Manon Lescaut

Manon is not a fully developed character, and the reader knows her only through the reactions of Des Grieux and other men. Many people remark on Manon’s charm and appearance, and many events transpire supposedly because men cannot resist her preternatural beauty. Indeed, she is thought to be dangerous, which leads to her transportation to America. Even Des Grieux, despite his love for her, presents her as manipulative from the first, claiming that she was more experienced than him when they first met, though she was only 16. This can be read differently, however. Just as it is not unusual for a 17-year-old boy to be overwhelmed by his feelings for a young woman, it is also not unusual for a 16-year-old girl to be flattered by the attentions of a young man.

Furthermore, after being separated for two years, Manon seeks Des Grieux out even though she is being well taken care of by the tax-farmer. This indicates that Manon does love Des Grieux. However, they have very different conceptions of love. Des Grieux equates romantic love with sexual intimacy, whereas Manon does not. Although sexual intimacy is one way she expresses her love for Des Grieux, she can divorce sexual intimacy from love when necessary.

This conception of sexual intimacy as unrelated to love was scandalous for the time, but Manon reiterates the idea in her letter to Des Grieux when she leaves to be with G…M…. She states that she is doing this for Des Grieux, so that they can be together. Des Grieux attributes this to her love of pleasure and entertainment, but Manon’s reasoning is much more practical. In her letter, she asks Des Grieux if he really thinks “one can be truly loving when one is short of bread” and claims “[h]unger would cause [her] to make some fatal error” (47-48). Des Grieux is outraged, but this is because Des Grieux has never truly been hungry. Manon, from a much poorer and humbler background, likely has gone without meals.

Manon’s story is also one of redemption. The episode with the Italian prince emphasizes her devotion to Des Grieux, as does her behavior on the journey to and in America, where she seems to understand Des Grieux’s passion for fidelity and repents for her sins against him. However, Manon must die to achieve redemption, whereas Des Grieux has the opportunity to “rectify, by a wise and well-ordered life, the scandal of [his] past conduct” (145), up to and including murder. Women were considered irrevocably damaged by immoral behavior, particularly sexual behavior; there was never a possibility of a happy ending for Manon.

A few years older than Des Grieux, and much more mature, Tiberge is the moral core of the story. He is the only character completely unaffected by Manon’s supposed charms, and his love for and loyalty to Des Grieux is unwavering. He makes the long and treacherous journey to America just to help his old friend, who repeatedly refused to listen to his advice, warnings, and pleas. In this way, Tiberge symbolizes God’s mercy and love, which Catholics believe to be omnipresent and persistent, provided the sinner repents of his sin.

Nevertheless, Tiberge also enables much of Des Grieux’s behavior by providing him money when he requests it. Prévost notes that Tiberge does not come from a wealthy family, which emphasizes the depths of Tiberge’s sacrifice. He would have to forego necessities to give his friend that kind of money. However, Tiberge believes in Des Grieux’s inherent goodness and asserts that there is “more weakness than wickedness in [Des Grieux’s] dissolute ways” (65).

Tiberge’s inability to resist Des Grieux, and his continual support of Des Grieux, despite the way Des Grieux mistreats him, mirrors Des Grieux’s relationship with Manon. Just as Des Grieux comes to understand that Manon does love him despite her infidelity, Tiberge believes that Des Grieux is not evil but merely weak. Finally, like Des Grieux’s devotion to Manon, Tiberge’s devotion to Des Grieux is emphasized by his willingness to travel to America for his friend.

Renoncour is the overall narrator of the main story, recounted in Memoirs and Adventures of a Man of Quality, but he plays only a small part in Manon Lescaut. His financial support allows Des Grieux to accompany Manon to America, and Des Grieux offers the full story of their adventures as a payment for that support.

Renoncour insists he offers this story as a warning against following one’s passion over one’s reason. However, like Tiberge, he also enables Des Grieux’s behavior through his financial support, and he too is struck by “the sight” of Manon, which “filled [him] with respect and compassion” (8). He is also charmed by Des Grieux himself, and his assessment of Des Grieux’s story is that it is “one of the most extraordinary and touching [he] had ever heard” (9).

Renoncour reflects the author, who published this story on its own because it was popular and entertaining, not as a moral lesson. Renoncour’s argument that this story provides readers of little wordly experience with examples from which they can learn is mere lip service to morality, a standard disclaimer to excuse the scandalous material that would be otherwise condemned.

Lescaut is Manon’s brother, a member of the king’s guard. Des Grieux describes him as “a brutal man, devoid of every honourable principle” (36) despite their many similarities. Although Lescaut at first condemns Manon’s scandalous behavior, he soon apologizes because he had heard “such favourable things about” Des Grieux that he was “eager to be on good terms” with them (63).

However, Des Grieux makes clear that Lescaut takes advantage of Manon’s irregular relationship, essentially living with Manon and Des Grieux and even taking “it upon himself to invite all his friends to [their] house in Chaillot and entertain them there at [Des Grieux’s] expense” (37). Lescaut seems to lack a moral compass. He wonders why Des Grieux does not use Manon’s beauty to make money, telling Des Grieux, “[a] girl like her ought to support us all, you, herself, and me” (38).

Lescaut nonetheless helps both Des Grieux and Manon, introducing Des Grieux to the League, the Order of the Chevaliers of Industry, which was “an ‘association’ or ‘confederation’ of practiced card-sharpers, who plied their profession in the gaming-houses” (151). He also helps Des Grieux and Manon escape imprisonment in the reformatories. Ultimately, Lescaut is killed over a card game, and no one seems to miss or mourn him.

M. de G…M… is a standard stock character, the wealthy and amorous elderly man. Des Grieux describes him as “an ageing voluptuary who was ready to pay lavishly for his pleasures” (47). Such characters are often figures of fun, roundly mocked by the other characters and usually humiliated by the beautiful woman and the young man who loves her. That is the case at first, but Prévost puts an interesting spin on this character by having him seek vengeance on Manon and Des Grieux.

Generally, such characters are too embarrassed to seek justice, but this is not true of M. de G…M…, who has Manon and Des Grieux arrested not once but twice, first for trying to defraud him, second for trying to defraud his son. M. G…M… gets his justice as Manon is sentenced to transportation. Like many other characters, he thinks Des Grieux is worthy of redemption, whereas Manon must be gravely punished.

M. de T…, the son of one of the administrators in charge of the reformatory where Manon is being kept, is another version of a popular stock character, the wealthy libertine. Like Des Grieux, he is moved by sensibility, particularly when it comes to love. He willingly helps Des Grieux liberate Manon from the reformatory and supports Des Grieux financially whenever possible. He declares himself envious of Des Grieux and Manon, stating, “there is no destiny, however glorious, I would not forgo for so lovely and so passionate a mistress” (73).

M. de T… is unique in that he recognizes Manon’s charms and approves of Des Grieux’s behavior. He fully understands Des Grieux’s helplessness and inability to resist Manon, but he never condemns him for this weakness, unlike Tiberge, nor does he try to steal Manon away, unlike M. de G…M… and Synnelet. He wants only to aid Manon and Des Grieux, and he does everything in his power to help them be together.

Des Grieux’s father is typical of the time. From a wealthy and noble family, he expects obedience from his children and is both infuriated and saddened by Des Grieux’s dissolution. He at first assumes Des Grieux’s love for Manon is a mere infatuation and even cruelly taunts him for his naiveté. However, he truly loves his son and attempts to be compassionate and understanding by offering to allow Des Grieux to marry rather than enter the church. He assumes that Des Grieux is not interested in the celibate lifestyle required of men who enter the church, and his offer to Des Grieux is indulgent for the time. He does not understand that Des Grieux is not interested in all women but just one, Manon.

Des Grieux’s father goes to great lengths to help his son, but as would have been expected at the time, he eventually washes his hands of Des Grieux completely, telling him to “go to [his] ruin” and deeming him both “ungrateful and rebellious” (123). However, much like the other characters, he blames Manon for Des Grieux’s immoral behavior. He dies without knowing that his son eventually returns to the family.

The reader never encounters M. de B… directly, but his actions play an important role in the story. When Manon and Des Grieux first live together, they rent a furnished apartment in “the Rue V […] near the house of M. de B…, the well-known tax-farmer” (18). M. De B… is a tax collector and the first wealthy lover that Manon takes; he writes to Des Grieux’s father so as to have Manon all to himself.

Des Grieux’s contempt for M. de B… stems not only from his interference with Manon but also from his position in society. Like Manon, M. de B… is a member of the Third Estate, or the commoner class; unlike Manon, he has made a great deal of money. The nobility looked down on such men, perhaps even more than the poor, as evidenced by Des Grieux’s description of how M. de B… propositioned Manon “like a true tax-farmer, which is to say, by informing her in writing that payment would be in proportion to the favours received” (33).

Des Grieux, as a member of the nobility, considers any discussion of money as vulgar and base, particularly in relation to sex, which he considers an act of love or romance. However, Des Grieux’s increasingly desperate need for money makes him just as vulgar and base as the tax-farmer, who at least earns his living in a culturally acceptable way.