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The Hunchback of Notre Dame, 1831

Original title: Notre-Dame de Paris

Hugo started working on The Hunchback of Notre-Dame in 1829. He had a contract with the publisher Gosselin, stating that it should be finished that same year. But other projects came in between and Hugo was granted respites again and again until Gosselin in the summer of 1830 finally demanded the novel to be completed in February the following year. Hugo bought ink, a grey woolen robe and stuck to his desk, refusing to go out - with the exception of nightly visits to Notre-Dame - and forbidding any disturbance.

The set of the story was the church Notre-Dame on the Île de la Cité. Hugo had studied it well, spending hours examining its spiral staircases, hidden chambers and inscriptions. He had also read old writings, records and law texts. Although he laid stress on the importance of the plot, he was determined to make its framework historically correct.

He stuck by his desk for six months and by the beginning of January, it was finished - just within the time limit set by Gosselin. It was Hugo's first full-length novel and on 16 March it appeared in the bookshops.

The Hunchback of Notre-Dame was an instant success and it soon made Hugo the most famous living writer in Europe. Spread and translated across the continent, another effect of the novel was evident; the old, neglected and into disrepair fallen church of Notre-Dame started to attract thousands of tourists, who of course were disappointed when the impressing Gothic Lady Hugo had described turned out to be a manhandled old woman, tossed away in the corner of Île de la Cité. But the fame Hugo brought her made the City of Paris realize that something had to be done and in 1845 a much-needed restoration that would take 19 years began.

The novel also had an effect on French architecture; pre-renaissance buildings that had been considered vulgar, were suddenly revered and a committee for the preservation of historic monuments was founded. Hugo started a revolution in the field of aesthetics. He had always seen the front structure of the church as the capital H of his last name - now the world was beginning to see it too. In 1837, when the newly arrived queen-to-be Duchess of Orléans met Hugo, she told him: "I have visited your Notre-Dame".

Today, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is regarded as a standard classic and it must be one of the most adapted stories for cinema and television. In addition, the bell ringer, Quasimodo, has become a horror classic - although anyone that reads the novel realizes that Frollo represents the horror. And perhaps the English title - which Hugo himself hated - is to blame for putting too much emphasis on the hunchback.

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