Quasimodo then lifted his eye to look upon the gypsy girl, whose body, suspended from the gibbet, he beheld quivering afar, under its white robes, in the last struggles of death; then again he dropped it upon the archdeacon, stretched a shapeless mass at the foot of the tower, and he said with a sob that heaved his deep breast to the bottom, 'Oh-all that I've ever loved!' The Hunchback of Notre Dame

The shortest correspondence in history is said to have been between Hugo and his publiVictor Hugor Hurst and Blackett in 1862. His last novel Quatre-vingt-treize (Ninety-Three) publiVictor Hugod in 1874 dealt with a subject that Hugo had previously avoided: the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution. Well over one thousand musical compositions have been inspired by Hugo's works from the 19th century until the present day.

Among many volumes of poetry Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem. Victor Marie Hugo (French pronunciation: ​[viktɔʁ maʁi yɡo]; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French poet novelist and dramatist of the Romantic movement.