Charles Dickens' Hard Times
When we think of hard times in today’s world, our thoughts might consist of the number of days before we get paid, an argument with our spouse, or simply that our car is not operating so great these days. Most people today can not begin to imagine what hard times were like during the Industrial Revolution. In nineteenth century England, hard times to the factory workers may have consisted of watching one’s nine-year-old child tied to a machine in the mill for fourteen hours a day. It is no wonder why the writers of this period protested society through the voices of their writings. One of the greatest of these writers was Charles Dickens, who made his voice of protest through a literary masterpiece known as Hard Times. There are many aspects of Hard Times, and Dickens manages to capture what life was like for all of the social classes of his day through each individual character with his protests against the horrible ways in which people were treating one another in the times that truly were hard.
Dickens put a great deal of thought and research into all of his works, just as he did in Hard Times. As one writer states, “He visited Preston to get material for the industrial and trade-union aspects of the novel; a few weeks latter he began to collect circus slang” (Collins 29). He latter obtained the Educational Board’s series of questions for the examination of teachers in schools. On April 1, 1854, Hard Times appeared in a weekly journal, Household Words, which Dickens edited.
Some people believe that Dickens “was determined to create a means where he could communicate his ideas on social reform so in 1850 he began editing Household Words” (Ford 16). One author states that “by 1851 the twenty-four page Household Words was selling 40,000 copies a week” (Gray 2). The weekly journal included articles on politics, science and history. To increase the number of people willing to buy Household Words, it also contained short stories and humorous pieces. Dickens also used the journal to serialize novels that were concerned with social issues such as Hard Times.
The scene is a factory driven English town known as Coketown. The novel begins in a classroom where we meet Mr. Gradgrind, a wealthy parliament member, to whom the school belongs.
Dickens used his great talent by describing the city London were he mostly spent his time. By doing this Dickens permits readers to experience the sights, sounds, and smells of the aged city, London. This ability to show the readers how it was then, how ...
Charles Dickens wrote Hard Times in 1854. He lived in London and because he was writing about industrialisation in the North at that time he went up to Preston in 1852 to explore the industrialisation there and to witness the strike of the weavers. He was horrified by the oppressing industrialists he witnessed and also horrified by seeing the way the common people were made to work.
The novel Hard Times by Charles Dickens offers a glimpse into the life and times during the industrial revolution in England during the nineteenth century. Dickens offers a wide range of characters from the upper class factory owner to the lowest class factory workers. He creates characters in this range of social classes and crafts this story that intertwines each person and their transformations throughout the novel. Almost every character in this story is complex and has characteristics that run deeper than their place in society, and this is what makes the novel so very important and intense. While there are many complexities linked to these characters, some do not appear to be as complex but in actuality they are. A strong example would be Josiah Bounderby, the wealthiest character in the novel.
Charles Dickens’s Hard Times is a novel divided into three books. These books are titled “Sowing,” “Reaping,” and “Garnering.” Charles Dickens is one of the most important and popular authors of the nineteenth century. He lived in an interesting time and because of his position as a huge popular author, he had the chance to comment on them. Charles Dickens wrote Hard Times to convey his inner feelings of repression of the Industrial Revolution, by putting his characters through the processes of sowing, reaping and garnering.
In Bleak House, by Charles Dickens, Mr. Vholes is Richard Carstone’s legal advisor. Introduced to Richard by Mr. Skimpole, Vholes encourages and assists Richard as he attempts to unravel the mysteries of the Jarndyce and Jarndyce case in Chancery. Vholes, however, may not have the best intentions. Through descriptions of his gloomy physical appearance, suspicious actions, and unfortunate connections to English law, Dickens paints a vivid image of Mr. Vholes—a man who cannot be trusted. Vholes, therefore, is made up of multiple layers; as each layer peels away, the reader understands a little bit more of this secretive man. Surprisingly, Mr. Vholes is seen as more and more evil as readers journey to the center of his being.
12. Oldham, R. (2000) Charles Dickens’ Hard Times: Romantic Tragedy of Proletariat Propaganda [Online]. Available: http://www.pillowrock.com [Accessed: 25th April 2005].
In society today, all people determine their lifestyle, personality and overall character by both positive and negative traits that they hold. Sydney Carton in Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities was a drunken lawyer who had an extremely low self-esteem. He possessed many negative characteristics which he used in a positive way. Carton drastically changed his life and became a new man. Sydney is not the man he first appeared to be.
Dickens, Charles. Hard Times. Ed. Fred Kaplan and Sylvere Monod. A Norton Critical Edition. 3rd ed. New York: Norton, 2001. 5-222
The novel, Great Expectations, presents the story of a young boy growing up and becoming a
Charles Dickens uses satire in his novel Hard Times as he attempts to bring to light social issues such as class division, education, and industrialization in nineteen-century English society. Hard Times was originally published in weekly segments in Dickens’ magazine, Household Words, from April 1854 to August 1854 (Cody 1). In order to better fit into the Libraries at the time, Charles Dickens divided Hard Times into three books: Sowing, Reaping, and Garnering. Each book with its own theme, guides us through the lives of the characters living in the fictional city Dickens calls, “Coketown.”
Swisher, Clarice, Ed. “Charles Dickens: A Biography.” Readings on Charles Dickens. San Diego, Greenhaven Press, 1998. Print. 21 March 2014.
The death of God for many in the Victorian era due to scientific discoveries carried with it the implication that life is nothing more than a kind of utilitarian existence that should be lived according to logic and facts, not intuition or feeling – that without God to impose meaning on life, life is meaningless. Charles Dickens, in Hard Times, parodies this way of thought by pushing its ideologies and implications to the extreme in his depiction of the McChoakumchild School.
Charles Dickens lived in England during the 19th century, during a period of rapid economic growth when the industrial revolution was in full swing. Industrial cities sprung up throughout England, sustained solely by their factories, which furiously churned out wealth and merchandise and employed thousands of working class citizens. The living and working conditions for factory laborers in these towns were extremely poor, and the wealthy bourgeoisie prospered marvelously by greedily exploiting their employees, unfortunate people who toiled long hours in grimy factories to barely earn their subsistence. Utilitarianism was a prevalent viewpoint during this period of industrial frenzy, for it embraced the values of practicality and efficiency; and the success and survival of the participants of industrial society often depended on these standards. Dickens was disgusted with the single-mindedness of his society and with the dreary, inanimate atmosphere that accompanied it. In his novel Hard Times, an ongoing struggle ensues between the ideas of `fact' and `fancy'-- or the `head' and `heart.' The rivalry between these philosophies is a central theme to the Hard Times, not to mention a fundamental crux of human existence as well. Should an individual base his life on fact and rationality, or should he live by the whims of his imagination and fancy, following his heart? Dickens advances this theme persistently throughout the Hard Times, employing frequent use of descriptive imagery and metaphor throughout novel to animate the conflict between Fact and Fancy, and the result of this emphasis is a broader, encompassing critique of industrialized society in general.
Dickens’ Hard Times conveys the detached culture present at the time of England’s industrialization, a period was a time of unwavering focus on industry and a neglect of the human soul. The character of Thomas Gradgrind best exemplifies the defining fabric of the time. As an educator involved in molding the minds of the youth, Gradgrind helps to uphold the utilitarian ideas of England. Dickens disproves the prevailing utilitarian mentality avowing life as simply about the hard facts. Through the eventual failure of Gradgrind’s philosophies, Dickens conveys that the mind cannot simply function on logic, it must also have emotion lest it become dispirited.
In the novel Hard Times, Charles Dickens connives a theme of utilitarianism, along with education and industrialization. Utilitarianism is the belief that something is morally right if it helps a majority of people. It is a principle involving nothing but facts and leaves no room for creativity or imagination. Dickens provides symbolic examples of this utilitarianism in Hard Times by using Mr. Thomas Gradgrind, one of the main characters in the book, who has a hard belief in utilitarianism. Thomas Gradgrind is so into his philosophy of rationality and facts that he has forced this belief into his children’s and as well as his young students. Mr. Josiah Bounderby, Thomas Gradgrind’s best friend, also studies utilitarianism, but he was more interested in power and money than in facts. Dickens uses Cecelia Jupe, daughter of a circus clown, who is the complete opposite of Thomas Gradgrind to provide a great contrast of a utilitarian belief.