The Count Of Monte Cristo
(Alexandre Dumas)
Alexandre Dumas' France is a country in the grips of political turmoil. Napoleon has been banished to the Isle of Elba and those who call themselves Bonapartists are frowned upon and distanced from by friends and family members alike. It is with this volatile situation as a background that the protagonist of our story, The Count of Monte Cristo, Edmond Dantes is handed a letter by the captain of the Pharoan (the ship on which he sails) to be delivered to Napoleon. Upon returning to France however he discovers that he has been betrayed by those closest to him. After being denounced by an anonymous letter as a Bonapartist, Dantes is forcefully taken away from his engagement ceremony to his betrothed, Mercedes and is placed at the mercy of the prosecutor, Villefort. All seems to be going well until he is asked for the letter which was to be returned in reply to the captain's letter and upon reading it, Villefort learns that it will be damaging for his father and ruinous for his career. Thus, Villefort chooses to destroy the incriminating evidence and condemns young Dantes to a fate worse than death; interment in the notorious Chateau d'lf. It is here in the Chateau d'lf, however, in the most unlikely of places, that Dantes discovers the one person that will make him the man capable of carrying out his quest for justice. The Father Faria is an old man whom the prison wardens think insane for his endless talk about a buried treasure. Unknown to them, he has also been working tirelessly at trying to tunnel his way out of the prison but by a miscalculation, he succeeds instead at breaking through the wall of Dantes cell and the two quickly strike up a friendship, with Faria acting as teacher to the young man, imparting decades of knowledge and wisdom to him. It is here that Dantes learns the crucial reason for why Villefort destroyed the letter and sent him to prison. Faria informs him that the prosecutor's full name is Villefort de Nortier and that Nortier is his father. He puts two and two together realising that the letter he handed Villefort was addressed to Nortier and that it must have been damaging for him. He also realises that others such as Caderousse, Morcerf and Danglars had much to gain from his being imprisoned and that it was perhaps they, his closest friends who had in fact written the letter denouncing him as a Bonapartist. He is deeply saddened when he hears the prison wardens say that his friend Father Faria has died. But the old man's death gives young Dantes his one hope for escape. He takes the old man out of the sack in which he had been placed and takes his place instead. From there it is he that is thrown into the sea as the wardens dispose of the body, thinking themselves getting rid of the old man. Being a sailor he swims to his freedom and soon sets out for the island of Monte Cristo, the location Faria claims his treasure is buried. After finding the treasure and realising that he is now rich beyond his wildest expectations, Dantes returns to his home country to the tragic news that his father has died and his fiance Mercedes has left and has since married his ex-friend now enemy the new Count de Morcerf. Here, Dantes remakes himself in his mission of justice as the avenging angel, the Count of Monte Cristo and at once sets about settling old scores, repaying injustices but also using his new wealth to aid those who had been his allies before and during his imprisonment. With his new role as Count, he begins to move in the circles of the rich and powerful and learns that Morcerf has become a count, Danglars has become a baron and that Villefort is now the Crown Prosecutor. He at once moves to strike up a business relationship with Danglars and entangles himself in the Morcerf family by saving the life of the Count's son Albert from bandits. None, he decides shall escape his vengeance, all shall be judged and punished accordingly. It is at this point that shocking secrets are uncovered concerning the new Crown prosecutor Villefort and the Count de Morcerf. Learning of the unfaithful actions of Villefort and Danglar's wife and the love child they produced, Dantes tracks the boy down and realises that he will come to play a vital part in the destruction of the Crown Prosecutor. At the same time as Lord Wilmore and Father Busoni, Dantes learns more about his enemies and begins plotting their end as well, a task that soon has him facing off in a deadly duel against Albert de Morcerf, the young man whose life he had saved previously. With his own life at stake as well as Albert's, Dantes begins to doubt the price of his mission of justice. After a number of tragedies strike both the house of Morcerf and the bank of Danglars, leaving the corrupt man bankrupt and on the run, a triumphant Dantes pays a visit to Villefort after his son and wife have both died and leaves an insane Villefort declaring to himself that he will spare the last (Danglars). The Count of Monte Cristo is a story of justice, a masterpiece unequalled in our time.
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