The Count of Monte Cristo: Imagery 5 key examples

In Chapter 15, Dumas relates the extent of Dantès's predicament as he sits in prison in terms of that which Dantès does not know: uneducated as he is, Dantès has no means to entertain himself with knowledge of literature or memory of historical anecdotes. Dumas articulates this plight with a series of literary devices, including visual imagery, metaphor, and an allusion to the vividness of oil painting:

Dantès was a simple, uneducated man; to him, the past was covered by a murky veil that can be raised only by knowledge. In the solitude of his dungeon and the desert of his thoughts, he could not reconstruct ages past, revive extinct races or rebuild those antique cities that imagination augments and poeticizes so that they pass before one’s eyes, gigantic and lit by fiery skies, as in Martin’s Babylonian scenes. All he had were: his own past, which was so short; his present – so sombre; and his future – so uncertain: nineteen years of light to contemplate, in what might be eternal darkness!

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In Chapter 58, Dumas invites the reader into a conversation with Noirtier, the old Monsieur de Villefort himself—an apparently ancient man who has lost the power of speech and movement but nonetheless retains his presence of mind. Dumas introduces Noirtier with a slew of literary devices, including hyperbole, metaphor, simile, and the imagery of light and darkness: 

Motionless as a corpse, he greeted his children with bright, intelligent eyes .... Sight and hearing were the only two senses which, like two sparks, still lit up this human matter, already three-quarters remoulded for the tomb. Moreover, only one of these two senses could reveal to the outside world the inner life which animated this statue, and the look which disclosed that inner life was like one of those distant lights which shine at night, to tell a traveller in the desert that another being watches in the silence and the darkness.

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In Chapter 62, Bertuccio prepares the house at Auteuil for the Count's massive dinner. Describing the extravagant transformation of the house, Dumas relies heavily on the imagery of sight and smell:

In all, this house, which had been empty for twenty-five years and only the day before had been dark and gloomy, impregnated with what might be called the aroma of time, had in a single day recovered an appearance of life, full of the master’s favourite perfumes and even his preferred amount of daylight: nothing could better have illustrated the steward’s skill and his master’s understanding...

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In Chapter 69, Villefort waits to interview Lord Wilmore to get more information on the mysterious Count of Monte Cristo. As he waits for Wilmore to arrive, Dumas treats the reader to a vivid description of Wilmore's residence aided by visual imagery and allusions to literature:

The visitor waited in the drawing-room; there was nothing remarkable about this room, which was like any other in furnished lodgings: a mantelpiece with two modern Sèvres vases, a clock with Cupid drawing his bow and a mirror, in two sections; engravings on each side of the mirror, one showing Homer carrying his guide, the other Belisarius begging alms; wallpaper, grey on grey; a sofa upholstered in red, and printed in black—this was Lord Wilmore’s drawing-room. It was lit by two lamps with shades of frosted glass that gave only a feeble light, as if deliberately designed not to strain the tired eyes of the prefect’s emissary.

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In Chapter 115, as Danglars sits imprisoned by Vampa and his crew, he watches them eat a miserable meal that becomes more and more appetizing as he realizes his own hunger. Dumas conveys Danglars's thoughts on the food through the use of vivid visual and taste imagery:

...it may be that the crudest of victuals can address a tangible invitation in quite eloquent terms to a hungry stomach. Suddenly Danglars felt that at this moment his was a bottomless pit: the man seemed less ugly, the bread less black and the cheese less rancid. Finally, those raw onions, the repulsive foodstuff of savages, began to evoke certain sauces Robert, certain dishes of boiled beef and onions which his cook had adapted to more refined palates when Danglars would tell him: ‘Monsieur Deniseau, give us a spot of plain home cooking today.’

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