throws himself in the arms of the one who has given him life.”
And so Victor came home.
Early the next morning, Dr. Itard came to see him. Victor sat up in bed. He held his arms toward his teacher, but Dr. Itard only gave him a cold stare. Victor covered his head with the bedclothes and began to cry. Dr. Itard reproached him “in a loud and threatening tone,” until Victor was sobbing deeply. Then finally, Dr. Itard went and sat down on Victor’s bed.
“This was always the signal of forgiveness,” Itard wrote. “Victor understood me, made the first advances towards reconciliation, and all was forgotten.”
S TILL , D R . I TARD was not his teacher anymore. Victor was no longer a boy. What could he do now? Where could he go?
The other boys who had entered the Institute for Deaf-Mutes at the same time as he were now out in the world, plying the trades they’d learned at the Institute. Victor could work — he liked doing tasks for people, especially Madame Guérin — but he would never pass for an ordinary workman.
When he sawed logs for the fireplace, he always acted so overjoyed at the moment when the log was about to fall in two that someone who didn’t know him would think he was a “raving maniac,” Itard once wrote.
Around young women, he was unhappy and uneasy. Once, Itard saw him “sitting beside one of them and gently taking hold of her hand, her arms and knees until, feeling his restless desires increased instead of calmed by these odd caresses, and seeing no relief from his painful emotions in sight, he suddenly changed his attitude,” and pushed the young woman away.
Another time, after caressing another young lady in the same, odd way, “he took the lady by her hands and drew her, without violence however, into the depths of an alcove.
There . . . showing in his manners and in his extraordinary facial expression an indescribable mixture of gaiety and sadness, of boldness and uncertainty, he several times solicited the lady’s caresses by offering her his cheeks.”
He held his face still, waiting for the kiss that did not come. He gave the young lady a hug and held her for a minute. Then he walked away.
Who these mysterious young women were was never written down. Julie came often to visit her mother at the Institute, so perhaps they were Julie’s friends. Or maybe one of them was his old childhood friend, the astronomer’s daughter.
Whoever they were, it does not seem that they were frightened of the peculiar young man. But still, there was no denying it: Victor was different from other people.
When a stormy wind blew, he still laughed out loud. He was still filled with joy and longing — and sometimes sadness — at the sight of a bright moon, a snow-covered field, a deep woods filled with light and shadow. . . .
Sometimes his unhappiness would turn to fury and he would cry out loud, tear his clothes, and even scratch or bite his beloved Madame Guérin, though he was always sorry afterward.
In short, he would never, ever be like other people.
Once, years before, when Victor was first beginning his studies, a Minister of the Interior named Jean-Antoine Chaptal (who took office after Lucien Bonaparte) had declared that the Savage, if he could not be educated, should be sent to a hospital for the insane called Charenton. If that had happened, Victor would have woken each morning for the rest of his life in a place where patients were given icy baths and confined by night in narrow boxes that held them tight as coffins. His fellow patients would have included a mad nobleman famous for his perversion and cruelty, the Marquis de Sade.
It hadn’t happened then.
But what about now?
Dr. Itard could have listened to the people who wanted to throw Victor into an insane asylum. He could have listened when people said Victor was nothing more than an idiot and that he — and his teacher — were utter failures.
But he didn’t.
Instead, in a report he wrote to the current Minister of
And so Victor came home.
Early the next morning, Dr. Itard came to see him. Victor sat up in bed. He held his arms toward his teacher, but Dr. Itard only gave him a cold stare. Victor covered his head with the bedclothes and began to cry. Dr. Itard reproached him “in a loud and threatening tone,” until Victor was sobbing deeply. Then finally, Dr. Itard went and sat down on Victor’s bed.
“This was always the signal of forgiveness,” Itard wrote. “Victor understood me, made the first advances towards reconciliation, and all was forgotten.”
S TILL , D R . I TARD was not his teacher anymore. Victor was no longer a boy. What could he do now? Where could he go?
The other boys who had entered the Institute for Deaf-Mutes at the same time as he were now out in the world, plying the trades they’d learned at the Institute. Victor could work — he liked doing tasks for people, especially Madame Guérin — but he would never pass for an ordinary workman.
When he sawed logs for the fireplace, he always acted so overjoyed at the moment when the log was about to fall in two that someone who didn’t know him would think he was a “raving maniac,” Itard once wrote.
Around young women, he was unhappy and uneasy. Once, Itard saw him “sitting beside one of them and gently taking hold of her hand, her arms and knees until, feeling his restless desires increased instead of calmed by these odd caresses, and seeing no relief from his painful emotions in sight, he suddenly changed his attitude,” and pushed the young woman away.
Another time, after caressing another young lady in the same, odd way, “he took the lady by her hands and drew her, without violence however, into the depths of an alcove.
There . . . showing in his manners and in his extraordinary facial expression an indescribable mixture of gaiety and sadness, of boldness and uncertainty, he several times solicited the lady’s caresses by offering her his cheeks.”
He held his face still, waiting for the kiss that did not come. He gave the young lady a hug and held her for a minute. Then he walked away.
Who these mysterious young women were was never written down. Julie came often to visit her mother at the Institute, so perhaps they were Julie’s friends. Or maybe one of them was his old childhood friend, the astronomer’s daughter.
Whoever they were, it does not seem that they were frightened of the peculiar young man. But still, there was no denying it: Victor was different from other people.
When a stormy wind blew, he still laughed out loud. He was still filled with joy and longing — and sometimes sadness — at the sight of a bright moon, a snow-covered field, a deep woods filled with light and shadow. . . .
Sometimes his unhappiness would turn to fury and he would cry out loud, tear his clothes, and even scratch or bite his beloved Madame Guérin, though he was always sorry afterward.
In short, he would never, ever be like other people.
Once, years before, when Victor was first beginning his studies, a Minister of the Interior named Jean-Antoine Chaptal (who took office after Lucien Bonaparte) had declared that the Savage, if he could not be educated, should be sent to a hospital for the insane called Charenton. If that had happened, Victor would have woken each morning for the rest of his life in a place where patients were given icy baths and confined by night in narrow boxes that held them tight as coffins. His fellow patients would have included a mad nobleman famous for his perversion and cruelty, the Marquis de Sade.
It hadn’t happened then.
But what about now?
Dr. Itard could have listened to the people who wanted to throw Victor into an insane asylum. He could have listened when people said Victor was nothing more than an idiot and that he — and his teacher — were utter failures.
But he didn’t.
Instead, in a report he wrote to the current Minister of
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