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The Importance Of Landscape Throughout Hard Times By Charles Dickens Essay

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Alicia Gonzalez
Professor Richard C. Smith
English 150
8 October 2016 The importance of landscape throughout Hard Times by Charles Dickens is seen in various locations that help to thread the novel together. When new scenes are presented to the reader, we are often given explicit details of the characters’ surrounding and current environment to draw us into that particular moment. The city is mainly described in a more negative light, with words such as ugly and monotonous. In contrast, the countryside (away from the hustle of the working town) is portrayed in such a way that it feels like a pure or sacred space, free of the blemishes of the working town. Dickens creates an underlying importance with how he describes the city versus how he describes the countryside, being that the latter becomes the place of death for one of the main characters Stephen Blackpool. The city of Coketown is a town introduced as an uncompromising, brutal, and fearful place defined by its work and industrialization. The description that we are given of Coketown makes it clear that it is not a place of enjoyment, pleasure, or nature. It is heavily characterized by its repetitive and endless labor. Coketown is therefore essential as a setting displaying the negative aspects of industrialization. However, there is additional significance in the negative portrayal of Coketown. The idea of monotony in the industrial city is one that is returned to several times throughout the novel. Dickens writes

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