Validity and Invalidity in The Count of Monte Cristo

The Fiction of Financial Legitimacy

I read the Count of Monte Cristo over the course of a year back in 2022. I enjoyed it, some parts more than others, but there were some aspects that have really stuck with me. But it wasn’t the main plot of the book. It’s a big book where a lot happens so there’s plenty to sink your teeth into besides Dante’s quest for revenge. Which, for me at least, was a good thing because I’m not a fan of stories about revenge. They tend to be about people using violence for vindictive ends and portraying it as ‘justice’.

I was a kid when I heard the old adage that “an eye for an eye and we would all be blind”, and I’ve never disagreed with it. There was another saying I heard in James Bond that “when embarking on revenge you must first dig two graves” which also spelled out to me the futility of revenge. As someone who got beaten up as a kid I’ve always known that violence is cyclical, and though it is sometimes necessary, it is (in my humble opinion) an option of last resort. This belief is unpopular today.

With impassioned arguments to continue militarising police forces to violently suppress protest, endless billions funnelled into ceaseless wars or to maintain genocidal regimes, and pop culture bloated with righteous, flag waving ‘heroes’ murdering or beating half to death their villains, society is more willingly and angrily violent than it has ever been in my lifetime. ‘Peace’ isn’t even a dirty word, it’s just simply not considered. I hate it.

Monte Cristo’s whole plot is predicated on this kind of unpleasant and mean vengeance. It’s moral, like so many stories of revenge, is that this kind of righteous vengeance should be rewarded. The cadré of collaborators who ruin Dante’s life live a decade of unfettered privilege while others live in destitution as a result of their cruelty, and when their fortunes finally turn, Dante himself is rewarded with a better life for his ‘just’ revenge. He certainly deserves a good life after his wrongful imprisonment, but rather than leave behind a life that is passed and enjoying the wealth he finds on Monte Cristo by building a new and happy second life, he uses his riches on a vindictive crusade, ultimately making him as bad as his malefactors. Of course, the peaceful…