THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO
By: Alexandre Dumas
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| THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO By Alexandre Dumas |
summary
Edmond Dantès, a handsome and promising young sailor, deftly docks the Pharaon, a three-master French ship, in Marseilles after the death of his captain on the way home. As a reward, Dantes is promised a captaincy, but before he can claim his new position and marry his fiancée, Mercédès, a conspiracy of four jealous and disreputable men arranges for him to be captured and secretly imprisoned under regimentation. isolation in the infamous Château. d'If, a prison from which no one has ever escaped. The four men responsible are:
Fernand Mondego, jealous of Mercédès's love for Dantès;
Danglars, the Pharaoh's commissioner, who covets the captaincy promised to Dantes;
Caderousse, an unscrupulous neighbor; and
Villefort, a prosecutor who knows that Dantès is the bearer of a letter addressed to Villefort's father; the old man is a Bonapartist who would probably be imprisoned by the current monarchist regime were it not for the influence of his son, Villefort. However, Villefort feared that this letter would damage his own position and thus made sure, he thought, that no one ever heard of Dantes or the letter again.
For many years, Dantes barely exists in his tiny isolated cell; he almost lost his mind and the will to live until one day he hears a fellow prisoner digging near him. He too begins to dig, and soon meets an old abbot who knows where a huge fortune is, who belonged to an immensely wealthy Italian family.
Dantès and the Abbot continue to dig for several years, and from the Abbot, Dantès learns history, literature, science, and languages, but when they are finally almost free, the Abbot dies. Dantes hides the body from him, then sews it into the abbot's funeral bag. The guards arrive, carry the bag outside and lift the body.
Dantès manages to escape and is picked up by a shipment of smugglers, whom he joins until they locate the island where the treasure is hidden. When he finally discovers it, he is stunned by the immensity of his wealth. And when he reappears in the world, he is the very rich and very handsome Count of Monte Cristo.
Monte Cristo has two purposes: to reward those who have been kind to him and his aged father, and to punish those responsible for his imprisonment. For the latter, he foresees a slow and painful punishment. Having spent fourteen years eking out a living in a dungeon demands cruel and prolonged punishment.
Like Monte Cristo, Dantes ingeniously manages to introduce himself into the beautiful flower of Parisian society, among which he goes unnoticed. But Monte Cristo, on the other hand, acknowledges all of his enemies, all of them now wealthy and influential men.
Fernand married Mercédès and is now known as the Count of Morcerf. Monte Cristo releases information to the press that proves Morcerf is a traitor, and Morcerf is socially ruined. Monte Cristo then destroys Morcerf's relationship with his family, whom he adores. When they leave him, he is so distraught that he shoots himself.
To get revenge on Danglars, who loves money more than anything, Monte Cristo financially ruins him.
To get revenge on Caderousse, Monte Cristo easily catches Caderousse due to Caderousse's insatiable greed for him and then watches as one of Caderousse's cohorts murders him.
To get revenge on Villefort, Monte Cristo slowly reveals to Villefort that he knows of a love affair Villefort had long ago with the current Madame Danglars. He also reveals to her, by clues, that he knows of an illegitimate child he fathered, a child Villefort believed he buried alive. The boy, however, survived and is now engaged to Danglars's daughter, who is the illegitimate youth's half-sister.
Ironically, Villefort's wife proves to be even more evil than her husband, as she poisons the parents of Villefort's first wife; she then believes she has succeeded in poisoning the daughter of her husband in her first marriage. With these people dead, his own son is expecting a huge inheritance. Villefort, however, discovers her wife's plots and her threat, and she poisons herself and her child. At this point, Dantes is half worried that his revenge has gone too far, but since he is able to bring two young people very much in love together on the island of Monte Cristo, he leaves happy and satisfied. , never to be seen again.
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