Count of Monte Cristo (abridged) (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Read online

  Table of Contents

  From the Pages of The Count of Monte Cristo

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Alexandre Dumas

  The World of Alexandre Dumas and The Count of Monte Cristo

  Introduction

  Translator’s Note

  Chapter I - MARSEILLES—THE ARRIVAL

  Chapter II - FATHER AND SON

  Chapter III - THE CATALANS

  Chapter IV - THE BETROTHAL FEAST

  Chapter V - THE DEPUTY PROCUREUR DU ROI

  Chapter VI - THE EXAMINATION

  Chapter VII - THE CHTEAU D’IF

  Chapter VIII - VILLEFORT AND MERCÉDÈS

  Chapter IX - THE LITTLE CABINET OF THE TUILERIES

  Chapter X - THE OGRE

  Chapter XI - THE HUNDRED DAYS

  Chapter XII - NUMBERS 34 AND 27

  Chapter XIII - AN ITALIAN SCHOLAR

  Chapter XIV - THE TREASURE

  Chapter XV - THE THIRD ATTACK

  Chapter XVI - THE CEMETERY OF THE CHTEAU D’IF

  Chapter XVII - THE ISLE OF TIBOULEN

  Chapter XVIII - THE ISLE OF MONTE CRISTO

  Chapter XIX - THE TREASURE CAVE

  Chapter XX - THE STRANGER

  Chapter XXI - THE PONT DU GARD INN

  Chapter XXII - CADEROUSSE’S STORY

  Chapter XXIII - THE PRISON REGISTER

  Chapter XXIV - MORREL AND SON

  Chapter XXV - THE FIFTH OF SEPTEMBER

  Chapter XXVI - ROMAN BANDITS

  Chapter XXVII - THE APPARITION

  Chapter XXVIII - THE CARNIVAL AT ROME

  Chapter XXIX - THE CATACOMBS OF ST SEBASTIAN

  Chapter XXX - THE GUESTS

  Chapter XXXI - THE PRESENTATION

  Chapter XXXII - UNLIMITED CREDIT

  Chapter XXXIII - THE PAIR OF DAPPLED GREYS

  Chapter XXXIV - HAYDEE

  Chapter XXXV - THE MORREL FAMILY

  Chapter XXXVI - TOXICOLOGY

  Chapter XXXVII - THE RISE AND FALL OF STOCKS

  Chapter XXXVIII - PYRAMUS AND THISBE

  Chapter XXXIX - M. NOIRTIER DE VILLEFORT

  Chapter XL - THE WILL

  Chapter XLI - THE TELEGRAPH

  Chapter XLII - THE DINNER

  Chapter XLIII - A CONJUGAL SCENE

  Chapter XLIV - MATRIMONIAL PLANS

  Chapter XLV - A SUMMER BALL

  Chapter XLVI - MME DE SAINT-MÉRAN

  Chapter XLVII - THE PROMISE

  Chapter XLVIII - MINUTES OF THE PROCEEDINGS

  Chapter XLIX - THE PROGRESS OF CAVALCANTI JUNIOR

  Chapter L - HAYDEE’S STORY

  Chapter LI - THE REPORT FROM JANINA

  Chapter LII - THE LEMONADE

  Chapter LIII - THE ACCUSATION

  Chapter LIV - THE TRIAL

  Chapter LV - THE CHALLENGE

  Chapter LVI - THE INSULT

  Chapter LVII - THE NIGHT

  Chapter LVIII - THE DUEL

  Chapter LIX - REVENGE

  Chapter LX - VALENTINE

  Chapter LXI - THE SECRET DOOR

  Chapter LXII - THE APPARITION AGAIN

  Chapter LXIII - THE SERPENT

  Chapter LXIV - MAXIMILIAN

  Chapter LXV - DANGLARS’ SIGNATURE

  Chapter LXVI - CONSOLATION

  Chapter LXVII - SEPARATION

  Chapter LXVIII - THE JUDGE

  Chapter LXIX - EXPIATION

  Chapter LXX - THE DEPARTURE

  Chapter LXXI - THE FIFTH OF OCTOBER

  Endnotes

  Inspired by The Count of Monte Cristo

  Comments & Questions

  For Further Reading

  From the Pages of The Count of Monte Cristo

  Edmond and Mercédès fell into each other’s arms. The fierce Marseilles sun which penetrated the room through the open door covered them with a flood of light. At first they saw nothing around them. Their intense happiness isolated them from the rest of the world. Suddenly Edmond became aware of the gloomy countenance of Fernand peering out of the shadows, pale and menacing, and instinctively the young man put his hand to the knife at his belt. (page 26)

  But sadness is not banished so easily. Like the wounded hero of Virgil he carried the arrow in his wound. (page 63)

  Now that this treasure, which had been the object of the abbé’s meditations for so long, could give future happiness to him whom he truly loved as a son, it had redoubled its value in his eyes; daily would he expatiate on the amount, holding forth to Dantès on the good a man could do to his friends in modern times with a fortune of thirteen or fourteen millions.

  (page 115)

  Dantès descended, murmuring the supreme word of human philosophy: ‘Perhaps.’ (page 141)

  “A secret voice warns me that there is something more than chance in this unlooked-for reciprocity of friendship. You will laugh at me, I know, but ever since I have known him the absurd idea possesses me that everything good that befalls me comes from him!” (page 301)

  BARNES & NOBLE CLASSICS

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  Published by Barnes & Noble Books

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  New York, NY 10011

  www.barnesandnoble.com/classics

  The Count of Monte Cristo was serialized in French as Le Comte de

  Monte-Cristo in 1844-1845. The present translation and abridgement,

  like many editions which first introduced English readers to

  Dumas’s work, remains anonymous.

  Introduction, Notes, and For Further Reading

  Copyright © 2004 by Luc Sante.

  Note on Alexandre Dumas, The World of Alexandre Dumas and

  The Count of Monte Cristo, Inspired by The Count of Monte Cristo,

  and Comments & Questions

  Copyright © 2004 by Barnes & Noble, Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

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  Barnes & Noble Classics and the Barnes & Noble Classics

  colophon are trademarks of Barnes & Noble, Inc.

  The Count of Monte Cristo

  ISBN-13: 978-1-59308-151-5 ISBN-10: 1-59308-151-0

  eISBN: 978-1-411-43379-3

  LC Control Number 2004102766

  Produced and published in conjunction with:

  Fine Creative Media, Inc.

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  Michael J. Fine, President & Publisher

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  7 9 10 8

  Alexandre Dumas

  Alexandre Dumas was born on July 24, 1802, in Villers-Cotterêts, a town northeast of Paris. He was the grandson of a French nobleman, the Marquis Davy de la Pailleterie, and Marie-Cessette Dumas, an Afro-Caribbean slave. His father, Thomas-Alexandre Davy de la Pailleterie, took the name Dumas when he enlisted in the French army. After a period of illustrious service, he rose to the rank of general; but by the end of the eighteenth century, he had fallen into disfavor with Napoléon and was subsequently imprisoned. Thomas-Alexandre Dumas died penniless and broken at age forty-five, leaving his family impoverished. Young Alexandre received only a limited education; however, he was an avid reader, and his elegant penmanship got him a position as clerk to a solicitor. In 1823 he moved to Paris, where, through his father’s connections, he became a copyist for t
he Duke of Orléans, the future King Louis-Philippe.

  Dumas soon turned his attention to literary pursuits. His first major success was the historical drama Henry III and His Court in 1829, followed in 1831 by Antony. By his thirtieth birthday, Dumas was regarded as one of the major figures of the nascent French Romantic theater. His The Tower of Nesle (1832) is a classic example of French romantic drama replete with love, treachery, and death. Despite his success as a playwright, Dumas found his true métier with the birth of the roman feuilleton, or serial novel, in the 1840s. His gripping adventures, with their rambling subplots and moments of suspense, were ideally suited to serialization in newspapers. The Three Musketeers, serialized beginning in 1843 and first published in novel form in 1844, was an overwhelming success that instantly established Dumas as a master of the genre. The Count of Monte Cristo, also published in 1844, was equally popular. In 1845, the first sequel to The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After, was published, followed by the final book in the trilogy, The Viscount of Bragelonne, or Ten Years Later, whose three parts were published between 1848 and 1850. Because of its length, the trilogy’s final book is often published in three segments: The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Vallière, and The Man in the Iron Mask.

  Enormously prolific, Dumas was known for collaborating with others, notably Auguste Maquet, with whom he wrote The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo. His practice of using other literary works as sources and working with collaborators, while hardly unique among his contemporaries, was often criticized, making him a controversial figure in French literary circles. The writer mirrored the adventures of his fictional heroes in his own life. Dumas’s life was filled with adventures. He participated in the July Revolution of 1830 in France as well as in Garibaldi’s quest for Italian independence in the 1860s; he amassed a fortune through his writing, only to let his lavish lifestyle plunge him into perpetual debt; and he built (and then lost in bankruptcy) an opulent château on the outskirts of Paris that he called Monte Cristo. He was also an incorrigible lover whose numerous liaisons produced three children, including a son, Alexandre Dumas (known as Dumas fils to distinguish him from his father), who became an important author in his own right. Alexandre Dumas père died on December 5, 1870.

  The World of Alexandre Dumas and The Count of Monte Cristo

  1789- 1815 The years surrounding the French Revolution and the rise and fall of Napoléon Bonaparte produce upheavals in French society. In literature, classicism, featuring universal themes and pure genres such as tragedy and comedy (the former as represented by Corneille and Racine, and the latter by Molière), re mains the dominant force. However, a new modernism, fueled by the works of Shakespeare, the German Sturm und Drang movement, and such Romantics as Lord By ron and Sir Walter Scott, arises as a competing trend.

  1802 Alexandre Dumas is born on July 24 in Villers-Cotterêts, a village in the department of Aisne to the northeast of Paris. Dumas’s mother is Marie-Louise-Elisabeth Labouret, the daughter of a local innkeeper; his father, Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, is the Haitian-born son of the Marquis Antoine-Alexandre Davy de la Pailleterie, a French nobleman, and Marie-Cessette Dumas, an Afro Caribbean slave from the French colony of Santo Domingo.

  1806 Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, a leading general in Napoléon’s army who has fallen into disfavor, dies, leav ing his family impoverished. Young Dumas receives a limited education and becomes attracted to the popular literature of the time.

  1817- 1820 Dumas takes a job as a solicitor’s clerk in Villers Cotterêts. At eighteen he meets Adolphe de Leuven, a young exiled Swedish aristocrat through whom Dumas is introduced to the Parisian theater scene.

  1822- 1823 Dumas relocates to Paris. With help from his father’s military colleagues and because of his elegant handwriting, he becomes a copyist for the Duke of Or léans, the future King Louis-Philippe of France, whose palace houses the royal Théâtre-Français. Attending a show one evening, Dumas meets writer Charles Nodier, who will later help advance the young playwright’s ca reer. Dumas reads the work of Shakespeare, Scott, By ron, Schiller, and others influential in the development of the French Romantic movement. He meets Giuseppe Garibaldi, an Italian patriot and soldier who will influ ence Dumas later in his life.

  1824 On July 27, Catherine Labay, a seamstress and neighbor Dumas had begun courting the previous year, bears him a son, Alexandre. (When the son later becomes a respected writer himself, he is known as Alexandre Du mas fils to distinguish him from his father, called Alexandre Dumas père.)

  1825- 1829 Dumas begins to write plays, often in collaboration with others such as de Leuven. In 1829 he achieves a re sounding success when Henri III et sa cour (Henry III and His Court) is presented at the Comédie-Française. The author becomes an instant celebrity in Paris and wins admiration from the young Romantics.

  1830- 1836 During the Revolution of 1830, Dumas supports the liberal campaign of the Marquis de Lafayette. The same year, a riot pits young Romantics against classicists at the opening of Victor Hugo’s seminal play Hernani, signaling the ascendancy of Romanticism in France. Dumas builds on his success as a playwright; his notable achievements include Antony (1831), La Tour de Nesle (The Tower of Nesle, 1832), and Kean (1836). The Tower of Nesle, in particular, is still considered a masterpiece of French melodrama.

  1837 Amid growing fame and popular success, Dumas is hon ored with the title of chevalier by the king.

  1840- 1846 Dumas turns his attention to the novel. Newspaper serialization takes hold as a trend in France, and Dumas quickly proves himself a master of the genre. Les Trois mousquetaires (The Three Musketeers) becomes a popular sensation when installments begin to appear in 1843. Within a decade two sequels follow: Vingt ans après (Twenty Years After) and Le Vicomte de Bragelonne, ou Dix ans plus tard (The Viscount of Bragelonne, or Ten Years Later), a three-part novel the last section of which is The Man in the Iron Mask. The success of Le Comte de Monte-Cristo (The Count of Monte Cristo), which begins serialization in the Journal des Débats in 1844 and is published in book form in 1846, eclipses even that of The Three Musketeers. Despite his success, Dumas is criticized for his vast production of material and is accused of overusing collaborators.

  1847- 1850 Dumas reaches his peak of success. He opens the Théâtre Historique in 1847, mainly to present his own plays, including an 1848 production of The Count of Monte Cristo. He spends vast sums to build a grand, hy brid Renaissance-Gothic-style country house, named Monte Cristo, near Saint Germain; some 600 people are invited to a lavish house-warming party in July 1848. With the Revolution of 1848, however, theater atten dance plummets. In 1850 the Théâtre Historique closes its doors, causing financial disaster for Dumas. His house, Monte Cristo, is sold at auction.

  1851- 1852 After fleeing to Brussels to escape his creditors, Dumas is forced into bankruptcy. He never regains the prosperity of the preceding decade.

  1853- 1870 Dumas travels extensively and produces travel books. From 1853 to 1857 he publishes a newspaper, Le Mousquetaire, and from 1857 to 1862 he produces a lit erary journal, Le Monte Cristo. He returns to Paris in 1854. While in Italy in the early 1860s he is an active participant in Garibaldi’s struggle for Italian indepen dence; he lives in Naples from 1861 to 1864.

  1870 Alexandre Dumas dies on December 5, at Puys, near Dieppe.

  Introduction

  The early nineteenth century was an age of giants, fiction-producing giants. Alexandre Dumas, Honoré de Balzac, and Victor Hugo in France; Charles Dickens and Sir Walter Scott in Britain; James Fenimore Cooper in America—all these men issued apparently limitless quantities of words, novels in multiple volumes amounting to thousands of pages, and they delivered such novels at least annually, sometimes more often. The novelists of preceding centuries had small readerships, limited by restricted literacy and access to leisure time, but these writers of the early industrial era addressed a new middle class voracious for sensation and ever-increasing in number as greater prosperity and universal education spread throug
h the Western world. In addition, the scope of their work was determined by the changing circumstances of the press. Newspapers, once dry juridical chronicles subsidized by the state and read by few, were now driven by advertising; they required a constant supply of attractions to bring in customers. Thus was born the serial, the novel continued over weeks or months, with each installment ending on a note of suspense to bring the audience back day after day.

  So writers became entrepreneurs, and a star system arose that richly rewarded a handful of names while making it difficult for the young and untried to break into the business. Production was key, however; even the most famous writers were paid by the installment or by the line. Balzac, who died prematurely partly as a result of his overconsumption of coffee, sometimes had three or four serials going on simultaneously in different newspapers. Dumas was notorious for exploiting the practice of payment by the line, garnishing episodes with lengthy monosyllabic conversations, which ultimately caused newspaper owners to devise other standards for payment. That penchant of his is generally forgotten now, but not his practice of employing other, lesser writers to fill in the parts of the books that bored or blocked him, like a Renaissance painter hiring apprentices to daub the clouds on a canvas—that bit has remained attached to his reputation like a leech on skin. But the physical demands of serial publication made such a thing necessary to someone less driven than Balzac, just as serialization accounts for the length of their books, huge by to day’s standards; we may see them as the equivalent of twenty-hour movies, but they were consumed, like episodic television, in daily or weekly bite-size portions.