The Phantom of the Opera: The Original Novel | Gaston Leroux

The Phantom of the Opera: The Original Novel | Gaston Leroux | Enjoyable for what it is

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The Phantom of the...

	The Phantom of the Opera: The Original Novel Gaston Leroux Harper Perennial, 1988 - 368 pages average customer review:based on 215 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Love unto madness

I read the book without ever having seen any of the plays or movies based on the book, so I cannot compare this to the modern retellings of it. I must say that if some of the previous reviewers are correct and the movies are much better than the book, they must be very spectacular indeed. I am inclined to think that they are simply biased toward the version they first saw, just people who have read a book which a movie is based off of like the book better simply because it is the version they first loved.

As to claims that this is poorly written and that Leroux simply provides the framework for future authors to build upon, I assume that the people who say this will say that books like the Iliad are the same way. They are simply upset that Leroux does not write in the manner that they are used to. Part of the appeal of the book is that it is written almost as a penny dreadful. I think that it simply adds to the story. If it is not realistic enough for you, then perhaps you had better stick to contemporary novels, for if you think like a previous reviewer that it is odd that the main characters can have a conversation while searching the tunnels for the phantom, then I cannot imagine what you will think of Frodo and Sam talking on the way up Mount Doom.

I found this to be a very enjoyable book, full of love, death, horror, and courage. The Phantom loves Christine yet cannot have her, and is driven to madness. The mad Phantom becomes the book's antagonist, yet all the while Leroux is trying to lead the reader to pity him rather than hate him. Definitely an intruiging book.

Overall grade: A

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Enjoyable for what it is

I read this book because I'm a big fan of the original 1925 screen adaptation, and wasn't entirely disappointed by the original print form of this very famous story which has been adapted for the stage and screen countless times since. As expected, it's not exactly the same as the movie or the musical. In the book, we get much more of a backstory to the whole business of the Opera Ghost, more development of the romance between Christine and Raoul (in contrast to the movie, in the book they're not even a couple when the story begins, and for awhile it doesn't seem like they will become romantically involved at all), more emphasis on other characters (such as Madame Giry and the new managers of the opera), more detail on and development of just what the connection between Erik and the Persian really is, and overall a lot of great details that have been left out in the various adaptations of the novel.

However, as enjoyable a book as this is, and as quick of a read as it is, I'd have to recommend it as a companion to the movies and musicals, not something to read instead of watching them or even to read before watching any of them. It's a good book, but as a number of other reviewers have pointed out, it's not exactly great literature either. And while the exposition style sometimes works, that of having the story be told as a series of events which Monsieur Leroux is reporting as a journalist instead of telling as a fictional tale, sometimes it kind of gets in the way and isn't fully effective. I actually felt that the movie was more gripping and suspenseful, even though the book provides more details about certain events, such as when Raoul and the Persian are in the Phantom's torture chambers and trying to find their way to Christine and to find their way out. The language used just isn't extraordinarly compelling or the type that keeps the reader on the edge of his or her seat. I also felt that the ending events presented in the book are a bit anticlimactic, not necessarily because they're not exactly the same as the ending events in the movie, but rather because these events are related in the abovementioned journalistic manner, after the fact, instead of being related right as they're unfolding, which would have made for more suspense and drawn the reader more into the story.

Still, all in all, this is a worthwhile story, in spite of its shortcomings. It might not be great literature, but it is an enjoyable read in the style of the old penny dreadfuls. And for fans of the movies and musicals based on the book, it does help to fill in some of the missing pieces of the puzzle and makes for a more thorough enjoyment of the whole story.

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The Phantom of the Opera

Ages 15 and up. The book The Phantom of the Opera is a book about the musician who is living under the famous Paris Opera House. He does strange and unpredictable things at the opera house to benefit the career of a young singer. After a while of helping her, he falls in love with her. But wait there's another man who is also in love with her. While this singer goes through some rough times in her life, she grows closer to one man and not the other.

Poorly written, but still a good read

Although the story was rather engaging, The approach Leroux takes in narrating his story is sorely lacking. He wrote the story from the point of view of an investigative journalist--a third person limited point of view. There are places in his novel, however, where he refers to what "he thinks" or "Christine thought," which means that the narrator is really third person omniscient! In this regard the novel was poorly written, but all in all, I had fun reading it and would recommend it to others.

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The Frame work exists.... but little else.

The Phantom of the Opera is quite possibly one of the most well known books in print today, and quite possibly one of the most accesable classics today, in the fact that it is a relatively easy book to get through. Gaston Leroux uses relatively easy vocabulary and a almost commical tone throughout the novel, playing on the reader's sense of intrigue and mystery. He has constructed one of the most adored tales ever to grace the printing press, however, Leroux has by no means written a novel that rivals Joseph Conrad, or Poe.
Leroux's work reads much like a mystery, and, according to the most recent Sygnet version of the novel, this is what has made the work survive and thrive throughout the decades. This assumption, however, to me does not seem to be the truth of the matter. Leroux, while being a talented mystery writer of his day, has written a novel that has very little merit literarily in the telling of the story of the mad genious, Erik. Although the basic framework for a wonderful story is there, Leroux does little to act on it, and instead presents the majority of half the characters to be commical and not at all mysterious or romantic. Throughout the course of reading the novel I found myself wishing that Leroux had acted more upon his framework-- building up the suspense, delving more into the emotional state of the characters beyond the popular terms of the era, such as: raputre, ecstacy, and amiable. The fact of the matter is, Leroux has laid out the bare bones of a wonderful tale, his writing style, instead of aiding the telling of the story, instead hinders it and attempts to ground it.
Now, it is more than true that Leroux is merely the product of his times, appealing to an audience that demanded certain qualities from a work of fiction. It is quite possible that Leroux contained the possibilities of his work to ground it and to make it more accesable and I am merely judging it by today's standards, however, does it not hold true that books such as Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice still hold universal appeal, despite being past their times?
The Phantom of the Opera is based on the framework of a great story, one that is better realized in the Musical: The Phantom of the Opera, by Andrew Lloyd Webber. This is simply because Webber takes the framework laid out by Leroux and doesn't try to ground it, but instead makes it into a work of passion and seduction, which the characters of Erik and Christine better work as; it just makes more sense than being moved by angelic songs. I give the novel three stars because the framework is so fantastic, Leroux's writing style and presentation of the work detract from the book, squandering the framework.
However, it should be read by everyone, as any classic should.

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