A Tale of Two Cities or Les Miserables

[....]

I'm trying to decide which one to have the kids read this upcoming year.

I know Les Miserables takes place a little later than the other...  

Which would be more of an interesting read for a 16 year-old boy and 14 year-old girl?  Also, I was planning to use an abridged version for Les Miserables, because the full version would take us 6 months to read.  It's like over a thousand pages.  A Tale of Two Cities has a Progeny Press guide available, so I'm leaning towards that one, but if Les Miserables is much better....

Any opinions?

[Lori D.]

How about reading / studying Tale of Two Cities, and watching a good film version of Les Miserables? (1935, or 1952, or 1978, or 1998 version)

[....]

1 minute ago, Lori D. said:

How about reading / studying Tale of Two Cities, and watching a good film version of Les Miserables? (1935, or 1952, or 1978, or 1998 version)

 

Sounds like a plan!  lol

And I forgot about The Count of Monte Cristo or The Three Musketeers.  I'm going to fit one of those in there somewhere this spring.  The Count of Monte Cristo was one of my favorite books when I was a teenager.

[Lori D.]

PS -- DSs here were about that age when we did Tale of Two Cities; once we got over the hump of about the first 10 chapters of them trying to get everything straight and get used to Dickens' writing style, they really got into it. Nobody writes character like Dickens. 😉 

[J-rap]

I'd choose Tale of Two Cities, but I'm a huge Dickens fan.  

[....]

I'm seeing an audiobook of The Count of Monte Cristo in the WTM store (Jim Weiss), but it looks like it's more for younger kids?  I can't really tell.  There's "A Novel Units" on Christianbook.com for Count of Monte Cristo, but I've never used those, either.  

Well, now I'm leaning towards Count of Monte Cristo, A Tale of Two Cities and then the movie Les Miserables.  So many decisions!!  

Edited to say: I'm trying to plan this big unit study for March and I wanted to cover some French literature (or at least literature about France), but my plans are growing so much that I might need to break my unit study into 3 separate parts.  Ugh!  My unit study was going to be a comparison of the American Revolution, French Revolution and Russian Revolution.  Just by brainstorming, my unit study plan is starting to look like a giant octopus.  There's no way I can cover all 3 in one unit study.  I'm going to have to break them up. Also, I am finding way too many interesting books for this.

Edited December 15, 2019 by Evanthe

[ALB]

A Tale of Two Cities is shorter than Count of Monte Cristo, but both are equally interesting and action-packed IMO.  Les Mis and Three Muskateers were less gripping to me, personally.  I'd go with movies and/or abridged versions for those two.  I found Hugo pretty long winded in some chapters and more of a slog to get through.  

One thing to consider may be that Dickens also has many other worthwhile reads, which may be a compelling reason to read Count first, with the plan to read at least something else by Dickens at some point (although I need to say that Tale of Two Cities is my personal favorite Dickens book).  Both are similar in their historical context, plot of intrigue, and theme of redemption.  You won't be disappointed whichever you choose!

 

[Roadrunner]

Count of Monte Cristo is impossible to put down. My son spent many sleepless nights reading through it. It is one of the family favorites.

I am a fan of Dickens, but I think Tale of Two Cities isn’t as exiting as the Count of Monte Cristo or for that matter other Dickens books. 

Les Miserable is long, but again I think it’s a lot more engaging than Tale of  Two Cities. 

So I am being a contrarian here 🙂 

[Rosie_0801]

I love 'Les Mis' and have read it three times. The best movie version is the 6 hour French one. 

I thoroughly enjoyed The Count of Monte Cristo, which I wasn't expecting to.

'A Tale of Two Cities' bored me to death and even the BBC version bored me to death. I am bored to death just typing about it. 😩

[RootAnn]

The best version of Les Mis is the unabridged version in French. Assuming you aren't going to be reading that one, I'd be going with a movie of it. (There are definitely parts of the book that drag on, both in English & French.)

I cannot speak of the others except my dd#2 is attempting to get through the Three Musketeers & is finding it slow & tedious going. Dd#1 enjoyed however.

[Rosie_0801]

Cary Elwes really should have made 'The Three Musketeers.' I feel history has lost the opportunity to make the definitive version of this film.

[Lori D.]

LOL about the previous 2 posters being "bored" by Tale of Two Cities.  I think this is a case of different strokes for different folks... Different books connect -- or not -- for different people. 😉 We ended up really enjoying reading ToTC, but then, we have enjoyed other works by Dickens as well. I did not do Les Mis with DSs, either book or film version, so I can't compare how DSs would have liked/disliked it in comparison. 😉 
 

3 hours ago, Rosie_0801 said:

Cary Elwes really should have made 'The Three Musketeers.' I feel history has lost the opportunity to make the definitive version of this film.

LIKING this!!!! 👍

Edited December 16, 2019 by Lori D.

[madteaparty]

13 hours ago, Roadrunner said:

Count of Monte Cristo is impossible to put down. My son spent many sleepless nights reading through it. It is one of the family favorites.

I am a fan of Dickens, but I think Tale of Two Cities isn’t as exiting as the Count of Monte Cristo or for that matter other Dickens books. 

Les Miserable is long, but again I think it’s a lot more engaging than Tale of  Two Cities. 

So I am being a contrarian here 🙂 

This is true. But I have to say if your DC have a tiny bit of background on the French Revolution and can get through the first chapters (I remember reading here that most new words or concepts like 10 freaking words for a horse pulled carriage etc) are always introduced in the first few pages of a book, it ended up being a rewarding read. We cheated and used the audio alongside. Now ds makes jokes about me knitting shrouds 😂. I’m crocheting not knitting anyway 

[....]

13 hours ago, Rosie_0801 said:

'A Tale of Two Cities' bored me to death and even the BBC version bored me to death. I am bored to death just typing about it. 😩

 

Lol!  We read a book like that recently.  At one point, I said, "we're done."  Even the cats were leaving the room when I brought that book out.

[....]

8 minutes ago, Florimell said:

You might check out The Scarlet Pimpernel, too. I never see it recommended, but it is very good -- I think it might be more generally appealing to high school kids than A Tale of Two Cities. If you aren't familiar with it, here's the summary from Amazon:

The year is 1792. The French Revolution, driven to excess by its own triumph, has turned into a reign of terror. Daily, tumbrels bearing new victims to the guillotine roll over the cobbled streets of Paris.… Thus the stage is set for one of the most enthralling novels of historical adventure ever written.
 
The mysterious figure known as the Scarlet Pimpernel, sworn to rescue helpless men, women, and children from their doom; his implacable foe, the French agent Chauvelin, relentlessly hunting him down; and lovely Marguerite Blakeney, a beautiful French exile married to an English lord and caught in a terrible conflict of loyalties—all play their parts in a suspenseful tale that ranges from the squalid slums of Paris to the aristocratic salons of London, from intrigue on a great English country estate to the final denouement on the cliffs of the French coast.

 

Thank-you!  I think Progeny Press has a study guide for that, too.  I kept seeing it, but never knew what that book was about.

[Lori D.]

In case you're wanting your French literature to also be written by a French author, The Scarlet Pimpernel (1905) was written by the Hungarian-born British author Baroness Orczy. It is the first in a series of adventure novels about that character, all set during the French Revolution. It is an adventure story from the perspective of the English aristocrat who portrays himself as a useless "dandy", and who disguises himself in various ways to save French aristocrats, and the people who served them, from the guillotine.

The Scarlet Pimpernel is more exciting than Les Miserables (1862), or Tale of Two Cities (1859) -- which also not written by a French author -- but Scarlet Pimpernel has less depth of theme or character development, and does not dig into the psyche of the French people and what drove the French Revolution (Tale of Two Cities), or what drove the post-Revolution/post-Napoleonic socio-economic culture in France that culminates in the June Rebellion (Les Miserables).

Just depends on what your lit. goals are. 😉 

Edited December 16, 2019 by Lori D.

[cintinative]

Ironically, this thread has caused me to pick the Count of Monte Cristo as my next read aloud instead of The Three Musketeers.  You have got to love the rabbit trails on these threads!

Edited December 23, 2019 by cintinative
I have grammar.