From medieval to modern love in Paris: who would love Quasimodo, the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, now?… love in Gothic times and now, what now? …
This Valentine’s Day, I am in the shadowed bell towers of Paris, reading Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, a novel that is, beneath its Gothic drama, a meditation on love in all its fragile, distorted, but radiant forms. Quasimodo, the bellringer of Notre-Dame Cathedral, is described as deformed, deafened by bells, and feared by crowds. Yet within him lives one of literature’s purest hearts and the most famous, albeit fictional, bellringer in the world. Published in 1831, the novel is set in 1482, medieval times during the reign of King Louis XI. Quasimodo was raised in the Notre-Dame Cathedral by its archdeacon Claude Frollo after being abandoned as an infant. He began bellringing at the age of fourteen, and by the end of the novel he is about twenty years old, rising to the position of ringer-general. Hugo writes, “Notre-Dame had been to him successively, as he grew up, the egg, the nest, his house, his country, the world.” Quasimodo serves his cathedral with reverence. It is his home; its bells are his voice. He is devoted, almost blindly, to the man who raised him. He loves Esmeralda with tenderness. She was a gypsy girl who showed Quasimodo kindness. In a society that shunned him, a cup of water that she offered in mercy felt like love to him. That single act becomes his constant thoughts. But, who loved Quasimodo back? In medieval Paris, difference was destiny. To be physically different was to be morally judged as well. Deformity was seen as divine punishment, evil, or something to laugh at. If Quasimodo lived in Paris in 2026, he would not be paraded in public stocks in the village square but he might still be stared at on the Metro. Modern Paris would protect his rights and uphold the principle of inclusivity. He would likely have a diagnosis such as spinal curvature, hearing impairment, and facial difference. He might still struggle on dating apps where he is judged by first impressions based on appearance. But would modern Paris offer him love? We live in an age more tolerant and yet often more obsessed with perfection. Quasimodo today might be included but inclusion is not the same as intimacy. Who would love him now? Perhaps someone who understands being unseen, someone who values loyalty over aesthetics, someone who looks beyond appearances, someone who recognizes the beauty of gentleness, or someone who admires his skills as a bellringer. Love is not always returned. Love is not always rewarded. But love is never wasted. Perhaps the real measure of a society, medieval or modern, is how it loves. The tragedy of Quasimodo wasn’t his body. It’s that the world was too cruel, and too shallow, to recognize his extraordinary soul. Can’t see the whole article? Want to view the original article? Want to view more articles? Go to Martina’s Substack: The Stories in You and Me More Paris articles are in my Paris website The Paris Residences of James Joyce Invite your friends and earn rewardsIf you enjoy The Stories in You and Me , share it with your friends and earn rewards when they subscribe.
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Friday, 13 February 2026
From medieval to modern love in Paris: who would love Quasimodo, the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, now?
Sunday, 8 February 2026
The Poet of Snow in Paris: Finnish artist Pekka Halonen
The Poet of Snow in Paris: Finnish artist Pekka Halonen… not merely winter landscapes but snowscapes of peace ...
The poet of snow has come to Paris in winter. Finnish artist Pekka Halonen was known as the poet of snow – not for his poetry but for his paintings. Pekka Halonen (1865-1933) wasn’t merely interested in snowy scenes as motifs; rather, he saw snow as the spirit of silence Outside Finland, his work hasn’t been as widely seen as that of other Nordic masters like Finnish painter Akseli Gallen-Kallela and Norwegian Edvard Munch. Yet Halonen’s work synthesized European modernism, French plein-air painting, and Asian influences with a devotion to his homeland and has been regarded as an important translator of Finnish culture and nature. Titled “Un Hymne à la Finlande” (“An Anthem to Finland”), this is the first major retrospective in France devoted to Pekka Halonen, a central figure of Finland’s Golden Age of painting who drew “the land itself with a poet’s soul.” The exhibition will continue at the Petit Palais in Paris until 22 February 2026. Born in Lapinlahti in eastern Finland, Halonen grew up in wild nature. After formative artistic training in Helsinki and in Paris from 1890, including a period studying with Paul Gauguin. He returned home in 1895 where he married musician Maija Makinen the same year. They had eight children. He built his wooden studio-house called Halosenniemi on the shores of Lake Tuusula where he lived, worked, and painted. There, surrounded by forests and long winters, he committed himself to painting rural life and the natural world he knew intimately. He said in a 1932 interview for the newspaper Svenska Pressen, “My original source of inspiration is Nature. For thirty years, I have lived in the same place with the forest on my doorstep. I have often felt that I have the equivalent of the Louvre or the greatest treasures of the world within reach. All I have to do is venture into the forest to admire the most beautiful paintings possible, and in this, I need nothing more.” Rather than dramatizing nature, he said, paraphrasing his ethos, “Art should not jar the nerves like sandpaper — it should produce a feeling of peace.” That peace comes through in his snowy fields and forest clearings, with light and atmosphere. In this way, Halonen’s landscapes are about reconnection to the natural world. The collection of his works on display is immense, mostly of snow; vast and pristine with lots of winter white, representing silence and solitude. In their totality, Halonen was not simply painting winter; he was painting solitude as a creative force, focusing less on people and more on their environment. Halonen’s nature scenes include pine woods, melting ice and snow-covered rock gardens; all imbued with a deep sense of belonging to a place. They are meditations on the beauty of an everyday landscape in Finland, and how the smallest natural details can hold the emotions of tradition and culture in the silence of snow. Halonen said that snow absorbs sound, slows movement, and reduces the world to the essentials of light, shadow, and breath. He thought creative solitude was often misunderstood as isolation. Halonen’s paintings suggest that solitude can be fertile and generative as winter prepares the ground for spring. Snow covers, but it also protects. Beneath it, seeds rest and roots gather strength. The words and images of the poet of snow may resonate with creatives. There are seasons when progress is in repose, or seems invisible, or when what we are doing feels small or unseen. Halonen’s snowfields are reassurances that unseen does not mean unimportant.
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From medieval to modern love in Paris: who would love Quasimodo, the Hunchback of Notre-Dame, now?
… love in Gothic times and now, what now? … ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ...
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