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Charles Dickens Use Of Setting

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Setting Authors have tough jobs. They have to express their purpose, themes, a plot, characters, and development, along with their setting, in an interesting and effective way. Some of the best stories and authors can express a setting very cleverly and creatively. Two examples are The Signalman by Charles Dickens and The Meteor by John Wyndham. Along with developing the rest of their story, Wyndham and Dickens use hidden descriptive language in a steady progression to paint a picture (the setting) for the reader. The Signalman is a story about a train worker experiencing supernatural events that he relates to a skeptical passerby. Dickens uses tiny detailing to evoke a dark and forbidding scene, where the signalman works. For example, on the pathway to the patrol box, there is “a dripping-wet wall of jagged stone” (19). The use of the wall elicits a cold, closed-off, scary setting to the reader. …show more content…

At the beginning of the writing, there is a dialogue between two main characters, Graham Toffts and Sally Fontain, about the possible cause of a big bang that rattled the house (171). Although at first the dialogue seems insignificant, it is actually a major clue. Graham indirectly proposed that the cause of the bang was a bomb (171). Along with other specific references throughout, the bomb implies that the story is set during World War 2. This is important to one of the themes. Wyndham also uses the perspective of the aliens (who are sent to explore new planets) to describe the setting. For example, the character Onn shows that they are on Earth in his journal: “It shines like a blue pearl” (173). He also describes the outhouse the aliens land in, which was ironic, because as a result of their puny size they had mistaken it for what Earth was like (177). Using all these descriptions and discreet signs, Wyndham establishes

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