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Use of Symbolism
Use of Symbolism
The use of symbolism in the novel
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In France, the years between 1789 and 1794 are a time of thoughtless inhumanity and brutality toward fellow man. These inhumane acts are carried through by the Revolutionaries and the nobility of France in these years and the years leading up to the French Revolution. One of the foremost illustrations of the inhumanity felt and shown during this time is A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. Dickens uses metaphors as symbols throughout this book to exemplify his theme of thoughtlessness toward people by other people. Dickens develops these metaphors throughout the novel and manipulates them to fit different circumstances. He uses everyday objects and ideas and makes them personifications of the Revolution and their unsympathetic mindsets …show more content…
The scarecrows are the emancipated and starved peasants who are hungry for revolution. The birds of fine feather little know that “the time was to come, when the gaunt scarecrows of that region should have watched the lamplighter, in their idleness and hunger, so long, as to conceive the idea of improving on his method, and hauling up men by those ropes and pulleys…”(Dickens 23). The birds’ necks will be wrung by the Revolution and they will be strung up on the lampposts in the coming years of the Revolution. The nobles take no warning of the scarecrows’ unrest, “and every Wind that blew over France shook the rags of the scarecrows in vain, for the birds, fine of song and feather, took no warning” (23). The nobles’ disregard for the peasants is a huge reason for the French Revolution, but an even bigger reason is the total savagery toward them. The nobles, sitting lavishly in their castles, are watching the peasants starve to death. For example, Dickens writes “what the few village scarecrows who, in their quest for herbs to eat and fragments of dead stick to burn, had borne in upon their starved fancy that the expression of the faces was altered”(135). The peasants are literally starving on the doorsteps of the nobles, but the nobles turn them away simply because of the difference in class levels. As inhumane as …show more content…
This metaphor is introduced with a man scrawling “BLOOD” on a wall in the midst of frenzy in which peasants were scooping up wine that has spilled into the street outside the Defarge’s wine shop when a cask broke. Dickens explains, “The time was to come, when that wine was to be spilled on the street-stones and when the stain of it would be red upon many there” (22). This scene parallels two later scenes in which there is much bloodshed spilled via La Guillotine and the Revolution. The insanity that the Revolutionaries go through in the spilling of blood is the same insanity that the starved peasants go through when blood is spilling instead of wine. Everyone is a victim to the barbarism of the Revolution, no matter what they do or did not do. The killing of innocents is not a rare or unusual thing. Dickens states, “Every day, through the street, the tumbrils now jolter heavily, filled with Condemned…. all red wine for La Guillotine, all daily brought into light from the dark cellars of the loathsome prisons…”(213). The prisoners are little more than blood to the members of the Revolution. The same wine that is spilled in front of Defarge’s wine shop spills over and over from innocent and guilty people alike. There is a startling amount of this savage wine spilled each day by the Revolution. Dickens declares, “Six tumbrils carry the day’s wine to La Guillotine” (288). The
In the short story, “The Story of An Hour”, written by Kate Choppin, a woman with a heart trouble is told her husband had passed away in a railroad disaster. Mrs. Mallard was depressed, then she came to a realization that she was free. Back in the day this story was written, women did not have many rights. They were overruled by their husband. As she became more aware of how many doors her husband death would open, she had passed away. The doctors had said she had died of heart disease--of the joy that kills. The irony in the situation was that as she was dying, her husband walked through the door, alive.
In this passage, Dickens’ juxtaposition, personification, detail, and diction reinforce Dickens’ tone of empathy and pity for the social conditions of the people of lower class France. When a large cask of wine spills open on the streets of France there is a mad rush to collect a taste of the spoiled wine. The people’s reactions consisted of “...frolicsome embraces, drinking of healths, shaking of hands, and even joining of hands and dancing a dozen together.” This exciting and scene of much happiness is juxtaposed by the “gloom that gathered on the scene that appeared more natural than sunshine” that occurs after all the wine has run out. This juxtaposition of the momentary happiness that the peasants of St. Antoine experience provide a contrast
To support a major theme of this novel, scarecrows and birds of fine song and feather, wine and knitting, all represent the theme of man’s inhumanity toward his fellow man. The Revolution was a tragically devastating time full of senseless and meaningless violence, deception of neighbors as well as treason towards the government, and blissful ignorance of the surroundings. Many scenes and dialogue from this novel point out what contributed to make the revolution a period of intense political destruction. In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens includes many themes pertaining to the French Revolution and the moralities and immoralities that goes with violence, betrayal, and ignorance, by using many different types of symbolism.
The French Revolution was a time of chaos and uprising in France during the mid-19th century that divided the French people. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is a novel that is set during this tumultuous time in history. During this period of time, the people of France made many sacrifices. Sacrifice is a common theme that is developed throughout this novel. One reason many people make sacrifices is for love, and throughout the novel this theme is developed through the characters Miss Pross, Doctor Alexandre Manette, and Sydney Carton.
Dickens wrote A Tale of Two Cities during his time of fascination with the French Revolution. The French Revolution was a time of inequity. There are many occasions in the novel where the problems of the Revolution are displayed. The human race is shown at its worst. Throughout the novel, man’s inhumanity towards fellow man, whether from a different social class or their own neighborhood, is shown through the metaphors of wine symbolizing blood, water symbolizing life, and blue flies symbolizing townspeople buzzing around death.
The poor that crave the aristocratsâ€TM deaths have such a strong aura that they are a part of a living Saint Antoine, and for a moment, their death craving is delayed until a later time. Dickens also states in this novel â€the knife [strikes] home, the faces [change], from faces of pride to faces of anger and pain; also that when that dangling figure [is] hauled. . . they [change] again, and [bear] a cruel look of being avengedâ€? which shows the poor switching from their pride to revenge against the aristocrats and the aristocracy (177). Madame Defarge makes the statement â€[v]engeance and retribution require a long timeâ€? to her husband during his time of impatience to seek revenge against the aristocrats, and it implies that Monsieur Defargeâ€TMs revenge happens later in the future (179).
Charles Dickens writes this book explaining the French Revolution, in which the social and economic systems in France had huge changes and the French monarchy collapsed. This causes high taxes, unfair laws, and the poor being mistreated. Charles Dickens shows that cruelty of other people will lead to a revolution and in addition to the revolution more cruelty will occur. He explores the idea of justice and violence through the use of ambiguous characters with positive and negative qualities, meaning that they have to different sides to them; for example, Charles Darnay, Sydney Carton, and Dr. Manette. Throughout the story of A Tale of Two Cities, Charles dickens uses ambiguous characters to shows how violence and cruelty can be stopped through the power of true sacrifice.
The French Revolution was a period of radical social and political upheaval, lead by the lower class of France, which began the decline of powerful monarchies in France and the rise of nationalism and democracy. In A Tale Of Two Cities, written by Charles Dickens, he highlights these aspects of the war between classes and makes them personal to the reader. Throughout the novel, Dickens’ establishes and develops several symbols in order to help the reader better understand the Revolution and the way people acted during this time. He shows that while emotion, desperation, and irrationality run high, humanity, justice, and morality are scarce. The blue flies, Madame Defarge’s knitting, and the sea are three of Dickens’ symbols that develop his theme of man’s inhumanity to his fellow man throughout the novel.
The French Revolution was a time when many people sacrificed their lives for their beliefs. As the French Revolution moved on, more people joined the movement and risked their lives. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is set during this time. Many people who sacrificed their lives for the Revolution felt like it was their fate to do this. This idea of fate is described many times in Dickens’ novel to magnify the story. The theme of fate is prevalent in the novel through the lives of many characters. This theme is used to show how a person is unable to escape their fate because it is already decided. The metaphors and symbols in the novel are greatly used to contribute to the theme of fate through the symbols of knitting, the fountain and water, and the wine.
Set during the French Revolution, Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities remains one of the most influential books of the modern era. Within A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens provides an alternate social and political structure for society through the rehabilitation of Doctor Manette, the sacrifice of Sydney Carton, and the change that Charles Darnay undergoes.
With imagery revealing the poor straits and desperation of the peasant class of France, Dickens influences the reader to pity them. He writes, “The cloud settled on Saint Antoine, which a momentary gleam had driven from his sacred countenance, the darkness of it was heavy—cold, dirt, sickness, ignorance, want were the lords waiting on the saintly presence—nobles of great power all of them; but most especially the last” (Dickens 22). Through hunger, want, etc. being personified and compared to nobles through language such as “nobles” and “lords”, Dickens shows the extent of the suffering of the peasants, their deserving to be pitied, and the human nobles’ apathy towards them. The peasants of Saint Antoine suffer in the 1770s, and the town’s name is made into a play on words with “saintly presence”, with the cloud of cold, dirt, sickness, ignorance, and want looming forming the imagery of irony. Another description of the peasants’ plight is revealed in the quote saying, “Ploughed into every furrow of age and coming up afresh, was the sign Hunger. It was prevalent everywhere...Hunger was the inscription on th...
The novel Tale of Two Cities goes into intensive detail about the issues of social injustices in the time period of the French Revolution. Both Charles Dickens and Thomas Carlyle believed the lower-class French had to take cruel treatment from the nobility. Dickens felt sympathy for the lower-class because he went through poverty and cruel treatments in his early life. Charles’ father was terrible with his family’s finances and wanted to be wealthy desperately. This greed caused Charles’ father to become in debt and eventually be imprisoned.
At the beginning of A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Dickens once again expresses his concern. The novel opens in 1775, with a comparison of England and pre-revolutionary France. While drawing parallels between the two countries, Dickens also alludes to his own time: "the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only" (1; bk. 1, ch. 1). The rest of the chapter shows that Dickens regarded the condition to be an 'evil' one, since he depicts both countries as rife with poverty, injustice, and violence due to the irresponsibility of the ruling elite (1-3; bk. 1, ch. 1). As the novel unfolds, however, England becomes a safe haven for those escaping the violence perpetrated by the French Revolution. In this paper, I shall argue that A Tale of Two Cities reflects the popular confidence in the stability of England in the eighteen-fifties, despite Dickens's suggestions at the beginning. A Tale of Two Cities thus becomes a novel about the England and the English of Dickens's time. And yet, many people today would believe that the novel is essentially about the French Revolution, which brings me to my second point. If in the nineteenth century the novel served to affirm the stability of Britain, in this century it has been greatly influential in the formation of the popular image of the French Revolution, mainly thanks to film and television adaptations. The purpose of this paper is to look at the popular reception of the novel from the time of its first publication in 1859 to the nineteen-nineties.
Charles Dickens’s voice varies from being sympathetic with the revolutionaries, to a feeling of discord with their method of revolting. A Tale of Two Cities revolves around the French revolution and the tension in England. Dickens gives the tale of a family caught in the conflict between the French aristocracy and radicals. In the course of the book, the family handles extreme difficulty and obscurity. Dickens’s neutrality, though sometimes wavering from side to side, is apparent throughout each book in the novel.
A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens, is a story set in the year 1775 and through the turbulent time of the French Revolution. It is of people living in love and betrayal, murder and joy, peril and safety, hate and fondness, misery and happiness, gentle actions and ferocious crowds. The novel surrounds a drunken man, Sydney Carton, who performs a heroic deed for his beloved, Lucie Manette, while Monsieur and Madame Defarge, ruthless revolutionaries, seek revenge against the nobles of France. Research suggests that through Dickens’ portrayal of the revolutionaries and nobles of the war, he gives accurate insight to the era of the Revolution.