Character Analysis of Hugo's JavertHugo's character Javert sees anyone who may have commit a crime as simple as the theft of a loaf of bread as a social malefactor, a blight on all of society, a prime evil who needs to be eliminated, removed from the general population, and a devil that can be neither reformed nor tamed. Javert is the true rationalist. Like Medieval philosophers, he believes that people will naturally resort to evil, and that these people can never be saved or reformed. Javert is the true rationalist because he believes the law is the highest authority, sees Jean Valjean as purely evil, and because he wholeheartedly believes in the infallibility of the law.Javert belie ...view middle of the document...
Javert also believes that the word of the law always supercedes the word of a normal man. Champmathieu, who denied being Jean Valjean, was, in fact, not him, but Javert was positive that he was because the police had accused him of it. When Champmathieu proclaimed his innocence, Javert said of him "Champmathieu plays off astonished" because he believes that there is no shadow of a doubt on whether this man is Jean Valjean. The police accused him of this, so they must be right. The police, because they are the envoy of the law, the supreme judge of character, must not be wrong, they are infallible in his eyes. Javert is a true rationalist because he believes that the law decides what kind of person you are, and the law is the highest authority, and that once judged by the law, a man cannot change.Javert is a rationalist because he believes that man is incapable of reform. Throughout the novel, Javert pursues Jean Valjean because he is a convict who is a danger to society. In M_ sur M_, Jean Valjean showed he was reformed by giving to his fellow man before taking for himself. In M_ sur M_, Jean Valjean made 600,000 francs, but not without giving 1,000,000 to the people of the town. Javert pursues him even though he proved himself to be good for the community. Javert is relentless in his pursuit because he firmly believes that a convict is incapable of reformation because he has shown himself to be a doer of evil, and someone who has done evil is inherently evil. When Jean Valjean saved Cosette from the Thenardiers, he showed that he was capable of love and that he was no longer bitter from years of incarceration. Nevertheless, Javert chases after him because he believes he is still a threat, because of his evil nature. Afterwards, Jean Valjean made it his life's purpose to raise Cosette and give all his money to the poor, to better their circumstances. When Thenardier intended to kill Jean Valjean, Javert came not to stop a crime in process but to get Jean Valjean. Javert even pursued Jean Valjean after he had spared Javert's life at the barricade. Even after the innumerable good, selfless deeds that Valjean performed Javert pursued him because he thought Valjean was still and would always be evil, because a man's soul cannot change, is predestined to good or evil, love or violence. Javert shows he is a rationalist beca...
