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The novelist Hector Malot shares with the publisher P.-J. Hetzel the wish to give a new impulse to the novel for young people. He sets the wilful child at the centre of his plots. Brought up according to models inspired by Rousseau, Malot’s young characters succeed in overcoming the various obstacles of an often challenging quest by dint of will, persistency and clerverness. Plots dealing with various cultures and countries and a growing attention paid to girls’characters show evidence of the modernity of those novels for young people. The universal nature of the initiations displayed in the novels and the enigmatic strength of the plots are the basis for a success that goes beyond time and places. The numerous translations of the novels – and those of Sans famille in particular – in so many languages are a clear sign of a work still worth reading.