CONFLICT - REMEMBERING JEAN VALJEAN

Its now four years since Les Miserables was performed and I came across notes I had written to understand the character of Jean Valjean. Snippets taken from Victor Hugo's prose stitched together to form a framework upon which I could build on. The sheer complexity of his character and reading this after four years left me wondering if I had done adequate justice to what was demanded of me...

Escape has a strange effect on the human soul
Instinct says to you "Away" but Reason says "Stay"
But, in front of this delicious seduction,
before so mighty a temptation, 
Reason flees leaving Instinct behind
The beast rises and chooses to play
with a terrible cry like a demon's laugh

Unfortunates, the men in the lowest depths
Rejects which the law no longer needs
feel on their heads the formidable weight
of human society that observes from afar
Their terrible deeds not as terrible as the stares
from passersby hurrying through their affairs

Liberation is not a delivering call
that erases your past behind
No amount of freedom
justifies the condemnation within
the noise of a rusty hinge
that sounds clear in the thief's ear
As terrible as the trumpet of Judgement Day

And as delusion creeps into the mind
of one such distracted, reason subtracted
The sound then transforms into life
Lying wait in the shadows like a growling dog
ready to pounce on the unsuspecting foe

Fear grips like a vice beneath the mask 
A strong hold on either side of the chest
crushing the air out of the lungs
tearing the ribs apart
And the sound changes into an earthquake
Shaking the foundations 
of the house he came to rob

And as quietly as the moment came, 
it passes as a second on a clock-face
The stillness restored, the calm returns
The work resumes

Time observes as the soul withers
Slowly, more slowly than a fatally slow crawl
A shrunken heart dries the body
and bereft of emotion, tears no longer fall