Veuillot, a young Romantic, had been part of theHernaniclaque. In L'Écho de Rouen, in 1831, he reported on Les Feuilles d'automne, praising Hugo's work but already regretting the poet's political turn. In 1842, he devoted a very severe feuilleton to Le Rhin, denouncing the Hugolâtres, criticizing the poet's facile writing style and, above all, his claim to lead the people. He condemned Hugo's political evolution, from royalist, to quasi-Christian under the influence of Chateaubriand, to liberal in the style of Débats, to revolutionary. The break was confirmed in 1851. Although Veuillot was paradoxically in favor of the events of 1848 - according to the very Maistrian schema of Providence manifesting itself in the movement of the people - he soon joined the party of order. In February 1851, Veuillot approved the coup d'état, and his newspaper called for a yes vote in the plebiscite.
His decision made him one of the most maltreated figures in Châtiments - even though the two pieces Hugo dedicated to Veuillot, "À des journalistes de robe courte" and "Un autre", are dated September 1850, attesting to Veuillot's early presence in the collection's planning. In particular, Hugo took revenge for Veuillot's harsh accounts of his speeches to the Assembly, which constantly denounced the treachery of the former Peer de France who had become an orator for popular France, unlike Montalembert, who had remained faithful to his origins.
On October 19, 1849, the Assembly debated the restoration of the Holy See's temporal powers; Victor Hugo delivered one of his most important speeches, marking his transition to radicalism. Veuillot mocks the antitheses of Hugo, who has become a breathless poet since climbing the Montagne. In his mockery, the critic finds an ally in Montalembert. But Hugo retorts: "He has gone over to the side of those who oppress, and I remain on the side of those who are oppressed."
The debate on universal suffrage further inflames their war. Veuillot again mocks Hugo's discourse as a politician and poet. In his 1860 book on the Freethinkers, he declared: "The poet is a lascivious sparrow, that is the essence of his nature". But the phrase disappeared from the book's reprint: did Veuillot, a Catholic, realize that he was quoting an erotic line by Catullus? Meanwhile, Émile Deschanel replied that "if the poet is a lustful sparrow, the clerical pamphleteer is an ugly owl". Nor did Veuillot's mockery spare Hugo's second major speech to the Assembly, when the Constitution was revised in 1851.
Despite major disagreements, Veuillot influenced Hugo in the writing of several Châtiments pieces: he "encanaille la muse de l'ancien pair de France", as one critic remarked. Veuillot also published long excerpts from the collection in L'Univers. However, he notes that Hugo "insults [his] mother", a tenancière, in the line "Ce Zoïle cagot naquit d'une Javotte": Veuillot himself, in his 1842 review of Rhin, had described himself as a Zoïle. Veuillot nevertheless found great beauty in Contemplations, published in 1856, even though he continued to attack Hugo, who claimed the title of outlaw. He also recognized the Christian Jean Valjean in Les Misérables. In Les Odeurs de Paris, his 1867 book, he praises the Chansons des rues et des bois, in which Hugo finally seems to be pushing the Châtiments vein to completion. Veuillot recognized Hugo as "the greatest poet in the world, and perhaps of all time".
For his part, Hugo, expelled from Brussels in 1871, learned that Veuillot had "called him an old pumpkin"... But Veuillot added that the pumpkin was "half-filled with diamonds", which Hugo also knew. The enmity between the two men, though not the loyalty of adversaries, remains fertile: the Chansons des rues et des bois owe a debt to the Châtiments, which in turn owe a debt to Veuillot.
