In this chapter Hugo takes aim at the way that institutions like monasteries and convents can be used as mechanisms for control. Rather than fostering free speech and encouraging an open minded pursuit of truth, at their worst they are actively seeking to close people’s mouths and minds.
Claustration is castration
This one liner Hugo drops is a very succinct summary of the problem he is addressing. These spaces initially intended to be locations where people could be set aside for the purposes of deeper exploration of the great mysteries were reduced to command and control centers that effectively neutered the very exploration they were founded to foster. Pressing into this further, Hugo says the following:
Superstition, bigotry, and prejudice, ghosts though they are, cling tenaciously to life; they are shades armed with tooth and claw. They must be grappled with unceasingly, for it is a fateful part of human destiny that it is condemned to wage perpetual war against ghosts. A shade is not easily taken by the throat and destroyed.
There is some tragic irony to this section, for in the midst of this screed against bigotry and prejudice, Hugo can’t escape the prejudices that were endemic to Europe at this time. In this chapter we see some first glimmers of some racist thought that is primarily pointed at Islam but extends to Hinduism and Buddhism as well. This assumption of cultural superiority undermines the argument he is making, revealing that he is still somewhat controlled by the very shades he says he is at war with. To me this serves as a warning to anyone who might assume they are somehow exempted from unconscious bias and prejudices that are formed by the controlling narratives of our time and space. The shades are still present, and even while we war against them, they wind and weave their way into the cultural fabric of our lives.