Stendhal: Le Rouge et le Noir (novel)

Stendhal: Le Rouge et le Noir (FR 1830-1831). Frontispice du tome II (1831).

Stendhal: Le Rouge et le Noir; chronique du XIXe siècle / Punainen ja musta; kronikka XIX vuosisadalta. FR 1830. Finnish translation by J. A. Hollo / WSOY 1956 [the first edition of this translation. A previous translation into Finnish by Joel Lehtonen dates from 1929.]. This translation feels right, but I'm not able to compare it with the original text:
http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Le_Rouge_et_le_Noir

I read this novel for the first time and I found remarkable:
– the sense of history, the turbulence of the decades after the Revolution, the great movements of the recent generations all still valid during the Restoration
– the sense of society: Le Rouge et le Noir has been called the first class-conscious novel – after the Revolution, the aristocracy and the clerical estate are still mighty during the Restoration, but they are constantly afraid – the bourgeoisie has the financial power but not yet the social and political status which it deserves – Julien Sorel is the poor but talented provincial son of a sawyer
– the theme of corruption: the society is run by networks – corruption is rampant – influence is not based on justice and fairness
– the clerical world is also run by power games and evil machinations, including the power fight between the Jesuits and the Jansenists – clerical titles can be bought – the Church is also profoundly corrupt
– Julien Sorel as an anti-hero: he is not idealized by Stendhal – he has fatal weaknesses such as vanity and envy – his clerical career is pure opportunism – he knows the Bible by heart but does not believe in God – there is a line of development from Rastignac to Julien Sorel to Frédéric Moreau
– Le Rouge et le Noir is also a Bildungsroman of disillusionment – a deeply bitter one – and tragic, because Julien has both greatness and fatal weaknesses
– Julien Sorel is deeply loved by Madame de Rênal and Mathilde de Mole, but he is hardly worthy of either – both women have more strength of character than he does
– the story of the passion seems incredible to a modern reader, but it is full of surprises and elements of psychological credibility
– there is a line of development from Madame de Rênal to Emma Bovary to Anna Karenina – in her audacity of passion Madame de Rênal is close to Anna Karenina
– the style of Stendhal is concise, ironic, empathizing and yet with a fine sense of distance – in Stendhal's age, the writer was not afraid of blunt statements and generalizations – the writer's frankly subjective and partial statements I don't find inhibiting but on the contrary they provoke the reader to take a stand himself
– considering the current popularity of fantasy, I find historical novels like this as amazing and much more exciting, because the past is a foreign country

I have not seen film adaptations of Le Rouge et le Noir, the most essential of which is:
Le Rouge et le Noir / Punaista ja mustaa. FR/IT 1954. D: Claude Autant-Lara. SC: Jean Aurenche, Pierre Bost, Claude Autant-Lara. DP: Michael Kelber (Eastmancolor). CAST: Gérard Philipe (Julien Sorel), Danielle Darrieux (Madame de Rênal), Antonella Lualdi (Mathilde de Mole). 185 min