"If a writer wrote merely for his time, I would have to break my pen and throw it away," the larger-than-life Victor Hugo once confessed. Indeed, this 19th-century French author's books — from the epic drama Les Misérables to the classic unrequited love story The Hunchback of Notre Dame — have spanned the ages, their themes of morality and redemption as applicable to our times as to his.
![Title: Les Misérables (Centaur Classics) [The 100 greatest novels of all time - #3], Author: Victor Hugo](http://prodimage.images-bn.com/pimages/9788892536784_p0_v1_s192x300.jpg)
