When he reached the age of fifty, Victor Hugo became a political refugee, causing much concern, confusion, and doubt within the French government due to his writings about freedom, state laws, and the power of those who deviate from them. The French government requested the Belgian government to deport him, and he was transferred by a ship to the island of Guernsey, where he settled and began planning his novel that would bring him fame, glory, and trials simultaneously.

He continued to write the novel for over thirty years, beginning to plan it in 1828. He noted in his phrases that freedom would shine in every French sky and that the end of injustice was inevitable, and everyone would undoubtedly see that. He finished writing the first draft of the novel in 1848, totaling 600 pages. But due to the bloody events in France at that time, he could not publish it. From his exile in that dark basement, he decided to rewrite it, finishing the second version, which exceeded 3000 pages, marking the end of the novel in 1860.

The novel speaks of the plight of the crushed classes in France and the poverty and injustice that spread unprecedentedly across the country. No one was safe from it, and no one could escape it. The novel turned into a social issue through which Hugo explores the penalties of the blind law that only sees through a complete system of deception and distortion of facts.

The main characters in the novel are two completely contradictory heroes. The first is Jean Valjean, a former prisoner under total police surveillance, with strict control imposed on him from every direction despite his decision to change his fate. The second character is Javert, the policeman who represents the law.

Jean Valjean receives a yellow identity card reserved for the suspects and outcasts in the eyes of the law, finding himself besieged by the stares and suspicions of people around him. In the end, he meets a virtuous clergyman who sympathizes with him, deeply affecting Jean. Moved by the clergyman's personality, he decides to change his name and start a new life with a different beginning.

Fortune flourishes for Jean Valjean, and the years pass, making him one of the city's wealthy and property owners. But destiny did not grant him to live in that bliss for long. Officer Javert knew him thoroughly since his time in prison and was not convinced that Jean had become a better person. He tries to trap him in all twisted ways because he knew his past, forcing him to turn himself in to protect an innocent person whom the officer accused of being Jean Valjean. He escapes from prison and spends the rest of his life as a fugitive and alone.

Thus, the novel revolves around the tormented people's place on earth and that if they tried to reform themselves, their past prevents that, even if they were sincere in their intentions to break free from their previous actions. After years, Taha Hussein wrote a lengthy article about this novel, stating that Hugo had predicted the revolution that would occur due to the spread of injustice, tyranny, the absence of justice, and the disruption of law.

The novel was first translated into Arabic in 1901 AD by the Nile poet Hafez Ibrahim during his exile in Sudan after being expelled from the army on charges of inciting soldiers to stage a revolution against the occupying English. He wrote that the author of "Les Misérables" was the best that people produced in this era, as the author put his tragedy side by side with the tragedy of Jean Valjean.