LONDON: French writer Victor Hugo is famous for penning `The Hunchback of Notre-Dame` and `Les Miserables`, but less known is his work as an illustrator now the subject of a new exhibition in London.

`Astonishing Things: The Drawings of Victor Hugo`, which opened at the Royal Academy of Arts on Friday, traces Hugo`s passion for illustration, 140 years after his death.

The exhibition`s notes say that while the Romantic author and politician came to be a leading public figure in France in the 19th century, `in private, his refuge was drawing `Hugo`s ink and wash visions of imaginary castles, monsters and seascapes are as poetic as his writing, according to the Royal Academy of Arts.

`His works inspired Romantic and Symbolist poets, and many artists including the Surrealists. Vincent van Gogh compared them to `astonishing things`.`-AFPLONDON: French writer Victor Hugo is famous for penning `The Hunchback of Notre-Dame` and `Les Miserables`, but less known is his work as an illustrator now the subject of a new exhibition in London.

`Astonishing Things: The Drawings of Victor Hugo`, which opened at the Royal Academy of Arts on Friday, traces Hugo`s passion for illustration, 140 years after his death.

The exhibition`s notes say that while the Romantic author and politician came to be a leading public figure in France in the 19th century, `in private, his refuge was drawing `Hugo`s ink and wash visions of imaginary castles, monsters and seascapes are as poetic as his writing, according to the Royal Academy of Arts.

`His works inspired Romantic and Symbolist poets, and many artists including the Surrealists. Vincent van Gogh compared them to `astonishing things`.`-AFP