A-Z Characters & Transformation: Jean Valjean

Jean Valjean is one of the best known transformed characters within literature. He became especially well-known within my generation...and not (necessarily) because we read the book. The main reason was the 10th Anniversary Concert.

The 10th Anniversary Concert fully deserves all the praise it gets--in fact, I prefer that type of "musical" to a full stage production. I also consider Colm Wilkinson one of the best Valjeans on record. 

In the book and in the concert, Jean Valjean, an escaped convict, steals from a bishop. The bishop not only forgives him but gives him the candlesticks that Valjean stole. After this event, Valjean is a changed man. He saves Fontine, saves Cosette, saves Marius. And his change is more than surface deep. He isn't doing good things on a checklist. He has become a certain type of man. 

This inner change is demonstrated, interestingly enough, when he refuses to abandon Marius in his confrontation with Javert. That is, he places his obligation to a fellow human above his obligation to Javert. In the book, he is somewhat more respectful but since he already let Javert go once, he has gained a kind of ascendancy with Javert that Javert, as the ending proves, does not understand.   

My question was: Could the man undergo such a change? 

I posed the same question with Scrooge. Valjean is infinitely more believable, in part because of the time frame. Valjean may not have changed all at once. He saves Cosette and spends a lifetime doing good--all leading up to the moment in the sewers with Javert. 

Still--he changes from one direction to another. 

In the musical, Valjean performs a soliloquy.  

What have I done? Sweet Jesus, what have I done?
Become a thief in the night, become a dog on the run
Have I fallen so far and is the hour so late
That nothing remains but the cry of my hate?
The cries in the dark that nobody hears
Here where I stand at the turning of the years

Great number! Nevertheless, I went to the book, at which point I became seriously impressed by the musical's writers. 

In the book, Valjean is stunned by the bishop's behavior. He wanders until he ends up in a lane where he encounters a young boy from whom he inadvertently takes a sous--he also scares the lad. When he realizes what he has done, he is swamped with remorse. He tries to find the boy but fails. He then goes and prays at the bishop's door. 

The scene of inadvertently stealing the sous is remarkable because it is small event--nothing as large as Valjean's previous act of stealing a bishop's candlesticks. But it brings home to Valjean the type of person he has become and what he needs to do to change. 

In other words, his self-revelation echoes the lyrics. One can believe that this guy is fully aware of what it means to do better, not at a superficial level (I simply won't get caught the next time!) or a rule level (Let's see: how can I get God's blessings and how many can I get?) but at the human level (That boy didn't deserve to be scared.)

Shortly after the 10th anniversary special, every sermon at church seemed to make reference to Valjean, Valjean and the bishop, and so on. And honestly, the tribute is well-deserved and certainly preferable to people quoting from other people's sermons. Fiction can provide insight into the human condition.