A Run Through Luxembourg Gardens, Where Brothers Turn Into Fathers

“When Brothers Turn into Being Fathers” is how Victor Hugo chooses to title his chapter on the Thénardiers’ abandoned kids. I was so struck by this portrait of these children as well as the wealthier little boy with his father in this chapter that I wanted to bookpack it. I set off one windy, but sunny, Sunday, to jog through the gardens, following where these characters would have been.

These children wander through Luxembourg Gardens, alone, as the rest of Paris is either locked up in their homes or fighting in the barricade. Where are the police that usually patrol these gardens? At the barricades. Where are the authorities helping them find a home and food? Preoccupied. But these young children are not afraid. The older one puts out his hand. The younger one grabs it. The older one carries a small stick to ward off potential harm. The younger one is hungry. The older one looks for food. The older one is not his father, but he can no longer just be his brother. This is one of the many beautiful portraits of unexpected mentorship Victor Hugo paints. As they no longer have the luxury to think about the failures of their situation, they understand how to live by learning as they go, teaching others how to survive, and looking, always, towards the future. In these portraits of a friend or sibling taking on the responsibility of a parent, Victor Hugo shows us the value of mentorship, informed by lived experience, as a guide for how to live life and face tomorrow, even when tomorrow is not promised.

Getting off the metro stop, I was struck by the silence in this neighborhood. It was a Sunday, a day of rest for many Parisians, but I legitimately didn’t see a soul. Besides one older woman with her baguette. What a contrast from the craziness of the barricades surrounding the Luxembourg Gardens in this section of Les Misérables. Walking into the Luxembourg Gardens, I found out where everyone in Montparnasse was. They were having a baguette, jogging, riding ponies, and basking in the rare sun. What a contrast from the outside streets. And ironic, considering it was a flipped situation in Les Misérables, where Luxembourg Gardens served as a temporary refuge from the outside chaos and noise of the barricades.

In this chapter, Hugo makes a conscious decision to stop the rising action in the barricades to show, visually, how the personal is inherently political. It’s a striking moment that purposefully interrupts the flow of action. He writes “At the same moment, in the Luxembourg Gardens – for the eyes of the drama must be everywhere – there were two children holding hands.” (1092) In the chaos of this moment, these children have gone forgotten, but Victor Hugo makes the choice to remember them.

How did these children manage to get into the gardens among this chaos? Victor Hugo asks this question, but in his typical narration style, he doesn’t quite know the answer. He thinks that “Perhaps they had escaped from some guard-room…Perhaps somewhere in the vicinity, at the Enfer Toll Gate or on Esplanade de l’Observatoire.” (1092) The first time I went to this area, I was focused on Luxembourg Gardens, so I didn’t see the Enfer Toll Gate. I returned to this same area a couple of days later and noticed an interesting lion sculpture at an intersection in the Montparnasse neighborhood on the way to the Montparnasse Cemetery from the Catacombs. After a bit of research and digging online, I found out the Enfer Toll Gates, or the Gates of Hell as they were known, no longer exist as they were and are in fact in the approximate area of this lion statue that I happened to stumble upon. Today, it is called the Place Denfert-Rochereau, which seems to be in the place of the Enfer Gates. It seems very appropriate that I would stumble upon this landmark rather than seek it out, considering that these two young Thénardiers would have stumbled upon these gates, rather than knowing exactly where they were going.

My estimation of where the Enfer Toll Gates would be today.

And now into the Luxembourg Gardens. Hugo goes on for a few pages describing the beauty of the Luxembourg Gardens, particularly that “There is nothing so wonderful as foliage washed by the rain and dried by the sun – it is a warm freshness.” (1094) I can relate to this feeling, Victor Hugo! After the rain that plagued the first two weeks in Paris and often came right when we ventured outside into the streets there was truly no better place to be than in the Luxembourg Gardens, taking in the most beautiful park I’d ever seen, as the sun came out for the first time in days. In this rapturous prose, he gets lost in his thoughts: everything from Goethe to the flaws in thought that devalues human connection. Running through these gardens it isn’t hard to see how one can get lost in thought. I start to think about how lovely it would be to have the park to myself. Until I make eye contact with other runners, smile with them, and bask in this small moment of connection. I think that Victor Hugo would be proud of me for reaching out to strangers, even in this small way. I take in the statues “…clothed all in tatters of sunshine” (1092) and the “abundance of light” (1095). As I catch my breath at the end of this run, I take a seat by the lake, where much of the action of this chapter happens.

I watch the little boys with their sailboats, and they remind me of the Thénardier kids and the boy with his father, who came from a house which had owned a key to Luxembourg Gardens even when it was closed. A lot of these boys are with their parents. They don’t feed swans like the boy with his father. Perhaps these little boats have replaced the swans. The little boy with his little boat, the Greek flag waving on it, leans far forward to reach the boat, almost falling in, laying on his tummy to reach it with his guide stick. This feels familiar. Maybe because in this chapter: “The older lad quickly lay flat on his stomach on the curved edge of the pond…almost falling in, with his right hand he reached his stick out towards the brioche.” (1099). The brioche having been thrown by the wealthier father and son towards the swan. The little boy grabs onto his boat. The older lad “grabbed the brioche...” (1099) Both stand up. Their actions are almost identical, the context is completely different.

 At this, I walk out of the gardens. I have found what I was looking for.

Source:

Tribillon , Justinien. “New Life in the Kingdom of Death: The Plan to Redevelop Subterranean Paris.” The Guardian, 6 Feb. 2017, www.theguardian.com/cities/2017/feb/06/beyond-kingdom-death-journey-subterranean-paris.

The Hand that Advances Students' Souls

“Callow youth, if we may be forgiven the expression, was spreading its wings.” (584).

This is how Victor Hugo begins his chapter on the Friends of the ABC. In France, there seems to be a tradition of student revolution. An association with students being on the forefront of change. There is almost an expectation in Paris that as minds grow, the passion and desire for change gets to a fever point. To be a student is sometimes to experience both an urgency that comes with knowing that this time in flux will come to an end after a few years and the idea of seemingly endless time to discuss and debate the state of the country and what needs to change. In Les Misérables, Hugo profiles this contradiction beautifully in his fictional depiction of the 1830 revolution, spearheaded by young people like Enjolras, who disagree on pretty much everything besides the overwhelming need for liberty and a better tomorrow. As Hugo puts it: “There was enthusiasm for the absolute, with infinite materializations of it envisaged…And nothing like dreams for generating the future. Today’s utopia is tomorrow’s flesh and blood.” (583) There is a feeling that a utopia is possible, which comes from being fresh to the world and its problems. And a general feeling of empathy in these students, who may not agree on Napoleon but agree on a passion for their country and what it could be for all its residents. While this desire for utopia can oftentimes be viewed as unrealistic and superfluous, like when students broadcast their message in the 1968 revolution and changed the general opinion of the movement in Paris, and is sometimes parodied, like in Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch, there is something serious about this idea because of the passion behind it. Look past all the “rattling tray triple-tiered with double-espressos extended high” and the “highbrow/semiunreadable paperback” as Wes Anderson puts it, and there is something to be seriously admired in these students’ belief in a better world. There is something to take lessons from. This disagreement, this healthy debate, and the idealism that can be seen as either superfluous or beautiful, traditionally has found a home in cafes within the Latin Quarter, from the Friends of the ABC in a (fictional) Les Misérables to the point zero for the (real) 1968 student rebellion.

But where exactly was the Friends of the ABC located? Victor Hugo provides some clues: “They met in Paris in two places, near Les Halles in a tavern called the Corinthe…and near the Panthéon in a little café on Rue St Michel called Café Musain, which has now been pulled down.” (584)

Sorbonne University

On a particularly exciting day of bookpacking, we explored the Latin Quarter, from Shakespeare and Co. to the Panthéon. As we made our way through this Arrondissement, the abundance of tourists near Shakespeare and Co. became replaced by students clustered in cafes near the Sorbonne University. It wasn’t that hard to visualize Enjolras and co. discussing the pros and cons of Napoleon after some of us compared copies of Napoleon’s Civil Code in the many law book shops in the area. Being in the location where they would have stood, it’s fun to think about which character in the Friends of the ABC I would be or that student sitting in the café reading French literature. Maybe he’s got the view of democracy at all costs like Enjolras. Maybe he wants gradual change like Combeferre. The wonderful portrait Victor Hugo paints of all these members makes it easy to fit yourself or others into this group. And picture what niche you would fit into. However, he gives room for these characters to change their minds or carry multiple beliefs at the same time. That’s one of the most interesting parts of being a student: carrying a multitude of different beliefs at the same time, still figuring out where you belong. (“It is in the nature of undertows to create turbulence, hence some very peculiar combinations of ideas. People adored both Napoleon and liberty.” (583)) Marius certainly goes through many changes on his way to the ABC club. And the moment at the ABC club, when he praises Napoleon only to be shut down and argued against, only to make him ultimately question his beliefs, is one of the most telling moments of what it’s like to be a student. Your views are in flux because for most people it’s the first time you’ve been away from home for that long. There is a sense of freedom and anarchy; a place where you aren’t shamed for changing your beliefs. Hugo comments on how this process of change in college is natural: “Each individual was taking whatever step forward was his to take. Royalists were becoming liberals; liberals were becoming democrats.” (583)  Perhaps Victor Hugo sees himself in this constant thirst for knowledge and willingness to change, considering his own similarities with Marius (his father fought for Napoleon, etc.). Perhaps he sees himself as a student as well, at least in his state of mind.

The street leading up to the Panthéon.

Standing in front of the Sorbonne University made me see the Friends of the ABC in a new light. It made me think of the passage of time and the tradition of French students being activists and even revolutionaries. As I walked down Rue St. Michel where the Friends of the ABC would have met at the Café Musain, I realized that not much has changed, despite time marching on. In 1968, revolutionary students started out protesting the expulsion of other students but ended up demanding ultimate freedom on these very streets. Ripping up the cobblestones, yelling “Vive la France!”, making a barricade, and thinking about Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People. That feels awfully familiar. Maybe because it happened in Les Misérables as well. And happened in other revolutions, and again, and will probably happen again. And has happened again.

Taking in this view, it is interesting to think about what I would have done. Parisians certainly differ in the ways they respond to these revolutions. While there is this idea that Paris is used to revolution, so much so that “Innocent bystanders (old and young) stand on balconies and in open windows; wait on tables and eat/drink at the terrasses of the two cafés; pose for a tourist-family picture (T-shirt: “Liberty Junior High Boys Track”) (Anderson).” This is The French Dispatch’s take on the 1968 revolution. In Hugo’s take of the 1830 revolution, the people in Paris surrounding the barricades go on like every day. But there is also sometimes this sense of patriotic duty: that bystanders feel they must join in or help in some way. In a report on the 1968 revolution, an officer describes how older teachers joined in and those living in the buildings surrounding the barricades passed supplies to the protesters. Perhaps both can be true, as is often the case.

Inside the Panthéon.

There is just something so powerful about this street leading to the Panthéon, where Victor Hugo is buried. As the Panthéon looks down the Rue St. Michel, Victor Hugo, I feel, in some poetic way, looked down over the 1968 revolution, and every revolution to come in the Latin Quarter. The Panthéon itself was built as a symbol for the people of France. It was meant to be nondenominational and is a mausoleum. The walls are lined with mortal heroes throughout history. And although Victor Hugo didn’t want to be buried there, there is something so right about him being here, in a celebration of the power of individual mortal goodness and light, across from where students, again and again, demanded for history to turn towards goodness and light.

Sources:

Anderson, Wes. The French Dispatch . The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun, 2021, https://deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/The-French-Dispatch-Read-The-Screenplay.pdf. Accessed 2023.

Grimaud , M. Maurice. “Night of the Barricades .” Night of the Barricades, 1968.

Vive la Logo!

King Louis XIV’s marketing is impressive! It is. If you go around Versailles, you’ll see a lot of gold, a lot of full ceiling paintings, a lot of busts of various aristocrats, and surprisingly, a lot of branding. It feels very modern in its love of branding. This branding is not King Louis XIV water bottles or Marie Antoinette earrings, though you’ll find that in the gift shop, but it is the logo of King Louis’ court: the Sun King. And what an amazing logo it is! King Louis rising with the sun. Ahh, the sun, the moon, and Louis XIV. Things that just go together as celestial beings.

It really takes the whole “chosen by God” mandate to new heights. The logo was even inspired by Apollo the Sun God, who in Greek mythology controls the sun’s movements during the day riding his sun chariot. Louis also liked Apollo’s association with the arts, as he saw himself as a ballet dancer. So, he literally is comparing himself to a god. Kind of a delusional view looking at it from today…but it’s still a good logo, though.

If I lived at the time, maybe in a different country and all I knew about the French monarchy was this logo I would be a believer. If you took away the “little” problem of all the starving peasants and ridiculous class hierarchies among many other things, you’d be saying “Long live the King” just based on that logo alone. The point is: every door, every ornate ceiling, contains this logo. You can’t escape it. After you make your way through the house, you go into the gift shop, and guess what’s there: Sun King earrings and Sun King spoons and Sun King tote bags and Sun King crowns. Not much has changed in the love of this logo.  It’s so over-the-top and commercial…I’ll take the spoon and tote bag please! 

All this logo branding is not much different from the Louis Vuitton’s and Chanel’s of modern Paris. While brands like Louis Vuitton put the LV logo on countless bags, King Louis XIV slapped his face with a sun on every door in Versailles. It feels like a very modern idea to slap a logo on everything to increase its’ perceived value. Both are branding associated with wealth and status.

There is appeal to the LV logo; there is a huge market. If I ever doubted the value of this particular branding, I must only walk back over the Champs-Élysées, where tourists wait in an impossibly long lines to have their chance to buy Louis Vuitton at a slightly reduced price than the U.S. Unlike the symbol of the Sun King, anyone with the means can buy Louis Vuitton; they don’t have to be born into a certain family. But most people don’t have the means.

Versailles is still intertwined with this idea of luxury and branding in a modern sense as well. With one look at the website, I found that the Chateau of Versailles officially partners with luxury brands like Saint Louis Crystal and Bernardaud today. And luxury brands like Jacquemus, who did their Fall 2023-24 collection on the grounds of Versailles, show the continuation of opulence and over-the-top wealth even within the grounds of Versailles. And the continuation of branding…

And what about royalty today? Can you not buy King Charles tea (I admit I bought some, it’s a rare edition!) or Queen Elizabeth hand towels in London? I’ve seen both. The English royalty are treated like commodities: to be looked at and to buy into the idea, maybe so much so that you pick up one of those hand towels. If you do, you’ll probably see the coat of arms at the top. Not as interesting branding as Louis XIV but it’ll have to do. The point is that at the end of the day it’s a business; it’s a brand; in the same way a Louis Vuitton or Chanel is a brand. So, to buy their merchandise, essentially is associating with this high-class brand.

I ruminated on all this as I left Versailles.

I thought I had left behind the Sun King logo in Versailles but to my surprise, it made another appearance in the Musée de l’Armée. I wandered through many unbranded Napoleon-era uniforms wondering where his special branding was. Where was the bee symbol so integral in his reign as a symbol of immortality? I didn’t even see his eagle symbol but maybe I missed the military flags of his reign. Where was his branding? My eyes started to glaze over. But then something pierced through the many uniforms: a bright light, a bright gold color. Was it Apollo? No, it was just Louis the XIV and his god complex. And there was the logo again! A huge sun, in gold, with King Louis and his babyface in the center. I felt a bit disgusted at this branding, I must admit. Here were the uniforms of those who went into battle under Louis, perhaps even died for his causes, and somehow, they are all made almost anonymous under Louis’ branding. It is like Louis is saying that they are not the important part, he is.

But as the monarch of strict absolutism, religious intolerance, and dismissing staggering inequality in the face of endless parties, it is only realistic that he would see these soldiers as meaningless in the face of his alleged God-given power. And of course, the logo’s all in gold. Because of course it is.

Sources

Brands. Château de Versailles. (n.d.). https://www.boutique-chateauversailles.fr/en/152-brands

Louis XIV 1638-1715. Palace of Versailles. (2023, February 17). https://en.chateauversailles.fr/discover/history/great-characters/louis-xiv

Napoleon.org. (2004, June). The Symbols of Empire. napoleon.org. https://www.napoleon.org/en/history-of-the-two-empires/the-symbols-of-empire/

Pockets of Stillness in Paris

The first time I came into my apartment in Paris I was struck by one detail: the huge floor-to-ceiling windows. Although in many ways Emily in Paris is unlucky with her situation in Paris, all her problems seem to go away when she sees the large window at the back of her apartment. She opens it up and suddenly she feels overwhelmed by the beauty of Paris and the beauty of Le Marais where she lives.

View from the apartment window.

Now Emily is certainly not a role model or someone to follow closely while in Paris, but I can certainly relate to this feeling. After a long day of traveling, to see the large windows and to step out onto the balcony, to hear Paris, was refreshing. As someone who is naturally somewhat of a loud talker and extroverted, coming to Paris meant learning how to embrace moments of silence, and to simply listen to the sounds around me. I also found some surprises in the process.

Like Lucie looking out her window in London, and the cacophony of voices she hears coming towards her, I take in the various noises on my street: Rue de Vaugirard. I hear people talking in the café across from me, bikes going by in the wonderful bike lanes that are added to the street, and the metro rattling by underneath me. I hear the children playing in front of my apartment. Living like a local in Paris means understanding that it’s a city, not just an idea. Hearing the sounds of construction, of buses going by, the meow-like texture of the ambulance noise, reminds me that this is a big city no matter how romantic and special it is known to be. This is the first time I have understood Paris to be a city in the same way I have understood New York or Washington D.C. to be a city, because it is the first time I’ve been surrounded by working people in Paris rather than tourists or those whose livelihoods revolve around the tourism industry.

Another revealing moment of stillness came a few days later. I had gone onto the porch to take a phone call but had decided to remain there because of how lovely it is at night. I take in all the Parisians talking, arguing, eating, smoking, and think up stories for all of them and make assumptions about their relationships with each other. I feel like the movie character Amelie, the quirky Parisian who lives almost completely removed from the world around her and prefers to live in her imagination. Of course, there is a key difference: Amelie is French and knows French. When I hear conversations drifting in and out on my porch, I can’t understand it, so I have no context whatsoever for my imagination gone wild. And I kind of love it. Everything seems possible.

The first time this boundary turns sour happens that same night. Seated cross-legged on the balcony, suddenly I see a dog run into the café on the corner. It passes through the tables and chairs, weaving through the smoke from the cigarettes, and goes up to a man sitting at the café. Why is this dog not on a leash? I think. Is the dog homeless? I am now following this dog’s every move. Another woman joins the scene (new character!) and approaches the man seated. She asks him a question in French. He answers and the dog goes up to him. He pets the dog. Of course, I have no idea what this woman has said or whether this dog is his dog, so I remain in a state of not knowing, which, for the first time in my listening, bothers me. I want to somehow help the dog, but I don’t even know if he needs help.

A metro stop in Central Paris with style!

A little hidden Eiffel Tower view from the apartment window at night.

That same night I look out on the view and see something I hadn’t noticed before in the three or so days I’ve been there: the Eiffel Tower, lit up at night. In case I forgot that Paris was in fact not like New York or any other city. I felt renewed in my thirst to learn more and to be more patient in my not knowing or understanding.

The first time I take the metro, I am frustrated. The silence is frustrating. No one is speaking around me. It is so quiet that I entertain myself by counting the number of stops until I transfer lines. 12.. 10..5…3...oh, It’s time to get off. The transfer of lines comes as a welcome break from the silence as people converse or talk on the phone. I itch to talk to someone: the guy next to me looks friendly? Or what about that old woman across from me? I remember the rules: don’t smile at anyone or make eye contact, do as the Parisian women do. But can I at least talk to other members of the program? No, I quiet these thoughts. No reason to draw attention. No reason to alert the pick-pocketers that you’re American. I get off at my stop relieved at finally being able to escape the silence, which to me felt out of my comfort zone.  

The next time, the next day, I get on the metro with a different perspective. Having practically dragged myself out of bed and to the metro, I welcome the silence this time. It feels nice. I use the time I’m on the metro to steady myself and to refresh myself for the day ahead. The silence is a time to reflect on the goals I have and what I want to focus on during the day. For the first time I understand journaling. Maybe I should get back to that? No, I’ll just stick with my metro ride for now, baby steps…. I look at the Parisians around me: they’re not talking but they’re doing other things: sharing a book, watching Gossip Girl, resting before the day. I think again about Lucie: she is not loud nor extroverted; she’s not as interesting as Éponine or even Cosette, who she is most compared to in our class, but she does understand that there is power in stillness; in domesticity; in embracing the quiet moments. In class, we talked about the scenes of domesticity in A Tale of Two Cities, how it stands out in a book that moves at breakneck speed. As readers we need this moment of stillness to understand why Lucie must fight so hard to protect her family and life. After this metro ride, I still don’t relate to Lucie, but I understand her. I also understand the value of silence.

Wigging Out!

*Warning: This post contains a spoiler for the play, Prima Facie. Thank you!

Jodie Comer gets out her case file and prepares for a day of legal trials. But wait one second, she’s almost forgotten something: her wig! This is not a fun wig: pink, curly, or super long; this was a very serious wig: one that George Washington might have had to avoid lice as he fought the British. This was a very serious wig. I lean over to my mom next to me:

“Wait, why is she wearing a wig?” I whisper.

My mom whispers back, “She’s a barrister.”

Prima Facie on Broadway.

I smile and nod like I understand but I have no idea what she’s talking about.

“A British lawyer.”

Ahh, okay. That makes sense. Has Jodie Comer quit her acting career in favor of being a barrister? No, this is Broadway, but it might as well have been Temple Bar in London.

Prima Facie, now playing on Broadway, which premiered on the West End, deals with the British legal system in a way that prepared me for the conversations we had surrounding the Barristers in A Tale of Two Cities and our jaunt around the Temple Bar area of London. It stars Jodie Comer as a barrister who undergoes a profound change in the way she views the British legal system. Initially a barrister representing those that have harassed or sexually assaulted someone, she believes almost completely in the decency and fairness of the British law system. It is the same idea as what was brought up in one of our lectures, the unofficial doctrine that guides British prime ministers. In our lecture, I learned that the U.K. doesn’t have an official Constitution like the U.S. because those that are elected to the position of prime minister are supposed to share an understanding of protecting Democratic values and to be British for a second: being good chaps. Prime ministers are also elected by the majority party, not directly by the people in a vote. There is an expectation, a social contract essentially, that leaders will be good people, and therefore lead well. There is a similar expectation in the court. The wigs: the tradition of it all, the history of it all, is supposed to remove the individual from the process of finding justice and upholding the law. In the same way that citizens are supposed to believe in the inherent goodness of those in power, the wigs feed into the idea that those in the legal system are fair and will eventually come to justice. But wigs can be intimidating, as can the legal system.

When I think about how the legal system is portrayed in Prima Facie, I think about Mr. Stryver. It’s an on-the-nose name and shows Dickens tendency to sometimes just spell out what he wants to say (sometimes this is very refreshing!), but more so, it really speaks to how the Temple Bar and the British legal system are portrayed in The Tale of Two Cities. He’s a puffed-up man who runs over “weaker people” on the way to his office. He is also one of the leading barristers in London. He is all about the external: he wants others to view him as an all-powerful man, capable of getting the girl (Lucie) while barely lifting a finger. Is he a good chap or is the wig hiding someone who is so individualistic, he sometimes looks beyond reason?

Wig shop outside of Temple Bar!

Jodie Comer’s character in Prima Facie finds herself on the other side of the courtroom when she is sexually assaulted by another barrister. For the first time, she questions if the legal system is faultless; if it always is fair; if everyone wearing that wig is a good chap. For the first time, she sees the wigs as intimidating; the pomp and circumstance as scary. There could be a Mr. Stryver standing across from her: individualistic and only concerned with what directly relates to him, as Comer’s character was at the beginning of the play. When she loses the case against her coworker, her view of the legal system is broken. Yet she continues to be a barrister, and perhaps that is the only way that she can make sure other victims get justice. In her questioning of the legal system, she has become a stronger barrister.

As I walk past the wig shop and a solemn coffee shop where barristers take their well-deserved time off, I think about whether they are having similar epiphanies to Comer’s character. As a couple of smartly dressed Brits carry their cappuccinos past the wig shop, I think about the passage of time and how so much can change in who is represented in the legal system but so much can stay the same. Is one of the barristers sitting in the coffee shop in their robes a Stryver? Individualistic to a fault, consumed by their corrupt sense of what is just; or are they a Sydney, the long-suffering barrister? Sydney is sensitive, empathetic, and in touch with his emotions, but also insecure and consumed with his own suffering. When Sydney puts on the wig, he is still Sydney. When Stryver puts on the wig, he is still Stryver. And when the barrister in Prima Facie puts on the wig, she is still herself.

Legal London

At the end of the day, we bring our own biases, ideas, and understandings into the courtroom. We are individuals, with or without the wig. When we view the courtroom, whether it be in the U.S. or London, we want the people to be judging to be like the mannequins in the wig shop: neutral expression, serious eyes, understanding eyebrows, always pointed towards justice, but the reality is that we aren’t mannequins. We aren’t AI either. And who knows if the mannequins would be fairer than us humans? A mannequin can’t feel. Can’t understand. I look at the mannequin in the wig shop again: it looks cold, unfeeling, and well, a mannequin. We want barristers who can feel, who can change their minds, and change them again. Barristers who are real people under the wigs.