Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, the president of the Second Republic of France, was not allowed by the constitution to be re-elected, so he seized power by force in a coup d’état on December 2 1851. Victor Hugo, who supported the insurrection, publicly opposed the reign of Napoleon III. Threatened with arrest, he fled to Jersey where he continued his political uprising by publishing a collection of poems called Châtiments ("Castigations").
When Napoleon III was defeated, Hugo returned to France where he published the second edition of a collection composed of more than 100 poems, now titled Les Châtiments. In the masterpiece Hugo ridicules and violently attacks Napoleon III and his bloody regime. Through caricature and satire, he mocks Louis-Napoleon and all others involved in the "great tragedy", as Hugo himself calls it.
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