Enjolras

Name: Enjolras

Gender: male

Age: 22 (looks 17)

Fandom: Les Misérables (novel) by Victor Hugo

Journal: n/a

Typist: n/a

Quick Biography

Enjolras is a student at the University of Paris and the only child of rich parents. He is the leader of a small coterie of young men, mostly fellow students, who are working to overthrow the current king of France. At the beginning of the book, this is Charles X, the restored Bourbon monarch, but later it is Louis Phillipe, the "Citizen King" put on the throne by a successful bourgeois revolution in July 1830. They call themselves the "Friends of the ABC," masquerading as an aid society for educating children, but really wanting to uplift the oppressed poor of all of France.

Enjolras is first seen when Marius, a young lawyer, is introduced to the Friends by Courfeyrac, one of Enjolras's lieutenants. Enjolras takes offense at Marius's admiration for Napoleon Bonaparte, pointing out that France doesn't need Corsica to be great. When Marius blusters on, he is put down by the more gentle Combeferre, who then departs and sings a short sentimental ditty of motherhood, meant to be symbolic. Enjolras delivers the final killing blow to Marius's argument by telling Marius that his mother is the republic.

Much later when unrest is spiraling upwards and a cholera epidemic is ravaging the population of Paris, Enjolras needs to send out his people to check in with their political allies, other societies and groups of men who share a common cause with the Friends. He runs out of members present before he runs out of places to send them, and when he comments that Marius doesn't seem to come around anymore, the drunkard Grantaire, volunteers to visit the sculptors at the Barriere du Maine. Skeptical, Enjolras sends him but checks up on him later, finding out that Grantaire is instead playing dominoes and forgets his mission entirely.

Finally, the last blow to the people is struck. General Maximilien Lamarque succumbs to cholera and his funeral is set for 5 June 1832. Lamarque was the last of the old republicans who still spoke freely for the people. Lamarque's funeral was expected to be trouble. The army was massed in Paris, and the Friends planned to participate in the funeral in the hopes of being present if anything happened. When the fighting broke out just as predicted, they gravitated toward the Corinthe, one of their habitual eating places and barricaded themselves into a cul-de-sac. Enjolras, armed with a carbine, led the organization of the fighting.

They raise a red flag at the front of their barricade, but in the early fighting it is knocked down by enemy fire. When Enjolras, knowing the danger to do so, entreats the 60-odd fighters to retrieve their symbol, all but one worn-down old man decline. The old man climbs up and is shot down when he picks up the flag. Enjolras declares that the old man's coat will be their flag from now on and raises it to the top of the flagpole, still rent with bloody holes.

At one point, Marius saves the barricade from being overrun with a suicidal threat to blow up a keg of gunpowder. Enjolras names him as co-leader of the barricade, because he saves them all. Enjolras settles into shooting at the enemy from a concealed redoubt and proving that he's an excellent marksman. One of the fighters, who calls himself Le Cabuc, violates the unspoken rules of honor that govern the barricade by shooting an old householder in one of the adjoining buildings. Enjolras executes him coldly with a bullet to the brain and then gives a speech, promising among other things, that he will face his own judgment when all is won.

Eventually, they realize that they are soon going to be cut off, so Enjolras and Combeferre try to send a few men away to save their lives. It is Marius who eventually persuades them, and Jean Valjean, the adoptive father of the girl Marius loves, provides a fifth National Guard uniform for the departing men to use as disguises. When the soldiers start firing grapeshot against the barricade, Enjolras finds a solution in the form of a mattress that is hung above the street to air out. Jean Valjean shoots the rope, allowing the mattress to fall and be dragged into the gap to stop the shot. For his help to the barricade, Enjolras rewards Valjean with the task of executing a police spy they had captured earlier. Enjolras had ordered the spy Javert to be tied to a pillar on the ground floor of the wine shop to await execution, since they didn't have the bullets to spare to kill him first. However, Valjean releases Javert, for personal reasons.

Eventually, the barricade is overrun, and most of the students are killed outright. Enjolras fights his way into the wine shop, armed only with the broken butt of his carbine. Still unhurt, he retreats with a few men up the spiral staircase to the first floor. They hack away the stairs to impede the soldiers' pursuit, but when they make it up there, the soldiers systematically slaughter the final defenders. Apparently, only Enjolras is left alive, and when they surround him to execute him, the sudden silence awakens Grantaire, who has been lying with his head upon a table in a drunken stupor. He'd resisted Enjolras earlier attempt to drive him away from the barricade. Grantaire instantly understands the situation and requests and claims a place at Enjolras's side to be executed. Both men are shot, Grantaire falling to Enjolras's feet, the leader staying upright, pinned to the wall by numerous bullets.

Physical Abilities

Enjolras is a natural leader, skilled in judging people and making quick decisions. His primarily orientation is on the martial, planning and fighting battles, though he is a talented orator as well. He demonstrates a noted ability at sharp shooting, sniping at soldiers from concealment in the barricade. And he successfully fights hand to hand until he is virtually the last survivor of the barricade.

Superhuman Abilities

N/A

Unusual or Magical Possessions

N/A

Appearance

Enjolras is tall and slender with long, wavy blond hair. His eyes are a clear blue, like the sky before sunset. He's been described as both a "marble statue" for his paleness and hard demeanor and called "Apollo" just as much for his fiery beauty. Either way, he is classically handsome with patrician features and a high forehead. He dresses quite soberly and formally, usually in black. Even though he's strong, he is unnaturally fragile and young looking, so much so that his executioners say that killing him is like shooting a flower.

Personality

Enjolras can be described as both fiery and icy. These contradictions can be explained by understanding how completely his devotion to his ideals possess him. He follows only one passion, that of freeing the people of France to live in the glorious republic of his dreams. To that end, he neglects all aspects of the rest of normal life. He has no interest in wine or lovers or conventional beauty and comfort. He despises those he considers weak, especially the one useless hanger-on in the Friends of the ABC, Grantaire. His efforts to expel Grantaire come to nothing, since the spineless drunk adores Enjolras as an ideal model, even if he won't follow him in his fight.

He can speak passionately and persuasively on the republic and his lofty goals, his strong oration reminiscent of Louis-Antoine Saint-Just. At these times, he seems to burn from the inside, calling to mind many comparisons to leaders of the past. Any attempt to flatter or compliment him or distract him from his work is met with an icy, uncomprehending stare. He simply will not recognize or see anything that doesn't further his goals. Opposition is to be cut down or dismissed. Allies are to be cultivated but not coddled. He is a perfect, selfless leader.

Except that he loses. Even in defeat, he's unyielding. His pleas to his men to save a few of themselves are ineffectual. His promises to deal harsh justice to himself are valid. He knows he's a weapon, a tool to bring about the dream, but not a man fit to live in the result. He is too much in love with his ideals to see himself as a monster, and truly he isn't, but he knows that the men who walk into the bright sun of freedom covered with blood, even the blood of the enemies of freedom, have no right to live there. He's there to open the gateway with his life and his devotion, not to live a real life.

Relationships

• Family:
• Lovers:
• Score card (People they snogged without dating):
• Friends:
• Enemies:
• Allies:
• Affiliations (to a particular group, of origin, or not):

RP Canon

TBA