Grenouille Sparknotes

Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born in a food market that had been erected above the Cimetiere des Innocents, the "most putrid spot in the whole kingdom" [p. 4].
He barely escapes death at his birth; his mother would have let him die among the fish guts as she had her four other children. But Grenouille miraculously survives. How would you relate the circumstances of his birth to the life he grows up to live? When Grenouille was born his mother immediately rejected him, opting to throw him in with the fish guts and get rid of him, and he spends the majority of his life in the same cycle. When he is put into the arms of his wet-nurse she takes a very strong disliking towards him and gives him back to the church, and he is then passed around like a hot potato until he’s done helping out Baldini. Grenouille’s rejection by society from the time he was born contributes to him spending seven years alone in a mountain which he only leaves because he rejects himself in a dream that makes him admit to himself that he has no scent.

2.When the wet nurse refuses to keep Grenouille because

similarly towards the end of the book the entire town of grasse fails to do the same thing, they know that Grenouille killed the 25 virgins, yet they still are completely overpowered by one drop of perfume. The small amount of Perfume it took to fool an extremely large crowd implies that the french have almost no moral upstanding and restraint. The fact that it is smell in both cases that leads the people to betray their better judgment for some insignificant aspect of the situation adds on to Suskind's satirical portrayal of the french and their