Les Misérables in the context of "Victor Hugo"

Street children are poor or homeless children who live on the streets of a city, town, or village. Homeless youth are often called street kids, or urchins; the definition of street children is contested, but many practitioners and policymakers use UNICEF's concept of boys and girls, aged under 18 years, for whom "the street" (including unoccupied dwellings and wasteland) has become home and/or their source of livelihood, and who are inadequately protected or supervised. Street girls are sometimes called gamines, a term that is also used for Colombian street children of either sex.

Some street children, notably in more developed nations, are part of a subcategory called thrown-away children, consisting of children who have been forced to leave home. Thrown-away children are more likely to come from single-parent homes. Street children are often subject to abuse, neglect, exploitation, or, in extreme cases, murder by "clean-up squads" that have been hired by local businesses or police.

Les Misérables (/leɪ ˌmɪzəˈrɑːb(əl), -blə/ lay MIZ-ə-RAHB(-əl), -⁠RAH-blə, French: [le mizeʁabl]), colloquially known as Les Mis or Les Miz (/leɪ ˈmɪz/ lay MIZ), is a sung-through musical with music by Claude-Michel Schönberg, lyrics by Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel, and a book by Boublil and Schönberg, based on the 1862 novel of the same name by Victor Hugo. Set in early 19th-century France, Les Misérables tells the story of Jean Valjean, a French convict, and his desire for redemption. After stealing a loaf of bread for his sister's starving child, Valjean is imprisoned for 19 years and released in 1815. When a bishop inspires him with a tremendous act of mercy, Valjean breaks his parole and starts his life anew and in disguise. He becomes wealthy and adopts an orphan, Cosette. A police inspector named Javert pursues Valjean over the decades in a single-minded quest for "justice". The characters are swept into a revolutionary period in France, where a group of young idealists attempts to overthrow the government at a street barricade in Paris.

The French musical premiered in Paris in 1980 with direction by Robert Hossein. Its English-language adaptation, with lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer, produced by Cameron Mackintosh and directed by Trevor Nunn and John Caird, has been running in London since October 1985, making it the longest-running musical in the West End and the second longest-running musical in the world after the original off-Broadway run of The Fantasticks. Many other long-running productions followed on Broadway and around the world, and a film adaptation was released in 2012.

Les Misérables is a 1909 American silent historical drama proto-feature film (four short films that can be seen separately as a series, but when combined resemble a full-length feature film). The proto-feature movie is based on the 1862 French novel of the same name by Victor Hugo, and stars Maurice Costello and William V. Ranous. It was directed by J. Stuart Blackton.

Distributed by the Vitagraph Company of America, the film consists of four reels. The reels were released over the course of three months, from September 4 to November 27, 1909.

Gavroche (French pronunciation: [ɡavʁɔʃ]) is a fictional character in the 1862 novel Les Misérables by Victor Hugo. He is a boy who lives on the streets of Paris. His name has become a synonym for an urchin or street child. Gavroche plays a short yet significant role in the many adaptations of Les Misérables, sharing the populist ideology of the Friends of the ABC and joining the revolutionaries in the June 1832 rebellion. He figures in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th parts of the novel.

Émile-Antoine Bayard (2 November 1837 – 6 December 1891) was a French illustrator born in La Ferté-sous-Jouarre, Seine-et-Marne. A student of Léon Cogniet, he is known for illustrating Victor Hugo's 1862 novel Les Misérables.