College Students! discussion

Discussion with spoilers goes here..
read at your own risk! :)

----Spoilers For Chapter XX The Graveyard of the Chateau D'If---


What a brilliant horrific way to escape imprisonment. I was at turns horrified and amazed.


Does any one else here think Villefort is a grade-A douchebag?

His escape was brilliantly thought out. Okay, I thought he would have been barried, but I was wrong, what a twist, he didn't even know until it was too late.

I agree that Villefort is a douchebag, why would he do that to someone inocent?

What did you think of Faria? I found Edmond's time in prison to be extremely dynamic, but only because of Faria.

I loved Faria. I thought he was so intriguing and I loved that he was a great surrogate father-type figure, especially as he helped Edmund exercise his mind. Essentially I see him as a saviour-character and he definately really added to the storyline. I also thought it was funny that the inspector would enjoy visiting him because he was the amusing madman ha ha.

Spoiler for chapter XXXI - Italy -Sinbad The Sailor






OH MY GOD. No wonder this book was so abridged by the Victorians. We've got "Sinbad" feeding Franz hashish, and Franz is so high he's having sex with statues. What a great book this is shaping up to be.

Did anyone else's jaw drop a little at this part?

I don't know how many of you have finished the book yet but it's a great and amazing book. I loved it. The characters were well thought out and just live through the pages.

I love this kind of book. Where there's a young character who is innocent and humble that is taken through a journey, sometimes short but other times, as is the case in this one, long and stretches a lifetime. I love how they mature and acquire the skills necessary to thrive. All of that is entertaining and mind blowing to me. And the Count of Monte Cristo is all that and more.

April, I don't remember that part in the story. Maybe I have an abridged version or just skimmed over that part. I am going to re-look at my book now.

I just looked... I don't have that chapter in my version. But it doesn't say that it is abridge.

I feel cheated now.

I loved this book. I agree that this book has a bit of Christian zeal to it. It repeatedly says in the epistles (st pauls letters) that horrible circumstances can be expected in life and that God only allows this to happen so as to force us into creative change which in the end makes us better people.
At the start of the book I couldnt BELIEVE how naive Edmond was! He knew Danglars didnt like him, he knew Fernand was his rival and that even Caderouse was a pesky neighbor and a drunk. And even though Villefort was a douchebag I agree with this staement he made to Edmond when he was enquiring about possible enemies:
Ed ".. I confess, I prefer not knowing them (enemies) because then I will be forced to hate them."
Villefort "You are wrong, you should always strive to see clearly around you.."
Obviously, Ed thinks its unchristian to "hate your enemies", but he should have read his bible some more and find out that it also says, 'dont be a pushover!' He was too afriad to allow the concept of even a few people not liking him so he prefered to ignore the signs.
Idiot..
Well, he learnt his lesson awesomely :D

POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD!

Ive just seen the movie.
Dont know what say much except its obviously been highly romanticised for the viewers eg allowing Mercedes and Edmond to hookup at the end all luvey dovey happy families. And whats the deal with him buying the island prison of chateau d'if?? Thats not even in the friggin book! It also cut out all the awesome secondary characters like the second generation of villfort, danglars and mondego. Such a shame that movie was, was very glad the ending was completely different but way better.

Jim Caviel (Passion of the Christ) and Guy Pierce were smoking hot though!!

Yay! Just finished it! Enjoyed the whole book so much Im gonna buy it :D

It's definately worth the money, Melody :-)


The only thing which kind of bothered me was that I felt Mercedes got the raw end of the deal.

I just finished it!! I loved it, so far the classics are still the way to go for me.

I agree April, Mercedes did seem to kind of be on the loosing end of the happy ending.

I agree too, my dream ending would have been Edmond marrying Mercedes while hooking Abert up with Haydee. She sounded way too young for Edmond and I think Edmonds love for her will always be fatherly than the romantic kind he had with Mercedes.

This is one of my favourite books!!!

Been a while, but what did you guys think of the morality of seeking revenge in such a planned manner? I mean, it certainly didn't seem as if he would've helped Valentine if her love hadn't been Maximilien (she probably would've fallen among his collateral damage like Albert. And certainly Edmond eventually reached realized some guilt in the matter when Villefort's son dies, but I think it's entirely too easy how a mere visit to Chateau d'If is able to assauge his guilt. This is a man who spent ten years methodically trying to replicate the underhanded tactics used to betray him to destroy his enemies! How is it fair that he can simply forgive himself for equal crimes? Is it just because he's certain "God" is on his side? I found this plot development and how it was handled very perplexing.

Maybe it's because I was raised on wuxia adaptations- where revenge is always bad, even when righteous- and always almost without fail leads to tragedy for the avenger (I'm watching a new version of The Demi-gods and the Semi-devils now.)

And to be honest, I found most of Dantes's plans of revenge to be much too convoluted and slow. And in a lot of the choices he made after his "Count of Monte Cristo" transformation, he didn't really show himself to be better a person than Franz or Villefort or Danglers- just one with less reason to be worried about rank, or really- money (because that's how he bought his rank) - because he had just about . He just wasn't a protagonist I could root for most of the time.

Nortier, on the other hand, is truly what *I'd* call a magnificent bastard. He did the majority of the heavy lifting in the whole Valentine debacle, while Edmond and Maximilien, strapping men they were, sat twiddling their thumbs. And he did it while almost completely paralyzed. And he has pretty much the only successful duel mentioned in the entire book.

I finally finished this. Yay! I really enjoyed the book and can't believe it took me this long to read.

In regards to the treatment of the children of his enemies. I think that the death of Villefort's son was not forseen by the Count and that is why he felt guilty. He spared the children from his revenge, well, at least to the extent he could. I feel that he realized that the children were not guilty of the crime committed against him, and was pretty much indifferent to them.

My issue was with his happy ever after with Haydee. Maybe it was the age issue, or the fact she was his slave for so long. I don't know, that part just didn't sit well at all.

I found it really interesting that noone seemed to recognize him. I knew Mercedes had right off, but the rest, especially Danglars, since they were always together on the ship, seemed strange that they didn't even sort of think they knew him somehow.

As for Mercedes, I agree that it is sad that she was left alone at the end, but.... am I the only one that thinks she should have realised something was wrong with Fernand? That he was somehow responsible for Edmond's disappearance? I know if I were in love and that love finally came home to disappear right before our wedding by suspicious circumstances, the first person I would assume to be involved would be the person I scorned for my love. There is no way I could end up marrying him, but maybe I am too suspicious of people. :)