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Tale Of Two Cities Inhumanity Essay

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Man’s Inhumanity Towards His Fellow Man
The French Revolution, beginning in 1789, was a time of great change brought about by great necessity as a result of an even greater suppression and division of classes. A Tale of Two Cities, written by Charles Dickens, was published in 1859 as a reflective novel about the influential and relatively recent historical event. Shown in both the novel and in historical facts, the Revolution begins as an eruption of built up oppression over hundreds of years, but progresses into a more complex social conflict. Switching back and forth between England and France, it is evident that the nobility sees their status as something to be coveted and used for segregation, as well as mistreatment, against those of the lower class who never have hope or help in gaining status. Dickens develops the idea of man’s inhumanity towards his fellow man through the spiteful beheading of an innocent peasant seamstress, Monseigneur Evremonde’s selfish killing of two innocent siblings, and Madame Defarge’s rapacious need for the Evremonde’s demise. The poor, innocent seamstress, portraying all those wrongfully murdered because of corruption following the uprising, is unfairly imprisoned and beheaded, even though she is part of the same class as her oppressors. Early in the novel, Dickens foreshadows the future state of France by saying, “Those who had been greedy with the staves of the cask, had acquired a tigerish smear about the mouth. One joker…

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