The French Revolution was a war in France between the French royalty and the French serfs, which lasted ten years, from seventeen eighty-nine to seventeen ninety-nine. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is set before and during the French Revolution. In his novel, Dickens used many metaphors to add enhancement. He also used many themes throughout the novel, one of them being the theme of fate. Dickens improved his novel excellently through his use of the innovative metaphors of a storm, knitting, and water to convey the theme of fate.
In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens uses the metaphor of a storm to represent the French Revolution. It was France’s fate to go through a war, and it was the French soldiers’ fate to fight in the war. The following quote describes the sheer chaos of the French Revolution. Dickens describes, “Over the chair they had thrown a red flag, and to the back of it they had bound a pike with a red cap on its top. In this car of triumph, not even the Doctor's entreaties could prevent his being carried to his home on men's shoulders, with a confused sea of red caps heaving about him, and casting up to sight from the stormy deep such wrecks of faces, that he more than once misdoubted his mind being in confusion, and that he was in the tumbril on his way to the Guillotine” (Dickens 222). This quote displays the confusion of the French Revolution. Storms are usually very destructive, as was the French Revolution. This next quote describes men and women dancing together after the horrible French Revolution had ended. Dickens happily notes, “Men and women danced together, women danced together, men danced together, as hazard had brought them together. At first, they were a mere storm of c...
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...et, making it seem like it was stained with blood. This quote about water being stained with blood makes it seem as if it is Madame Defarge’s life fate to die. Water is a fantastic and original metaphor to represent life.
By using the innovative metaphors of a storm, knitting, and water to convey the theme of fate in his novel, A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens is a famous and well-known writer. The storm representing the French Revolution comes down to simply social classes. The hit list that Madame Defarge knitted comes down to simply who dies and who does not. The flowing water comes down to simply the flow of life. Throughout the wondrous and enticing novel, the metaphors turn into symbols that relate to the theme of fate in a variety of ways.
Works Cited
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Dover Thrift ed. Mineola: Dover, 1999.
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In Kate Chopin’s story “The Storm” it talks about love and lust. It speaks of two kind of storm that occurs. These two storms I find to be the central part of the story, and is being represented as a symbol within the story. The first storm is the most obvious one that Bibi and Bobinot are faced with. The second storm isn’t that visible for it involves Calixta and Alcee. Just as like most storms they come and pass.
The French Revolution took place at the time when the poor peasants who had been mistreated, revolted against the wealthy and cruel aristocrats. When they did this, it was bloody, chaotic, and no lived were spared in their conquest for revenge. In Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities, the French Revolution is depicted through the lives of both peasants and aristocrats. The Marquis St. Evermonde and the whole Evermonde family treated many of the peasants cruelly and inhumanely. In the book, the poor townspeople from the suburb called Saint Antoine are among the many French peasants to revolt against the Marquis and all the aristocrats, but this is only the beginning of their revenge. Dickens uses the symbols of a whirlpool, a storm, and a sea, to portray the building of anger in the peasants, which drives them to seek revenge.
Cruelty, blood, and gore are all accurate descriptions of the French Revolution. This horrific time is correctly represented by the twisted and elaborate plot of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. During this time, pity and sympathy leave the hearts of both the revolutionaries and the aristocrats. The hatred felt by the revolutionaries towards their oppressors seizes control of their hearts and results in more ruthless and savage behavior towards their old persecutors. Man, himself, becomes a more brutal race in this time of animosity. He has no compassion towards his fellow man, resulting in extraordinary bloodshed. Throughout A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens conveys the theme of inhumanity by using symbols, especially scarecrows, blue-flies, and dogs.
The French Revolution is a war between the peasants and the aristocrats. A Tale of Two Cities is by Charles Dickens and is set in England and France from 1775-1793. The French Revolution is starting to come about because the French peasants are trying to model their revolution after the American Revolution. King Louis XVI of France supported the colonists in the American Revolution; therefore, it is ironic that he does not help the poor, distressed, and oppressed peasants in France. The peasants are trying to rise against the oppressive aristocrats because the rich are unfeeling and mean towards the poor serfs. In A Tale of Two Cities, the symbols help represent the theme of man’s inhumanity toward his fellow man because the symbol of the scarecrows and birds of fine song and feather is helpful in understanding the differences between the poor and the rich, the Gorgon’s head is meaningful because it shows that change needs to occur, and the knitting is insightful because one learns that evil can come out of good intentions.
Dickens exquisitely uses foreshadowing as a tool to give the reader a way to have some kind of idea of the evens to come and the give the reader some kind of knowledge of how the peasants intend to carry their plans of destruction out by using metaphors. The turmoil between the aristocracy and the peasants has been summed up into the metaphor of the storm. This metaphor truly helps the reader have a grasp on the violence and destruction going on at that time because a Revolution, much like a storm, causes demolition to all things around it. This metaphor is used to enhance the reading experience by cluing the reader in on the minor details of the plans of the Revolutionaries, so they are not confused in later chapters.
The French Revolution was a movement from 1789 to 1799 that brought an end to the monarchy, including many lives. Although A Tale of Two Cities was published in 1859, it was set before and during the French Revolution and had over 200 million copies sold. The author, Charles Dickens, is known for being an excellent writer and displays several themes in his writings. Sacrifice is an offering of an animal or human life or material possession to another person. Dickens develops the theme of sacrifice throughout the story by the events that occurred involving Dr. Manette, Mr. Defarge, and Sydney Carton.
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
Dickens uses different scenarios to put the revolution into a different perspective and sway the emotions of the readers towards the devastated nobles. The new form of government led by the rebels is deceitful and rigged, and under it new and unfair laws are constantly passed and innocent people are arrested. Dickens is showing that the new leaders are just as brutal and cold hearted as the old aristocracy was. The peasants are so caught up on revenge that stopping and making peace is not part of the picture, “Defarge, a weak minority, interposed a few words for the memory of the compassionate wife of the Marquis; but only elicited from his wife a repetition of her last reply, ‘Tell the Wind and the Fire where to stop, not me’” (265) Madame Defarge’s hate towards the Evrémonde family is just like the peasant class’ hate for the aristocrats; it has enveloped their souls. The peasants are now just as brutal and inhumane towards their fellow man as the nobles were before them.
Although the passage foreshadows the events later throughout the novel, Dickens ultimately uses a pathetic tone toward the social conditions of France before the French Revolution through the use of anaphora in the first half of the passage and the diction throughout the second half of the passage.
The French Revolution was a harsh fight between two classes and was full of revenge. A Tale of Two Cities is a brilliant novel by Charles Dickens that illustrates the magnitude of the French Revolution. This war was the peasants going against the nobles and involved many innocent imprisonments and deaths. It was a rough time for many people and put many of the cities in danger. Dickens foreshadows the coming of the Revolution as revenge on the nobles with the symbol of the storm, the frenzy of the wine cask, and Madame Defarge.
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.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us” (Dickens 3). Charles Dickens opens one of his most famous books with these words, which foretell how the entire novel is laid out and how conflicting viewpoints in the era were soon to be the causes of revolution. A Tale of Two Cities is historically important because it tells of life during the French Revolution, how people can change from a “civilized” society into a bloodthirsty army, and teaches the
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.
A Tale of Two Cities promoted the image of a stable England by using revolutionary France as a setting to highlight the contrasts between the two countries, although Dickens seemed to believe in the eighteen-fifties that England was heading towards an uprising on the scale of the French Revolution. In the twentieth century, we see the French Revolution used as a 'lavish' setting in film and TV productions of A Tale of Two Cities. In the preface to the novel, Dickens says "It has been one of my hopes to add something to the popular and picturesque means of understanding that terrible time" (xiii).
During the French Revolution, there were many controversies between the peasants and the aristocracy. In A Tale Of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens, most of the peasants are revolutionaries fighting against their nobility. Dickens’ use of imagery throughout the novel tries to sway the reader’s opinions about the peasants. Charles Dickens depicts the French Revolution well with the images of the novel as well as the tone he uses. Throughout the novel, Dickens illustrates through his imagery how the peasants change from poor, secretive, and then on to vicious.