'The Last Day of a Condemned Man' is a powerful story from an author who defined nineteenth century French literature. If you knew when and where you would die, how would you spend your final moments? For Victor Hugo's unnamed narrator, such an existential question is made reality. Sentenced to death for an unspecified crime, he reflects on his life as its last seconds wane in the shadows of a cramped prison cell. Recording his emotional state, observations, and conversations with a priest and fellow prisoner, the condemned man forces us to not only recognize his humanity, but question our own.