How we cite our quotes: (Book.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Again her eyes closed; she imagined that it was all over, that she had been executed during her swoon, and that the deformed spirit who had governed her destiny had seized and borne her away. (IX.II.6)
It's a bit unclear what Esmeralda means here by "the deformed spirit who governed her destiny." Does she mean Quasimodo? How has he governed her destiny so far? Or does she mean that when she sees Quasimodo's face, she automatically attaches it to the messed-up spirit that must govern her messed-up fate?
Quote #5
He thought of the miserable fate that Providence had allotted to him; that woman, love, and its pleasures would be forever passing before his eyes, but that he could never do more than witness the felicity of others. (IX.IV.27)
Hugo makes it clear to us that Quasimodo has no chance at love, just in case you were waiting for someone to see past his looks and fall for his winning personality or something like that. Sorry, folks: not gonna happen. Again, we're meant to see fate as something that condemns people to a certain unavoidable outcome. Frollo, for instance, seems condemned to never, ever find love.
Quote #6
Chance had unluckily favored the courageous hunchback. (X.IV.25)
Oh, the irony. It's strange to see a word like "chance" in a narrative that has been so much about fate. Or is chance one of fate's weapons? Is there such a thing as chance? Maybe it's possible that not everything is be determined by fate; but maybe not. Is a line like this supposed to make us question everything that has been said about fate so far? Or… wait for it… is Quasimodo a character who, unlike Frollo, fights against the idea of fate? After all, he does "end up" with Esmeralda at the end of the novel, despite the fact that it's his fate to never be loved. You might want to chew on that one for a while.