Does "The Three Musketeers" disgust anyone else?

[MelanieD]

Hi, d'Artagnan still sits tight in French imagination, shapes little boys into what you think is French: cocky, arrogant, presumptious. And believe me, most Frenchmen do have mistresses and many women have lovers, at least among the well-to-do classes.
Apart from this, Caspian's is my opinion: Dumas a third class writer for kids.

[stevey]

Cheating was essentially a fad of the upper and middle classes at that time, "Courtly Love". Almost everyone was sleeping with someone else. There was a very etiquette surrounding it that people were expected to follow (hence the long description about women giving their lovers gifts), and it was all considered an innocent and entertaining past-time. Remember that people were mostly marrying for circumstance (like each of the musketeers hoping to meet a wealthy woman who could take care of their needs) and so it was believed that hearth, home, and welfare were shared with one's spouse, and love with one's lover.

[Fray]

The Three Musketeers does have a few parts which could be seen as offensive, but that changes in the later books.

Example:The second book of the D'Artagnan romances, Twenty Years After, rarely discusses romance at all.

[JewelledSky]

Wow, what a discussion thread!

I'm not sure where the idea that The Three Musketeers was kids material came from. This is pretty adult stuff we're dealing with here. Sure, the Walt Disney corporation did a fine job prettying it up and making it fun, but that's not what the book itself was about.

Next, I agree there are some issues that could be off-putting to today's generation and outlook but you have to keep in mind the era this was written for. And it was not written as a novel to be sold to the higher classes. It was a long running, serial publication open to all. The rule of thumb when writing for the masses is usually writing to the lowest common denominator. In this case, not the upper class but the lower. Given that scenario, I think Dumas was smart in portraying his characters in the light he did. They were not infallible nobles but were low, dirty, base creatures that lived for the pleasures and intrigue of life and nothing more.

There's also the point that the women in Musketeers are actually the most powerful people in the novel. They're the ones bringing about the whole intrigue, controlling the situation, entrusted with the most secret of missions... and the ones who supported, cared for, and gave strength to all the men, without which the men would have all failed in any given task.

Having said all that... Musketeers was not meant as a serious look at what life was truly like. It was all overly exaggerated to make the nobles and all their partying/affairs/intrigues to look foolish... and it succeeded.

I actually enjoyed Musketeers very much, because I didn't take it seriously. It was impossible to take it seriously. The characters didn't even take themselves seriously, so how could I?

[Egorvlad]

Just pointing some things out. It's so funny to read some of these posts...

- The book takes place in 17 century France. The book is written in mid 19 century. More than half of all the moral or (god forbid) religious ramblings from contemporary point of view are simply irrelevant.
- High moral ground is good. Now let's look at the state of things in the same situations in contemporary righteous and god-fearing (idiotic term!) US for example (I assume everyone here is american).
- One of the best and strongest points in Duma's works (the second being the historical descriptions) i his characters workout. And it's not just my opinion. Read critics more.

Regards. =)

[Nightshade]

Actually the majority of the members here are not from the US.

but back on topic I read a young reader adaptation abridgment but even then although I enjoyed the book it was rather vivid and slightly stomach churning in places.

[JCamilo]

Actually, do you notice that Dumas is ironic? Do you really think Dumas considered that behavior of 4 heroes of the book anything close to ethical examples?
Dumas trait is humour - not really deep psychological/social arguments (that must be why some literature such as this one became kids books, since there was not the market for kids literature until the 19 century, all romances are read by kids and adventures with obvious steryotipes are among those who were more often "selected" by kids) - if you do not see his descriptions of D'Argtangnan "whorism" with irony or Porthos seeking free meal, Milady being so obviously nasty, Aramis so no-religious you are missing the deal - have fun with steryotipes.
It is like the Clergy coming offended because the portrait of Richelieu, even if he was a political fox - the exageration is obvious.
The D'Argantgan, Aramis, Porthos and Athos are not models of virtue, nobility - but they are models of good deeds and heroes. Two different things.

It is like those who feel offended by Moby Dick and Tom Swayer...

[AthosESK]

Well, I, for one, am offended by people who are offended by "The Three Musketeers." And that's perfectly all right. Go read "The Alchemist" or something.

[genoveva]

I can't wait to read this book!

[sbmarti2]

The Three Musketeers is far and away my favourite book, but I know what it is. It is an adventure story, and is not meant to tackle serious issues like social responsibility or individual morality. Dumas may seem tough on women in this book, but that was just the time of when the book was styled. As for d'Artagnan himself, he is young and inexperienced, and is much more of a gentleman in Twenty Years After and beyond. As to this being a kids story, anyone who was read it will agree it is not; it is simply a good entertaining story for people who like a good plot and even better narration.

[kiki1982]

I have now finished the book for about 1 week and I have been thinking about this women-thing.
After a lot of contemplation I discovered there was a scheme that (nearly) all women have in common in the book: they manipulate the world around them so that the men do what they want. Not only Milady, who is the real manipulating demon, but also Mme Bonacieux, the Queen Anne of Austria, Mme de Chevreuse and Mme Coquenard (mistress of Porthos).
The Queen Anne of Austria is in the beginning of the book in a difficult position, because she is Spanish/Austrian (they are against the French action against the protestants) and because she has an affair with the Duke of Buckingham, English embassador for France. BUT we have to see the use of this: he loves the queen of France and so he will do everything he can to prevent war, as embassadors are called back home in such a situation. Somewhere in the book it states that he is trying to mend bonds with everyone to prevent war. In the end, just before he dies, there is a letter from Anne that asks him not to come to France with reinforcements because she loves him. So all through the book she is trying to go against the cardinal, against war, for the unity of France, and she is using the one person who is able to pull it off, namely Buckingham: close to the King Charles I and to her.
Regularly in the book Milady, she of all women (!), says "je ne suis qu'une femme", (I'm only a woman) I am unable to do nasty stuff, I am totally inocent, how are you able to think of me such things? Actually I think she manipulated the cardinal in thinking she was doing the right thing. At the moment d'Artagnan shows the cardinal the letter he wrote for Milady saying that everything this person has done and maybe will do, is in the interest of the country, Richelieu relises that this was not the case and that the person who is showing it now, our hero d'Artagnan, is the one who should be rewarded and not killed. We know that she was, at some point, Buckingham's mistress. It didn't work out, and now she is jalous? Maybe she was just trying to take revenge on Buckingham, which she accomplished by shocking Felton so much with a story. Politics didn't interest her, I think. She knew Richelieu had had an affair with queen Anne and as he was jalous of Buckingham, he was an easy target like Felton was. So she tells lies about the queen, who is trying to make peace in France, and she provokes a war so that Buckingham is called back, and she can kill him without people looking. In the end Buckingham is killed so she has her revenge.
The first conversation Mme Bonacieux has with the queen, prior to the voyage of d'Artagnan to England, she just says to the queen that her husband is naive and that he will make the trip and get back the juwel because there is money involved. Sadly she is mistaken, as her husband was already taken on board by the Cardinal, but then d'Artagnan charges in, and of course she makes use of this 'act of love' gratefully.
Mme Coquenard, manipulates her husband into thinking that Porthos is her cousin. He doesn't want to open his box with money, but she tells Porthos to wait until he has fallen asleep. At the end of the story there turns out to be 800 000 books (francs??) of money in it. She marries Porthos and they live happily and richly ever after.
I believe even Mme de Chevreuse manipulated Aramis into lending his home to the communication between Buckingham and the queen. Communication that Mme Bonacieux had to provide. Aramis didn't know of this, but d'Artagnan discovers it and tells him. Maybe she was his mistress just for this??
So, looking at this, I think Dumas decided (maybe in collaboration with his fellow writer/researcher who was a history teacher) that women had had a greater influence in history than men would like to admit. The male characters in the book, I find, walk around in the foreground, but are not the main forces. The main forces, the women, operate behind the scenes, and they need to manipulate the men, so that things get done, because they are 'nothing but women', but not as weak as the men all think.
So I don't think we have to see a bad image of women, because I believe that women have a very strong role in the story. They don't only have children and walk by being beautiful, but they decide what happens. The men, on the contrary, live in a world of fun, let's say Disneyland for men back then and musketeers: a world of war, duels etc. But they don't see the greater picture.


Now don't think that I am a feminist, because that's not at all the case. I just thought about it in another way.

[fulyaoktem]

My religious belief says each person responsible only for his or her own acts.

Off course monogamy is the preferred one but you should read the book thinking the circumstances of the era it has written.

Let me remind you about the conversation between the Comte de la Fere and Duchess Madam de Chevreuse about their passionate night on October 11, 1633 in Twenty Years After:

"Ah, that is true," said Athos. "Well, then, Marie Michon had supper with her follower, and then, in accordance with the permission given her, she entered the chamber of her host, Kitty meanwhile taking possession of an armchair in the room first entered, where they had taken their supper."

"Really, monsieur," said Madame de Chevreuse, "unless you are the devil in person I don't know how you could become acquainted with all these details."

"A charming woman was that Marie Michon," resumed Athos, "one of those wild creatures who are constantly conceiving the strangest ideas. Now, thinking that her host was a priest, that coquette took it into her head that it would be a happy souvenir for her old age, among the many happy souvenirs she already possessed, if she could win that of having damned an abbe."

"Count," said the duchess, "upon my word, you frighten me."

"Alas!" continued Athos, "the poor abbe was not a St. Ambroise, and I repeat, Marie Michon was an adorable creature."

"Monsieur!" cried the duchess, seizing Athos's hands, "tell me this moment how you know all these details, or I will send to the convent of the Vieux Augustins for a monk to come and exorcise you."

Athos laughed. "Nothing is easier, madame. A cavalier, charged with an important mission, had come an hour before your arrival, seeking hospitality, at the very moment that the cure, summoned to the bedside of a dying person, left not only his house but the village, for the entire night. The priest having all confidence in his guest, who, besides, was a nobleman, had left to him his house, his supper and his chamber. And therefore Marie came seeking hospitality from the guest of the good abbe and not from the good abbe himself."

"And that cavalier, that guest, that nobleman who arrived before she came?"

"It was I, the Comte de la Fere," said Athos, rising and bowing respectfully to the Duchess de Chevreuse.

The duchess remained a moment stupefied; then, suddenly bursting into laughter:

"Ah! upon my word," said she, "it is very droll, and that mad Marie Michon fared better than she expected. Sit down, dear count, and go on with your story."


Yes... Athos was an adorable creature at all