Enjolras

Enjolras is a law student and the de facto commander of the revolutionary insurgents who gather at the barricade of the Rue de la Chanvrerie during Paris's June Uprising. At twenty-two, he possesses the physical beauty of youth combined with the unwavering conviction of a man whose entire being is dedicated to abstract principle. His single thought is to overthrow the obstacle to human freedom; his single passion is the Republic. Unlike his friend Combeferre, who seeks gradual reform through education and enlightenment, Enjolras embraces the logical necessity of revolutionary action—he would have been Saint-Just at the Convention or Gracchus on Mount Aventine. He is chastely indifferent to beauty, romance, and the pleasures of the senses; a grisette attempting to seduce him would encounter only a terrible, abyssal glance that distinguishes the mighty cherub of Ezekiel from the gallant Cherubino. His companions—including the irreverent skeptic Grantaire, who inexplicably worships him—follow him with a faith bordering on the religious. At the barricade, Enjolras exercises command with severe justice, ordering the execution of a traitor and then judging himself with equal harshness, declaring his own willingness to die for the cause. His speeches are invested with hymn-like fervor; his silences are heavy with marble immobility. He is both the priest and executioner of the Revolution, composed of light like crystal and stone like rock, and he faces the approaching massacre with unshakeable serenity.