Oh interesting. That's not a connection I'd made -- I just sort of, you know, assumed the characters were students because that was an easy way to have them running around with a lot of free time to spend on radical politics. Which of course has to have been part of the reason, but it's certainly not the only way to accomplish that, and I hadn't realized it was actually a departure from what Hugo's social circle at the time was. (I figured they were mostly theoretically students while also being artists and radicals and slackers extraordinaire.)
I suppose some of them have to be bourgeois-background students in order to be compared with Marius? Both narratively, and for Marius to hook into their society (uh, insofar as he ever does). But you're right that they certainly don't all have to be, especially since Marius never really hooks into their society all that much.
I don't have any immediate answers or insight, but now I'm curious too.
This is a record number of words to say "I DUNNO, GOOD QUESTION."
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2014-03-28 02:58 pm (UTC)I suppose some of them have to be bourgeois-background students in order to be compared with Marius? Both narratively, and for Marius to hook into their society (uh, insofar as he ever does). But you're right that they certainly don't all have to be, especially since Marius never really hooks into their society all that much.
I don't have any immediate answers or insight, but now I'm curious too.
This is a record number of words to say "I DUNNO, GOOD QUESTION."