A Tale of Two Cities
Charles Dickens was born in 1912 in England in a very poor family. The hardships that he experienced in his childhood have reflected in many of Dickens novels including such classics as Oliver Twist and Great Expectations. Dickens writing style was full of natural humor. Even as he portrayed his characters going through tough times, he gave them certain quirks and mannerisms which brought humor to the characters even as the plot had them go through the most trying times. Unfortunately, owing to the serious nature of the subject matter, A Tale of Two Cities does not allow its characters to have this funny side. But that does not stop Dickens from using sarcasm such as in the opening chapter when France is said to entertain herself with with such humane achievements as sentencing a youth to have his hands cut off, his tongue torn out with pincers, and his body burned alive, because he had not kneeled down in the rain to do honour to a dirty procession of monks which passed within his view, at a distance of some fifty or sixty yards (Dickens, Book 1, Ch.1, para 4). With this kind of sarcastic observations laced throughout the narrative, A Tale of Two Cities presents a realistic picture of the lives of common men in France during the late eighteenth century and uses this backdrop to tell the love story of its three main characters.
Summary
The novel starts in 1775, at a time when crime has become a way of life in both England and in France. The readers learn that a certain Jarvis Lorry of Tellsons Bank is on his way from London to Paris to bring back to life a man, Doctor Manette, who has been presumed dead for eighteen years. Apparently, Doctor Manette was alive but kept in prison for eighteen years without any charge and had only now been released. At a hotel in Dover, Lorry meets Lucie Manette, Doctor Manettes daughter and daughter and together they go to Paris, where the doctor is kept hidden by the owner of a wine shop. During his long imprisonment, Manette had lost some of his mental faculties and thought of himself as a shoemaker. Lorry asks Lucie to nurse back Manette to life through love, duty, rest and comfort.
Five years later, Manette, Lucie and Lorrie are summoned to bear witness in a treason case against Charles Darnay, who is charged with selling English secrets to the French king. During the hearing, the defense lawyers assistant Sydney Carton, points out his striking resemblance to Darnay. This puts reasonable doubt in jurys minds who then acquit Darnay. During the trial, both Carton and Darnay get attracted to Lucie. Carton is an idle and unpromising man who spends his days drinking. Darnay, on the other hand, is revealed to be the nephew of Marquis Evremonde, a rich, French nobleman, who despises poor people. Darnay however, renounces his inheritance since he does not want to act shamefully by injuring people who come between him and his pleasure, as the Evremonde have been doing. Even after the Marquis is murdered by one of the revolutionaries, Darnay does not go back to France to claim his title.
A year later, Darnay approaches Manette to get his permission to court Lucie. After Manette gives the permission, Darnay proceeds to tell him his true identity but Manette stops him and asks him to reveal his secret only after he has won Lucies love. Around the same time, Carton confesses to Lucie that he loves her but since he has wasted away his life beyond salvation, he is no longer worthy of her. He, however, does say that he would give his life to ensure Lucies happiness.
As this love triangle is being played out in England, France is getting ready for the revolution. The wine-shop owner, Monsieur Defarge and his wife Madame Defarge emerge as the foremost leaders of the revolution. Madame Defarge is always seen knitting and it turns out that she is knitting a register of the names of those whom the revolutionaries intend to kill. As the peasants prepare for the revolution they continue to keep the pretense of being simple subjects of the monarchy by feigning allegiance to the crown.
When Madame Defarge finds out that the nephew of the Marquis, Darnay, is about to marry Lucie, she knits his name into his registry as well. Meanwhile, in London, on the morning of their wedding, Darnay reveals his true identity to Manette. The knowledge causes Manette to have a relapse as he once again starts making shoes. However, he does not stop the wedding and Lucie and Darney get married and leave for their honeymoon. After they are gone, the Manettes housekeeper, Miss Pross and Lorry become greatly worried about Manette and his relapse into his incoherent state. They keep a close eye on him for the next nine days, but on the tenth day, Manette is back to normal, much to their relief. Lorry convinces Manette to get rid of shoemakers bench and the tools for Lucies sake and Manette agrees.
As the years go by, Lucie gives birth to a daughter and a son. The daughter is named little Lucie while the son dies young. Meanwhile, by 1789, the French revolution has reached its height and its affects can be felt even in London. Many rich people in France and increasingly sending their belongings to Tellsons Banks London branch for safe keeping. Lorry receives a letter for Marquis Evremonde, but he has no idea who Evremonde is. Darnay pretends that he knows Evremonde and takes the letter from Lorry promising him to deliver it to the right person. The letter requests him to urgently come back France. Darnay decides to go to France hoping that he would be able to do something good for the country and leaves after writing a letter to Lucie and Manette. However, as soon as he reaches France, he is captured and imprisoned in solitary confinement. When Lucie finds out, she along with Doctor Manette goes to France and asks Lorry, who is taking care of the French branch of Tellsons Bank, to help them. After learning from Lorry that the mob is planning to execute the prisoners, Manette goes into the streets and lets himself known as a former prisoner of Bastille prison. This immediately gets him recognition and he is able to secure the job of the prison physician.
At Darnays trial, he is acquitted when he proves that he had turned down the Marquis title and had nothing to do with the wealth of his forefathers. However, Madame Defarge has a personal grudge against Darnay and gets him rearrested. At the second trial it is revealed that when Manette was in prison, he had written a letter which charged Darneys father and uncle with raping and killing a young woman and her brother. It is decided that Darnay must be executed to pay for the sins of his ancestors. It is also revealed that Madame Defarge is the surviving sister of the dead brother and sister and that she is out to take revenge on all those who were directly or indirectly responsible for her familys death.
Meanwhile, Carton decides to save Darnay and enlists the help of Barsad, an English spy, by threatening to reveal his true identity if he does not help. As he prepares to rescue Darnay, he goes to the wine shop where he learns that Madame Defage is planning to have Lucie and her daughter killed as well. Carton gives his paper to Lorry and tells him to get Lucie and her daughter out of France the next morning. He then goes to the prison, where he tricks Darnay into changing clothes with him. He then drugs him and asks Barsad to take him to Telsons Bank, while he himself takes Darnays place in the prison cell. The next day, Lorry, Lucie, Darnay, and their daughter flee France. Madame Defarge goes to Lucies apartments to gather evidence which would help her get Lucie executed. However, she finds Miss Pross there, who engages in a fight with Madame Defarge. The battle ends in Miss Pross shooting and killing Madame Defarge. Meanwhile, Carton, who is mistaken by the guards for Darney, is taken for execution and in the final scene of the novel, he dies by guillotine, as he wishes long life and good health to Lucie, Darney, Lorry and Manette.
Character Analysis
There is a certain duality about A tale of Two Cities, which is also manifested in the main characters of the novels. Wile Lucie is shown as a tender, loving person who can bring people back from dead, Madame Defarge is shown as a cruel women who has only agenda, revenge. On the other hand, Darnay, is the son and inheritor of great wealth but renounces it to live a dignified and comfortable life of a tutor in London while Carton is a lawyer who has wasted his life to drinking. However, despite being seen as a man of unpromising idleness who cannot seem to generate any interest even in his own life, towards the end, he comes across as the most heroic of all the characters. He had promised Lucie that he would give his life to ensure that the person she loves will always remain by her side. In the last chapter, he keeps his promise when he happily and willingly dies by the guillotine so that Lucie can be with Darnay, her husband and the father of her daughter. Thus Carton, who throughout the novel comes across as a good-for-nothing alcoholic turns out to be the most important character in the novel.
Madame Defarges character is gripped by an unquenchable bloodlust. Although we learn that her being the de-facto leader of the revolutionaries is mainly because of the atrocities that she had suffered at the hands of the Marquis, we soon realize that her need for revenge far exceeds the wrong that had been done to her and her family. Just as in the case of Carton, Madame Defarges true nature is revealed only towards the concluding chapters when she plans and plots to kill not only Darnay but also Lucie and her entire family so as to seek her vengeance. Dickens prevents the readers from sympathizing with Madame Defarge by showing her as a cruel, manipulative woman, who though a product of oppression by the aristocracy, has reached a stage where her need for revenge is no longer human.
Charles Darnay and Lucie Manette are both simple, trusting people who want to do good to others. Because they are both inherently good, they also believe others to be good as well. This makes their characters uni-dimensional and lacking in depth.
Symbolisms
One of the most important symbol in the novel is when the wine cask breaks outside the wine shop and all the citizens try to get a drop of the wine in whichever way possible. This lust for wine is symbolic in many ways. On the face of it, it symbolizes the extreme drudgery in which the French peasants live. But when seen in the context of the entire novel, it also is foreshadow for what is to come. Just as the peasants could not control themselves when the wine cask broke, once the revolution broke across the French countryside, the peasants were no longer in control of whom they murdered with many innocent peasants dying along with the rich aristocracy.
Another symbol is in the footsteps that Lucie hears while sitting in her parlor. She says that is sounds like the footsteps of people who are about to come in her life. As the French Revolution draws near, the footsteps also become louder and we soon realize that these are the footsteps of all the revolutionaries who will soon impact Lucie and her family in many ways.
Yet another symbol used by Dickens is the knitting by Madame Defarge, The knitting soon comes to represent Madame Defarge herself. And while knitting me seem like a harmless chore, Madame Defarges knitting is in fact a registry of all the people she intends to have killed. In this sense, the knitting symbolizes simple people who may seem harmless but have the potential to do just about anything, including carrying out a revolution which can change the very character of a nation.
Conclusion
Dickens A Tale of Two Cities is a historical fiction. However, Dickens has taken care to ensure that his facts are historically correct. The novel delves into the lives of the common people before and during the French Revolution. As such, it gives us a good sense of the lives of the common people and the atrocities that they had to undergo which finally led to the Revolution. Reading A Tale of Two Cities can give us a better understanding of the causes of the French Revolution and the dynamics of mob mentality which resulted in the Revolution becoming so bloody.
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