“Les Misérables” by Victor Hugo (post 6): Narrator reminds reader that protagonist, Jean Valjean, has dual personalities, “two knapsacks”

Earlier (see previous posts), the narrator described Jean Valjean as becoming “separated from himself” and as having internal dialogues. Now, the narrator reminds the reader that Jean Valjean has a dual personality:

“Jean Valjean had this peculiarity, that he might be said to carry two knapsacks; in one he had the thoughts of a saint, in the other the formidable talents of a convict. He helped himself from one or the other as occasion required” (1, p. 398).

Victor Hugo could have simply said that this saintly person still retained the skills he had learned as a convict. But, instead, after emphasizing the “peculiarity” of what he is about to say, he uses the metaphor of “two knapsacks,” by which he means that the saint and the convict are two distinct, but readily accessible, personalities.

1. Victor Hugo. Les Misérables [1862]. Trans. Charles E. Wilbour. New York, The Modern Library, 1992.