Character Analysis
Remember in the Dark Knight how the Joker's whole shtick is compelling people to violate their deepest principles? Really diabolical stuff. Well, meet the Vicomte de Valmont. He's also something of a nihilistic pleasure-seeker who enjoys watching people give up the values most important to them.
Valmont's a rich aristocrat due to inherit his even richer aunt's estate when she dies. He's a major social player, attending the opera, visiting courtesans (high-class prostitutes), and spending his time with other aristocrats. For him, social events are mostly opportunities to test his capacities for seducing and ruining women. He's extremely good at it. Valmont's like a thoughtful chess player, and he's really good at seeing a few moves ahead of his opponents. He's kind of an evil genius in being able to suss out a person's motivations and predict what they'll do next.
Valmont's major weakness is that he's very susceptible to influence by Madame de Merteuil, his former favorite. Ironically, he sacrifices probably the only thing that's important to him in order to stay in her good graces.
Shameless Seducer
"Conquest is our destiny: we must follow it," Valmont says to the Marquise de Merteuil (1.4.1). All his relationships are described in terms of war: "conquests," "campaigns," "strategy." He uses all the tools of military conquests: spying, lying, stealing correspondence, setting allies against each other. How's this for confidence:
I know a hundred, a thousand ways of robbing a woman of her reputation; but whenever I have tried to think how she might save herself I have never been able to think of a single possibility. (2.76.8)
At the beginning of the novel, we find out that he's has undertaken what he calls a glorious enterprise: seduce and destroy the Présidente de Tourvel, a woman known for "her piety, her conjugal devotion, her austere principles" (1.4.2). In other words, he's chosen to seduce the most virtuous woman he can find, the person least likely to sleep with him. He likes a challenge.
Worse for him, he's a known libertine who sleeps around a lot, and his reputation precedes him. Madame de Tourvel's heard about him, and he has to convince her that he's a changed man and that she's the one who's changed him. He makes a show of attending Mass, visiting the sick, having pious conversations with his aunt, and generally being a good Christian gentleman. He learns the language of religious devotion and puts it to use.
The novel doesn't use the word rape, but Valmont is a serial rapist. He doesn't seek consent from women he's seducing; he only wants them weak enough or compromised enough not to resist too much. Here's his description of his forcing sex on Cécile. He doesn't have the slightest compunction about assaulting her. He uses the oldest excuse in the book: she really wanted it.
To confirm my observations, I was malicious to exert no more strength than could easily have been resisted. It was only when [she] seemed about to escape me that I restrained her […] Oh well, to go no further, our sweet inamorata, forgetting her vows, first yielded and then consented: of course, tears and reproaches were resumed at the first opportunity. I don't know if they were real or pretended, but, as always happens, they ceased the moment I set about giving her reason for more. (3.96.17)
Valmont's misogynistic to the extreme, but also note that his abuse of women is made easy by the sexist society in which he lives and operates. As a wealthy man of high social standing, he feels entitled to exactly what he wants. He has a bad rep among anyone with a shred of decency, but he's a free man, and to many men (and women) in his society he can openly brag about his exploits.
If it's not bad enough that he's simultaneously ruining the lives and reputations of two innocent women, he's happily sending regular detailed progress reports to the Marquise.
Ego-Tripper
Valmont's the ultimate narcissist. He has complete confidence in his superiority to just about everyone else. He's certain he can read everyone like a book and use that knowledge to manipulate them.
He's got complete contempt for just about everyone. The only person he even considers to be on his level, and that's a maybe, is the Marquise. They're partners in crime. Even though she has many other lovers, it doesn't bother him, because he believes that he was the only one who could really satisfy her and keep her monogamous.
He's always using over-the-top language to describe his conquests. When he decides to seduce Madame de Tourvel, he tells the Marquise that seducing teenaged Cécile is beneath him; any man could do it. On the other hand:
Not so the enterprise that claims my attention; its success will ensure me not only pleasure but glory. The god of love himself cannot decide between myrtle and laurel for my crown and he will have to unite them to honor my triumph. Even you, my love, will be struck with holy awe […] (1.4.2)
And if he succeeds?
I shall leave her. And if I know the woman, I shall have no successor. […] After all, she will have existed only for me […]. Once I have achieved my triumph I shall say to my rivals: 'Look on my work and find, if you can, its parallel in our age!' (3.115.5)
Valmont never stops congratulating himself on being accepted into polite society while managing to be the most promiscuous and nasty guy around. He's not worried about the rumors swirling around regarding him and Madame de Tourvel. He tells the Marquise:
Thank you, first, for the rumours current about me. But I have no anxieties on that score. I am sure I shall soon be able to put a stop to them. Rest assured: I shall reappear in society more famous than ever before and worthier still of you. (3.115.2)
We can only imagine how he'll accomplish this; probably by lying and denying, and if that fails, placing the blame on poor Madame de Tourvel. This guy has no conscience. The word "psychopath" is popping into Shmoop's head right about now.
An All-around Jerk
Valmont's a cruel guy, sadistic, even. When he sees someone in pain or misery, he loves it. When he sees Madame de Tourvel one morning, he says:
There were dark rings under her eyes. I hope she slept as badly as I did." (1.25.2)
Later, after she receives a letter from him, he notes to Merteuil:
I was enjoying her distress, and did not hesitate to provoke it a little further." (1.34.10)
When writing of his elderly aunt, he remarks that she has nothing left to do but die. (3.100.8)
You'd be right to call Valmont evil, but he has amoral aspects to his character as well:
If I have a talent for bringing women to ruin, I have no less a talent, when I wish, for saving them from it." (2.71.1)
He's not ashamed of a good deed as long as it entertains him or offers him a challenge to overcome. And listen to this heartless description of his plans for the innocent Madame de Tourvel after the Marquise taunts him for taking so long to seduce her:
Yes, I like watching, contemplating this prudent woman as she takes, without knowing it, a path which allows no return, which flings her willy-nilly in my wake down its steep and dangerous descent. […] Ah, let me at least have time to enjoy the touching struggle between love and virtue. (3.96.3)
This passage brings up two critical questions. First, is he taking his time because he's sadistically watching her suffer or is he really enjoying her company? Second, what's the French word for "willy-nilly?" Bonus tip: Actually, the French is more literally translated "despite herself." The translator punched it up a bit.
A Secret Lover?
So here's a question. The Marquise de Merteuil accuses Valmont of loving the woman he says he's only pretending to love, Madame de Tourvel. She dares him to prove he doesn't love her and he takes the dare, leaving Madame de Tourvel abruptly and heartlessly. However, the Marquise remains convinced (or says she is) that he still loves her and that he'll seek to make amends. Despite saying that his interest in Madame de Tourvel is only an interesting "experiment," his letters give us some reason to doubt him:
And I have nowhere else found the charm of which I speak. It is not the charm of love, either; for if I did at times, beside this astonishing woman, experience sensations of weakness which resembled that pusillanimous passion, I was always able to conquer them […] Yet the same charm subsists. I should even, I admit, feel a rather delicate pleasure in giving way to it, were it not that it causes me some disquiet. (4.125.2)
By the end of the story, we suspect that Valmont has really been seriously hooked by the virtuous Madame de Tourvel and has let his carefully guarded heart be stolen. But he can't stand this idea—he has a reputation as a player to protect, after all—and he destroys Madame de Tourvel just to show the Marquise that he's still in control of himself.
He claims that his attempt to reconcile with Madame de Tourvel after he jilts her is just another step in his evil plan, but we're not so sure about that. We're not privy to all the details of his deathbed confession, but it sure seems to involve a certain amount of regret and forgiveness. Maybe he's human after all. Or maybe he's manipulating with his last breath.
Valmont's Timeline