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Originally Posted by cearbhallain
I wish I could read in French. I know from experience that a good translation of Dumas makes *all* *the* *difference*. Now if I could only remember which translation of CoMC I read in high school...The best Three Musketeers was the one my mom had from college (back in the early 60's). My daughter has run off with it, so I can't tell anyone which one it was now. I'll give everyone this tip though: If you're not laughing by the third page, get a different one. The Three Musketeers is hilarious, which fact serves to offset the tragedy of the story.
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But why only read "The Three Musketeers"? It's only a small part of the much, MUCH larger "D'Artagnan Romances", the whole of which you'll find here at MR.
To quote from my own description of the books:
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Everyone is familiar with The Three Musketeers, thanks to the many movies which have been made of this book, some of them sharing little more than the name in common with the actual book
What some people may be unaware of is that The Three Musketeers is merely the first (small) part of a set of three books called, as a whole, the D'Artagnan Romances, which collectively tell the life story of D'Artagnan, who appears as a young man in The Three Musketeers. The book is, like its main protagonist, of truly heroic proportions. If you think that War and Peace or The Lord of the Rings would be quite good if only they were longer, this is the series for you  .
This gets a bit complicated, so pay attention (there will be a test at the end)...
The D'Artagnan Romances consists of three books:
1. The Three Musketeers.
2. Twenty Years After (set 20 years after The Three Musketeers).
3. The Vicomte de Bragelonne (set 10 years after part 2 - ie 30 years after The Three Musketeers).
OK, so far, so good. Where it gets complicated is that the final book in the series is a truly gargantuan work, and is generally published split into either 3, 4, or 5 separate volumes. This edition uses the four volume version, and these four volumes are called, respectively:
3a. The Vicomte de Bragelonne.
3b. Ten Years Later.
3c. Louise de la Valliere.
3d. The Man in the Iron Mask.
Where things get complicated is that The Vicomte de Bragelonne can refer to either the whole of this third book, or just to the first volume of it. Moreover, it is subtitled Ten Years Later, so once again this title can refer to the whole book or just the second volume of it. Finally, just to confuse matters, The Man in the Iron Mask is often printed as a "self-contained" novel, and can be split up in quite a different manner from the 4-part split described above.
Phew...
Hope that's clear to everyone .
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