Monday having now read it! Looking forward to Dinner..

Well. I just looked at the character table and am not surprised I can't keep up.

I'm enjoying that some people are noticing their past exploits catching up to them and are worried about it. I also really want to how exactly the revenge will take place. Some big show down? Or will he set wheels in motion and ride off as everyone's businesses fall apart?

I continue to be uneasy cheering for the Count. I don't think he has much integrity and it's interesting to see how absolutely entitled the wealth has made him. Had his story continued as it started he would never have been this rich and able to get live fish carried across continents.