Les Misérables Volume 5, Chapter 6 Summary

Summary

The chapter places the reader in a secluded corner of Père-Lachaise cemetery, by an old wall beneath a great yew tree where wild convolvulus climbs and dandelions and mosses grow. The focus is a plain grave-stone, long and narrow, designed only to cover a man and lacking any ornament or engraved name. The description emphasizes the stone’s isolation: it lies away from paths, under high grass, and is avoided by passersby whose feet become wet if they venture there.

Hugo concentrates on the actions of time and weather: water, air, lichens, bird droppings and dampness slowly blacken and green the stone. In spring the place is alive with linnets and lizards, yet the stone itself receives little attention. Long ago someone wrote four lines in pencil on the stone; those lines have been gradually made illegible by rain and dust and are likely now effaced. The chapter ends by reproducing these four simple lines in French, a brief epitaph that evokes a life and its gentle disappearance into nature’s processes.

Key events

1. Setting introduced: secluded corner of Père-Lachaise under a yew tree
2. Plain stone described as long, narrow, unadorned, and nameless
3. Stone suffers weathering: dampness, lichens, bird defilement
4. Location is off-path and overgrown, avoided by visitors
5. Natural life (lizards, linnets, weeds) continues around the stone
6. A penciled four-line epitaph is gradually rendered illegible by rain and dust

Analysis

This short chapter functions as a quiet meditation on memory, oblivion, and the leveling power of nature and time. By zooming in on an anonymous, unremarkable grave, Hugo contrasts human attempts at commemoration with the slow erasure that follows: pencil fades, lichens spread, rain washes words away. The absence of a name emphasizes universality—this could be any man’s grave—and anticipates themes of anonymity, the fate of the poor or forgotten, and the humility of death. The setting in Père-Lachaise, a cemetery known for grand monuments, heightens the contrast between ostentation and this modest resting place.

Narratively, the chapter slows the novel’s pace, offering a contemplative pause that allows readers to reflect on loss without introducing characters or plot movement. The detailed sensory description (dampness, lichens, linnets, wet grass) grounds the abstract theme in physical images, turning the environment into an active agent of erasure. The penciled epitaph itself functions as a symbolic trace of human intimacy and poverty—written in pencil, not carved—signifying fragility of memory. The technique of close description and the final reproduction of the lines invite the reader to attend to what survives and what disappears, preparing the reader emotionally for the fates of characters who may be similarly neglected or remembered only fleetingly.

Important quotes

“That stone is no more exempt than others from the leprosy of time, of dampness, of the lichens and from the defilement of the birds.”

NarratorDescribes how time and the elements are gradually wearing away the plain grave-stone.

“It is not near any path, and people are not fond of walking in that direction, because the grass is high and their feet are immediately wet.”

NarratorExplains the stone's isolation and why it receives little human attention.

“Il dort. Quoique le sort fût pour lui bien étrange, Il vivait. Il mourut quand il n’eut plus son ange. La chose simplement d’elle-même arriva, Comme la nuit se fait lorsque le jour s’en va.”

Narrator (epitaph)The penciled four-line epitaph on the stone, reproduced to show the fragile trace of a life now being effaced by rain and dust.