*Tale of Two Cities--Week Six.Day1.

Book Three is when the violence begins to strike and affect France in terms of the Revolution that has begun. The imagery used by Dickens aids in insight that the reader gains of what happened during the time period of the Revolution and the brutality that took place. Many people throughout the world can relate to the importance of the cross and the symbolism and effect that the cross instills on people. However, back in the Revolutionary time period, a new symbol began to take over. The Guillotine soon became a “sign of regeneration” for the “human race” as the Guillotine took the place of the once sacred cross. Society viewed the Guillotine as a light hearted joke, “jesting” that it was the “best cure for a headache” as it was the “National Razor which shaved close” and prevented “hair from turning grey.” Dickens personifies the guillotine, as if it has taken place of the King and overruled the country. Constantly catering to “slave her devouring thirst,” the Guillotine As the cross was refurbished into a new symbol of torture and violence, the country began in a transformation of sadism.

The once, pure white snow that softly covered the ground was soon reddened with “the prevailing Republican colour” as the revolutionaries marched the ground in their “red-caps” and brought the prisoners to the guillotine. The stain of the red clothing garments soon turned to a “deeper dye” with blood from the victims of the treacherous guillotine.

As if Madame Defarge needed any more of an eerie tone to her, Dickens uses Madame Defarge as a threat to Lucie and her child. When first meeting Lucie, Madame Defarge pointed her “knitting-needle at little lucie” as if it were the “finger of Fate.” Personifying “Fate,” Dickens conveys that Madame Defarge holds the fate of the country within herself-she controls who lives and who dies. With one stitch of a needle, Madame Defarge has the power to control the Fate of all the people around her. The “shadow” that Madame Defarge’s silhouette casts down upon Little Lucie that falls “threatening and dark” foreshadows the atrocity Madame Defarge has upon Lucie and her family. Even though Charles Evremond (Darnay) has been “acquitted,” Madame Defarge’s “shadow” proves that an event may occur later on, and that Charles and his family are not free from Madame Defarge.

*Tale of Two Cities--Week Five.

“Echoing Footsteps “is the motif in Chapter 21, in which Lucie consistently hears throughout the days. The resonance of the footsteps “upset” Lucie, as she is caught between “fluttering hopes and doubts.” Within the footsteps, Lucie hears the “sound of footsteps at her own early grave” as sadness is all the echo of the footsteps brought her. The footsteps that Lucie hears foreshadows the soon coming Revolution, footsteps that are “not easily made clean if once stained red” with blood, which the reader is introduced to in the following chapter.

The reader sees that all of the turmoil and Revolution stems from the Defarge’s wine shop. They all meet at “Defarge’s wine-shop” where Defarge was already “begrimed with gunpowder and sweat” as he “issued arms” out to people to begin war. The secret symbol for the Jacques is a “red-cap” which the reader sees in chapter 1 of book 3 when Darnay is imprisoned by the people in the red-caps and is sentenced to be kept “in secret” which means that Darnay will be isolated in a prison cell just as Dr. Manette was.

Lucie’s child, Lucie Jr., shows aspects of Lucie and her father Darnay, in that she speaks the “Two Cities of her life.” Speaking English from Lucie, and the French of Darnay—the part that Darnay’s family does not know of. Perhaps further on in the reading, Lucie Jr. will be forced to choose her father’s heritage or her mothers. Or perhaps Lucie will be a symbol that England and France can intermix and be created into one.

As the Revolution begins, the reader is introduced to a new character, “The Vengeance” who is Madame Defarge’s “lieutenant.” The Lady’s name epitomizes what the Jacques are about- “inflicting injury, harm, humiliation, and revenge.”

Chapter 22 embodies the violence during the late 1700’s. The sadistic pleasure that the Defarge’s and the others feel from the “hanging,” “beating,” and “murdering” of the wealthier population and the celebration of “dancing” that they feel portrays the unruliness of what the Jacques aim to accomplish. The irony in all of the killing is that the Jacques thought violence would better their own lives, yet they were all left with “children wailing and breadless,” empty “bakers’ shops,” and “scanty insufficient suppers.” However, the work that the Jacques accomplished made the “human fellowship” infuse some “nourishment into the flinty viands” which produced “sparks of cheerfulness” within the people. The people thrived on violence as their source of “nourishment.”

*Tale of Two Cities--Week Four.

As the reader proceeds in A Tale of Two Cities, the reader is again introduced into foreshadowing of the upcoming Revolution. In the beginning of “Knitting”, people enter the Defarge’s wine shop and view people as they perform tedious activities such as “card games”, drawing “figures on the tables with spilt drops of wine,” and “dominoes.” Dickens uses the simplicity of pastimes within the wine shop to foreshadow the upcoming Revolution. The “towers” of “dominoes” symbolizes the building up of the country, only to see a chain reaction of the country fall and crumble piece by piece. Also the “figures on the tables” drawn from “spilt drops of wine” foreshadow the blood that will soon be painted on the country.

Gaspard, brutally executed by “soldiers” and “workmen” who gladly built a “gallows forty feet high”, was hung above the fountain, “poisoning the water.” Previously in the book, the fountain symbolized purity and the fate of the people as the fountain “ran” the “day ran into evening, so much life in the city ran into death” symbolizing how the fountain was a token of fate for the people. However, after Gaspard was hung and the fountain was stained with crimson blood, the fountain now symbolizes the impureness and vindictiveness that was exhibited during the time period along with the fate that will soon become of the people- violence and war.

Previously in the book, the mention of stone faces was seen in the Marquis home. In chapter 16, the reader again sees imagery of the stone figures. This time, the people who pass by the stone figures see that the “expressions” have been “altered.” It was said that when the Marquis was struck with the knife, the faces changed from “faces of pride” to faces of “anger and pain.” Also, when the “tall man” was hauled up “forty feet above the fountain” the stone faces transformed again, and bore “a cruel look of being avenged.” The stone figure by the bedroom where the Marquis was killed, now mysteriously has “two fine dints” chiseled into the “sculptured nose.” The stone faces on the Chateau symbolize the people that have experienced death by the Jacques, and are now “stone” as they look upon the town. Although the Marquis had a “stone” personality- one lacking compassion and altruism, the people metaphorically turning into stone also symbolizes the personality of the Jacques that killed the Marquis.

“Judiciously show a cat milk, if you wish her to thirst for it. Judiciously show a dog his natural prey, if you wish him to bring it down one day” a metaphor used by Dickens to portray how the Defarge’s wish for the Mender of Roads to become a part of the Jacques. If the Defarge’s let the Mender of Roads meet the King and Queen and see what they are truly like, he will wish to “hunt” them down with the Jacques. Madame Defarge then asks the Mender of Roads questions, as to if he were “shown a great heap of dolls”, if he would “pick out the richest and gayest” and if “shown a flock of birds” the Mender of Roads admitted he would “set upon the birds of the finest feathers” conveying how the Mender of Roads will fit in perfectly with the Jacques, as he is willingly to execute the richest and finest items if he was given the choice.

Knitting has been a recurring motif throughout the story, and in chapter 15, the reader finally begins to discover the true meaning of Madame Defarge’s stealthy habit. The knitting that Madame Defarge does is a “registry” of names that is “doomed to destruction.” All of the names that Madame Defarge knits includes people from “the chateau and all the race” along with all of the “spies” that are against the Jacques. When John Barsad, a spy, enters the wine shop, Madame Defarge knits his name upon her registry, foreshadowing the killing of John Barsad, along with the others sewn upon the registry. The cruel needlework of Madame Defarge conveys the treacherous outcome of her adversaries as she knits their fate. Ironically, Madame Defarge says that she knits “shrouds” a garment that dead people are buried in.

Imagery is used in chapter 16 to equate flies to the people of the country. The “heaps of flies” that were “extending their inquisitive and adventurous perquisitions into all the glutinous little glasses near Madame, fell dead at the bottom." The “decease made no impression on the other flies” who looked at the other flies “in the coolest manner until they met the same fate” those flies being the nobility of the human race, who are “oblivious” and do not concern themselves with the pain of others, until they, too, “meet the same fate.”

Confident that the Jacques will have an impact on the country, Madame Defarge reassures Mr. Defarge by metaphorically comparing their task to that of an earthquake. Although it takes “a long time” for an earthquake to form, when an earthquake is ready, it “grinds to pieces everything before it” its strike is vengeful, and so will the Jacques when the Revolution finally breaks out.

*Tale of Two Cities--Week Three.

In the preface of “Monseigneur in the Country,” the reader is divulged into imagery of a desolate countryside, deplete of vegetation. The repetition of “poor patches” of vegetation reinforces the image of the lack of food the country faces. to reiterate the poor conditions the people face, Dickens then depicts the “crimson” glow of the sun upon “the occupant”, the Marquis. The red glow upon the Marquis foreshadows the upcoming war, along with the cause of the war being the dichotomy between the “high breeding” and the “poor.” When the Marquis ran over a child, he tried to buy the child’s father’s forgiveness by simply throwing a “coin” at him. The instance of …. Is again shown when the Marquis comes upon a woman who “petitions” the Marquis to place a “morsel of stone or wood with [her] husband’s name” upon the “heap of grass” in which her husband is buried under, for each of the mounds of grass looks the same, and the woman cannot tell which mound of grass contains her husband. The indistinguishable “puffs of grass” symbolize how the wealthy viewed the less fortunate- each one the same, and not worthy of help, shown by the Marquis as he rode off in a “brisk trot” leaving the woman “far behind.”

The color red is spotted again, as the “water of the chateau fountain seemed to turn to blood” and the “stone faces” in the Marquis house “crimsoned.” The reference to red and “blood” not only foreshadows the war, but also the death of the Marquis. One could say that karma strikes the Marquis, as he is found dead. A reference to “stone faces” is mentioned multiple times in “Gorgon’s Head” which symbolizes the “stone” personality of the Marquis towards others, and what the Marquis ultimately turns into.

When Charles Darnay, the Marquis nephew, enters into his home, Darnay decides that when the home is renounced to him, he will “abandon it” and live “otherwise and elsewhere.” Darnay, unlike the Marquis, understands the true value of wealth, and understands it is not associated with money. Darnay finds the home to be a “crumbling tower of waste, mismanagement, extortion, debt, mortgage, oppression, hunger, nakedness, and suffering” – the opposite of what most would correlate with a wealthy home. Darnay believes in “labour” rather than “gold” and “beds of roses” to prosper. Does Darnay truly have strong morals or is there an alternative reason for him giving up his inheritance, perhaps Miss Manette?

Ending the chapter, the Marquis, referred to as a “stone figure”, was a “knife” driven “into the heart.” Upon the knife, was a “frill of paper” in which a note was scrawled, “Drive him fast to his tomb. This, from Jacques.” The reader assumes that perhaps Darnay is a member of “Jacques”, who killed the Marquis, which foreshadows the upcoming war, brought upon by the members of “Jacques.”

Not only has the reader found out the nexus between Charles Darnay and his association with Jacques and the Marquis, but now the reader unearths the discovery that Charles Darnay is not his real name. When Charles tries to tell Dr. Manette his real name, Dr. Manette gets weird acting, like previously when the word “DIG” is brought up. When Lucie comes home, Dr. Manette and herself “walked up and down together for a long time” and later found all of Dr. Manette’s “shoemaking tools” out, which means that Dr. Manette had another relapse of his previous state of mind.

As the love triangle between Lucie, Carton, Stryver, and Darnay becomes more convoluted, the reader gains more knowledge of Lucie’s personality. Lucie’s main mission in the book thus far was to aid in the recovery of her father and “recall him to life.” The motif is again used in chapter 13, “The Fellow of No Delicacy” when Lucie must “recall” Carton back “to life.” As the motif was originally meant to denote the “business” that the men were in such as digging up bodies for money, the motif now takes on a different meaning. Perhaps Lucie is a character that must “recall” characters back to life, from the doubts and regret the characters have in their life.

The title of chapter 14, “The Honest Tradesman,” is ironic due to the fact that the reader finally discovers the true business that Jerry Cruncher is involved with. Thus far, the novel has been replete with foreshadowing of what Jerry Cruncher’s true business association is. When Jerry’s son follows Mr. Cruncher and three other men out during the night, the reader discovers that the men “dug” up bodies from the ground. Returning home, “Young Jerry” then asks Mr. Cruncher what a “Resurrection-Man” is, and what one does. Mr. Cruncher replies saying that they deal with “scientific goods” foreshadowing the true business of Mr. Cruncher- which is “digging” up people’s bodies and selling them to science for money. One mystery that still remains is who are the three men with Mr. Cruncher?

*Tale of Two Cities--Week Two.

As a Tale of Two Cities progresses, more secrets, clues, and mysteries begin to unravel. Commencing the plot of this week’s reading in a court room, a man named Charles Darnay is accused of treason in that he supposedly administered information from the English King onto the French King. Being a witness, both Miss Manette and Mr. Manette along with Mr. Lorry were questioned, and said that both had seen Mr. Darnay on the train. Was Mr. Darnay one of the passengers that was in the train in chapter one?

The court room provided a sort of “entertainment” for the town, as if it were a “play in the Old Bailey.” The violence and inhumanness that the town portrays is depicted through the description and imagery that Dickens uses when exemplifying the personality the people have towards court cases. Not only do the court cases serve as entertainment, but if the suspect was found innocent, or if there was any chance that the suspect “stood in peril of a less horrible sentence,” the onlookers lost interest. Each person was only there for the “ogreish” sentence to see someone “butchered and torn asunder.” Violence and the slaughter of mankind was a pastime, so to speak, for the English people, again reiterating the harsh crime and punishment which led England into a revolution.

Dickens expresses his opinion of the sadistic English behavior upon criminals with a “disease” that occurs within the courtroom. The diseases were claimed to have “came into the court with the prisoners” and affected the “Lord Chief Justice himself.” The whole courtroom was a “disease” along with the people in it- a contagious “morbid condition of the mind” that consisted of the pleasure society felt from the vulgar treatment—as if the “entertainment” the people had towards it fueled the disease as it soon started infecting everyone.

Continuing on, Darnay is found “acquitted” which is where chapter three gets its title “Disappointment”; disappointment that the “ogreish” society does not get to see someone be “quartered”, “butchered”, or torn apart, the people then had to go on as “baffled blue flies dispersing in search of other carrion.” One man testifying, Roger Cly, who had worked for Darnay, and also the other witness testifying had known Darnay, but was “merely a coincidence”, and not a “peculiar coincidence.” The obviousness the two men portray oddly represents mysteriousness- as if the two men worked with Darnay in whatever scheme he was a part of.

The reader soon starts speculating whether another man is in on Darnay’s plans, as the character of Sydney Carton is introduced. Sydney makes unusual comments such as “it’s not so long ago since you were pretty far advanced on your way to another “making it sound as if Carton has a part in Darnay’s past such as saving him from getting the death sentence previously. At the end of chapter 4, Carton speaks to himself in a mirror, pondering whether he is envious of Darnay since he reminds Carton of what he has “fallen away from, what [he] might have been!” The very last sentence creates an image of Carton with his “hair straggling over the table” and a “long winding-sheet in the candle dripping down upon him.” The winding sheet signifies the “death” that Carton feels towards himself, being unhappy with the choices he has made in his life and where he has ended up.

In Chapter 5, Sydney Carton is referred to as a “Jackal,” which refers to “a person who performs dishonest or base deeds as the follower or accomplice of another” (dictionary.com). The importance of Carton being referred to as a jackal belittles Carton’s reputation, illustrating how Carton caters to the wants of Mr. Stryver, a “lion.” Mr. Stryver being a “lion” attributes to the power that he obtains over Carton.

The “business” that Mr. Lorry always speaks of multiple times begins to make the reader wonder if perhaps he is covering up for alternative matters that he is involved with, especially in chapter 6. Mr. Lorry speaks of having “business” with Doctor Manette “many years ago.” In the middle of the night, the business that Dr. Manette was a part of is haunts him, for he “gets up in the dead of night” and will “walk up and down” in his room. The repetition of “walking up and down” adds effect to the anxiousness that Dr. Manette exhibits. The reader then unearths the discovery of the word “DIG” engraved upon a jail cell, in which the mere discussion of this makes Mr. Manette uncomfortable. Does Mr. Manette have something to do with the word inscribed upon the wall? Does the “business” spoken of from Mr. Lorry deal with more than what he is letting on?

In the conclusion of chapter 6, the reader understands a deeper meaning of the title “Hundreds of People.” As the “rain drops” fell, “large” and “heavy,” the drops sounded like “a multitude of people” that were “in a great hurry in the streets speeding away to get shelter before the storm broke.” Being that no one was truly there, the rain sounding like people scrambling about symbolizes the upcoming war. The question asked if the “footsteps destined to come to all of us, or are [they] to divide them among [themselves]” and the last sentence of depicting how the men might “see the great crowd of people with its rush and roar bearing upon them” makes the reader wonder if perhaps the war is because of this group of people? A remark was then made by Mr. Lorry that the night could have brought “the dead out of their graves” an evident foreshadowing and clue into the true “business” the men perform.

*Tale of Two Cities--Week One

Before one begins reading Tale of Two Cities, By Charles Dickens, one must first have an understanding of what was going on pre-French Revolution. Before the French Revolution, the country of France was in a period where monarchy had corrupted which caused social and political upheaval. At the time, Louis XVI was king, but had run into a financial crisis, which weakened much of France. France “rolled with exceeding smoothness downhill” when it came to spending money, and also practicing inhumane treatments such as “sentencing a youth to have his hands cut off, his tongue torn out with pincers, and his body burned alive.” England, on the other hand, also could not “justify much national boasting” as “burglaries took place in the capital itself every night.”

With knowledge of the hardships of the two countries, the reader is introduced with a contradictory statement “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” the first ten lines of the story provide insight that even though there is “wisdom,” there is also “foolishness.” Although a country has “hope,” a country will also be filled with times of “despair.” Also, in times of “light”, comes times of “darkness.” Dickenson, through the technique of poetic lines and repetition, shows the dichotomy that each country, along with good times, will experience times of hardship.

To aid in the eerie tone of the novel, Dickenson creates an image with “steaming mist” that covers the air “like an evil spirit” that was “dense enough to shut out everything from the light.” The darkness that Dickenson creates adds to the tone and adds to the element of a gothic novel. In chapter three, Mr. Lorry depicts a town with “darkly clustered houses” in which each house and person encloses its own “secrets” and “mysteries.” Lorry also speaks of death and the mystery that goes along with death, again contributing to that of a gothic novel.

In chapter five, the reader is brought into a town in Paris on a “narrow street” where “red wine” had spilt and “stained the ground.” Being of a poor town, each person stopped in the midst of what he or she was doing to drink the spilt wine off of the ground. The frantic scurry for tasting a single drop of wine not only contributes to the poverty stricken tone of France, but the wine itself shows symbolism. The wine being “red” contributes to a connotation of blood, which adds effect to the turmoil that France is dealing with before the French Revolution, as the “time was to come, when that wine too would be spilled on the street-stones” foreshadowing the war that France is soon to encounter, in which “the stain of it would be red upon many there.”

Another clue to the foreshadowing of the war and also to add to the tone of an unprosperous community, is in the town on each shops there were merely “grim illustrations of Want.” The diction of “Want” being capitalized shows how important “wants” are to the people and how badly the people wished for more than what each obtained.

Also in chapter 5, when Mr. Lorry and Miss Monette enter the wine shop and men are speaking to the owner, Monsieur Defarge, the men refer to each other as “Jacques.” Jacques Necker was a French statesman who helped with finances while Louis XVI was king, during the time that this book took place. Jacques is known as being an affluent man during this time period, and would have became controller of finances if he was not protestant. However, because of his affluent reputation, the men referring to each other by “Jacques” shows how each of the men think they are of higher standards and more prosperous than others in the community.

In chapter 3, Mr. Lorry dreams of a “white haired man” who had died and been buried, and it was Mr. Lorry’s duty to dig the man out. The reader learns later on that Mr. Manette has white hair, and is in a condition much like the man that Mr. Lorry dreamt of, which makes the reader wonder if perhaps the man in the dream is Mr. Manette. The girl that is referred to in the dream must be Miss Manette, Mr. Manette’s daughter. The idea is confirmed more so later on when the real life meeting of Mr. Manette and Miss Manette happens much like Mr. Lorry’s dream, where Mr. Manette is confused as to who his daughter is. Lorry then feels as if he has to “dig” the man out, foreshadowing that Lorry feels as if it is his duty to help Mr. Manette “dig” him out of the emotional state he is in.

Repetition is used many times throughout the reading thus far, which aids in the ability for the reader to see the problems in both countries. The first occurrence of repetition the reader sees, is of the word “now” followed by problems in the country such as “hanging up criminals” and “burning people…by the dozen.” In Chapter three, “digging” is seen multiple times in Mr. Lorry’s dream to metaphorically show how Mr. Lorry must “dig” for the truth. The phrase “worse than useless” is used later on in the story, which again adds to the negative events taking place during this time.

*The Scarlet Letter--Week Six.

As The Scarlet Letter comes to an ending, the characters are again brought back into the scene at the beginning of the novel- the scaffold. Contrary to before, this time at the scaffolding is a day of celebration, as Election Day begins with the “harmony of drum and clarion” and people celebrating all around. Hester is dressed in the same “clad garment of coarse gray and cloth” just as she has been “for seven years past.” Hester’s clothing “had the effect of making her fade personally out of sight and outline; while, again, the scarlet letter brought her back from this twilight indistinctness” and makes the reader wonder, yet again, why Hester wears clothing that makes the A look more apparent? Not until the end does the reader fully understand why Hester insists on wearing the scarlet letter and making it stand out. When Pearl leaves Hester and Hester is left to live by herself in the forest, she still continues to wear the letter, even though Dimmesdale has confessed and Hester could have taken the letter off long ago. Hester was the strongest character in the novel, as she portrayed self-confidence in not trying to be anything that she wasn’t. Hester was the only character in the story that lived up to who she truly was, therefore the A became a part of who she was. Without the A, Hester would be left with “bitterness wherewith she had been drugged, as with a cordial of intensest potency.” The metaphor used to compare “wine of life” with the scarlet letter shows how Hester would be left “bitter” without the letter, as the A is what has made Hester who she is.

The theme of night and day/ light and darkness is associated with Dimmesdale and Hester’s relationship. At nighttime, first on the scaffolding, and then later on in the forest, is the only time that Dimmesdale and Hester are truly happy with each other—when in a completely isolated area. During the daylight, Dimmesdale “seemed so remote from her own sphere, and utterly beyond her reach.” During the daylight, Hester missed the “dim forest, with its little dell of solitude, and love, and aguish, where sitting hand in hand, they had mingled their sad and passionate talk.” The darkness is the only time the two can truly be happy, because Hester and Dimmesdale are isolated from the view of the public, where they are concealed from the sin each committed. However, when in the daylight, the entire world is looking upon each one and not only the sin they committed, but the sin they are afraid to admit.

Dimmesdale’s appearance had “exhibited such energy he was seen in the gait and hair with which he kept his pace in the procession. There was no feebleness of step, as at other times; his frame was not bent; nor did his hand rest ominously upon his heart.” However, Dimmesdale’s change in appearance was “not of the body”, but was rather because of “spiritual” reasonings, foreshadowing the confession of Dimmesdale. After Dimmesale’s “best speech”, he stands upon the scaffolding with Hester and Pearl and finally confesses his sin. After the confession, Pearl finally gives Dimmesdale his long awaited kiss, symbolizing that Pearl is free of her “demonic” ways after the truth has finally been told.

Chillingworth continues to exhibit the personality of “The Black Man” as Dimmesdale tries to confess and Chillingworth attempts to convince Dimmesdale by guilting him with the threat that he will “bring infamy on [his] sacred profession.” Chillingworth isn’t stopping Dimmesdale from confessing for his own good, but because Chillingworth doesn’t want to be embarrassed. Also, without being able to aid Dimmesdale, Chillingworth is no longer classified as a “leech”; therefore, Chillingworth dies, as he no longer has the “blood” to suck out of anyone for his own well being.