The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas | 1844, serialized | Barnes & Noble Classics | Paperback $11.95
Mixing a bit of seventeenth-century French history with a great deal of invention, Alexandre Dumas tells the tale of young D’Artagnan and his musketeer comrades, Porthos, Athos and Aramis. Together they fight to foil the schemes of the brilliant, dangerous Cardinal Richelieu, who pretends to support the king while plotting to advance his own power. Bursting with swirling swordplay, swooning romance, and unforgettable figures such as the seductively beautiful but deadly femme fatale, Milady, and D’Artagnan’s equally beautiful love, Madame Bonacieux, The Three Musketeers continues, after a century and a half of continuous publication, to define the genre of swashbuckling romance and historical adventure.
I was really looking forward to reading this title for Classics Club, mainly because I previously read another book by the same author for the same reason — The Count of Monte Cristo, which I thoroughly enjoyed and count among my favorite books of all time.
It’s possible that my enjoyment of that book overly affected my expectations and therefore my enjoyment of this book. I know for sure that my having seen various adaptations of The Three Musketeers and its sequels affected my expectations. That was a major difference in my reading experiences between the two; I went into The Count of Monte Cristo with limited preconceptions about it, but I began The Three Musketeers with memories of multiple movies and TV shows and theater productions rattling around in my brain.
Don’t get me wrong, The Three Musketeers is still a fun read and a really great adventure story. If it wasn’t, there wouldn’t be so many adaptations! However, my ideas of what the characters would be like and how their stories would unfold were in some ways quite different from the reality of their original versions in the book.
I have to say, book-D’Artagnan is reads rather less like the loveable rogue I expected and rather more like a conceited sex-pest. He put me in mind of one of those kinds of boys who’s never really been told no, so goes through life assuming he’ll always be entitled to get his way (not just in relationships, but in life generally). It’s no wonder that modern adaptations tend to leave out the more distasteful of his actions — like tricking a woman into being intimate with him by pretending to be a different person and “seducing” a servant through chicanery (the most generous way of looking at it). None of the romance in this book is what I’d categorize as swooning, as it says in the book blurb.
Of course, it’s not really fair to judge a book written in the 19th century and set in the 17th century by modern ethical standards. I only mention it because it did affect my enjoyment of the story. I was a bit annoyed by the treatment of the lady characters in The Count of Monte Cristo, too. Dumas’ feminine characters tend to either be cardboard cutouts for scenery or else miserable creatures intent on messing up the lives of men somehow.
Despite having spent the last two paragraphs complaining about it, I’m actually glad I read this book and I did generally enjoy it. I’d recommend it to anyone who’s craving a good old-fashioned swashbuckling adventure story, particularly for those who aren’t afraid to curl up with a chonkster.
Links:
- Société des Amis d’Alexandre Dumas
- ’10 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Alexandre Dumas’ at Book Riot
- ‘Could You Fit in as a Musketeer?’ Quiz at How Stuff Works
Publication information: Dumas, Alexandre. The three musketeers. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2004. Print.
Source: Personal library.
Disclaimer: I am not compensated, monetarily or otherwise, for reviews of books or other products.
Leave a Reply