Hard Times – Charles Dickens Essay

Charles Dickens' Hard Times and David Lodge's Nice Work ----“Fact, fact, fact, everywhere in the material aspect of the town; fact, fact, fact everywhere in the immaterial.” – Charles Dickens In the early 1851, London staged the Great Exhibition to show the world, the achievements and inventions of the Industrial Revolution. Many people believed that this showed how much better, safer and healthier Britain was than its neighbours in Europe. People living in mansions amid lawns and fountains, with horse drawn carriages certainly felt that life couldn’t be better. However behind the publicity and the royal occasions there was another England, not so glorious.

In Book the First: Sowing, Dickens introduces the destructiveness of the wrong kind of education on innocent minds. The schoolmaster Mr. Gradgrind refuses to face reality by insisting on addressing Sissy Jupe by her formal name and changing Mr. Jupe’s occupation to one less involved with “fancy” (Dickens 7-8). The classroom, “a plain, bare, monotonous vault” and Mr. Gradgrind’s rigid, square, and dry appearance reflect the stringent, detached teachings of his philosophy (Dickens 6). The name Gradgrind epitomizes what his beliefs have made of him: a “fact machine,” a grinder of fact. In Chapter 2 “Murdering the Innocents”, Dickens compares Gradgrind to a loaded canon “prepared to blow [the children] clean out of the regions of childhood at one discharge” (Dickens 7). The metaphor reiterates the damage Gradgrind’s philosophy can cause, including slaughtering the imagination of children. Gradgrind’s ideology sickens his wife, a “little, thin, white, pink−eyed bundle of shawls, of surpassing feebleness,

- Pip begins to treat Biddy as an inferior as he feels he is in a

Adversity. A condition marked by misfortune, calamity, or distress. Adversity in most conditions is considered to be something should never happen. Adversity is the struggles of the poor and the homeless. Adversity is a hurricane and a tsunami destroying lives and homes. Adversity is, however, a rewarding experience. Not fun, not good, but rewarding. In the face of adversity, people tend to develop their character by uncovering new talents, making themselves stronger, and by becoming more understanding and compassionate.

Charles Dickens had a way of writing amazing characters. He was known for his passion in writing and his way of words. A man once said that Charles was the greatest story writer of all time. He was able to craft fully make a character that was both memorable and taught you a valuable lesson on how to be a better you. In this book I spotted a few characters that stood out to me. It was either their courage or loyalty that stuck out the most. The biggest lesson I wish to share from these characters that I learned in this novel is that it is important to study a person and get to know them before you make assumptions on their life based on their outward appearance.

In the book, Dickens portrays the people as having the hatred necessary for mob violence. Immediately, the book shows us an example how such hatred was created. When a youth’s hands were chopped off, “tongue torn out with pincers” and “his body burned alive” it shows the violence and torture that led to the French revolution. The youth represents the weak in French society

English author Charles Dickens has written many well known novels such as Oliver Twist and A Christmas Carol, of which both have a recurring theme: the expectations of society. During the Victorian Era, England was over populated and had terrible living conditions, with an enormous gap between the rich and the poor. Generally, people during the Victorian Era were not allowed to talk about things such as sex and crime, and had to live by strict social rules set by society. With the social disparities came many other concerns as well. Charles Dickens eloquently displays issues such as child abuse, prostitution, poverty, and crime in such a way that readers are able to understand and view them from diverse perceptions. By creating characters that have been through hell and back, Charles Dickens executes a great display of struggle especially within the lower classes. In the works of Charles Dickens, the wide variety of social issues of the Victorian Era are presented in a way such that readers are able to see specific issues from the perspectives of people from contrasting social classes, while speaking from his own experience through the characters. By doing so, Dickens is able to compare and contrast issues deemed controversial in the Victorian Era, especially regarding the disadvantaged.

Charles Dickens is one of the most renowned British writers with well-known and widespread work. Dickens was born in England in 1812 and died in 1870. During this time, Victorian England experienced an Industrial Revolution, which impacted his life tremendously. New factories and industrial machinery changed many lives of the lower class citizens. The family grew up impoverished and struggled to maintain a good lifestyle. The family’s financial situation was strained as John Dickens, Charles’s father, spent money that the family didn’t have. These societal factors were influential in Charles Dickens’s life, and the same themes present themselves in his works. When an author creates a work, frequently themes of their life events are incorporated into the theme of the book, consciously or unconsciously. Victorian Age industrial-influenced strife was a common theme in Dickens’s life and presented itself throughout Dickens’s books.

Charles Dickens, the greatest novelist of the Victorian period, is well known for his skillful use of irony in moments of coincidence and chance within his stories. In one of his most famous books, A Tale of Two Cities, he showcases this skill by forming small connections between various characters throughout the story. These minute connections end up playing important, plot-twisting roles in the story. Dickens’ use of coincidence and chance weaves and enhances the plot, making readers consider how all of the precise details come into play as the plot thickens and shows that even the smallest detail can change a person’s fate. Dickens’ proficient use of irony through chance is shown through detailed character descriptions, the

The French Revolution mainly took place in the city of Paris during the late 1700’s. The Revolution did not only affect the people of France, but also the citizens of England as well. The French Revolution is known as one of the most brutal and inhumane periods of history. If one studied the beliefs and views of the people involved at the time, one would see a reoccurring theme of “ being recalled to life”. Born from the world of literature, Charles Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities takes a deeper look at the culture of the late 1700’s, in both England and France. Dickens uses the character of Lucie Manette to further examine one of the major themes presented in the novel, consisting of the belief of one being

The fictional novel, Hard Times by Charles Dickens, concentrates on the Gradgrind family; of Mr. Thomas Gradgrind, his daughter Louisa, and son Thomas Jr. A major theme of friendship is portrayed in the books through the character of Mr. Gradgrind as he struggles with the idea of friendship between other characters. According to the Nicomachean Ethics, by Aristotle, it explains a detailed account of friendship and what it is to be a friend to others. In comparing the character Mr. Gradgrind in Hard Times, to the 5 basis of friendship written in the Nicomachean Ethics, Mr. Gradgrind cannot be a friend to others because he does not use emotion but rather factual evidence in his actions toward his children. The novel confirms Aristotle’s view of friendship with Mr. Gradgrind, proving that the standards need to be set up in order to have a proper friendship and relationship with others.

Charles Dickens’s novel Hard Times critiques the use of extreme utilitarianism as an acceptable means to governing a society in which citizens are able to lead happy, productive, flourishing lives. “Just the facts,”19th century English utilitarianism argued, are all one needs to flourish. Those answers that we can arrive at by way of mathematical, logical reasoning are all needed to live a full human life. Hard Times shows however that a “just the facts” philosophy creates a community inhospitable to the needs of one another, a society nearly void of human compassion, and one lacking in morality. Underlying the novel’s argument is the Aristotelian concept that the primary purpose of government is to

Charles Dickens is one of the most influential writers in history and was “born in Landport, now part of Portsmouth, on February 7th, 1812”(Priestly 5). Despite being the successful writer that he was in life, Dickens had very humble beginnings and because his Father, John Huffman Dickens, “lacked the money to support his family adequetly” , Dickens lived in poverty through out most of his childhood (Collins). Matters only got worse, however, when Dickens’s Father had to “spen[d] time in prison for debt” causing Dickens to have to “work in a London factory pasting labels on bottles of shoe polish” (Collins). It was a horrible experience for him, but it also helped him to no doubt feel pity for the poor, which is

In Hard Times, Dickens presents life philosophies of three men that directly contradict each other. James Harthouse sees one’s actions in life as meaningless since life is so short. Mr. Gradgrind emphasizes the importance of fact and discourages fantasy since life is exactly as it was designed to be. Mr. Slearly exhibits that “all work and no play” will make very dull people out of all of us. He also proclaims that one should never look back on one’s life and regret past actions. Dickens is certainly advocating Sleary’s life philosophy because the subjects of the other two philosophies led depressing and unhappy lives. This is made clear when Louisa realises her childhood of fact without fancy has ruined her, when Tom’s life falls apart after leaving his father’s home in rejection of his strict parenting, and when Mr. Gradgrind himself realises the faults in his own philosophy and devotes the rest of his life to virtue and charity.

Explore some of the ways in which Dickens’ attitudes to Victorian society are presented in the opening chapter of Great Expectations.