A Tale Of Two Cities

Alizatul Aisyah binti Mohamad Ali Maznah binti Ishak Nur Suraya Ashikin binti Isa

Themes A Tale Of Two Cities

y Perspective

The novel's opening statement "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" sets the tone for a story in which a given circumstance is perceived as good or bad depending upon the point of view. Jerry Cruncher, for instance, considers his nocturnal occupation a viable source of income to provide for his hungry family but Mr. Lorry views it as an abhorrent practice worthy of censure. Under scrutiny Cruncher admits that the sights of the bloody revolution in Paris have convinced him that such an occupation is immoral and he resolves to give up the practice. The revolution itself is believed to be an abomination by the exiled aristocrats that meet at Tellson's whereas the peasantry, personified by the mender of roads and the woodsawyer, see it as an opportunity for empowerment and revenge. Most significantly, Doctor Manette's Bastille manuscript reveals that during his years in prison the doctor believed that the whole Evrmonde clan should be destroyed but when his daughter has wedded an Evrmonde he is resolute in his determination to save him. The litany of wrongs suffered by the French peasants including the horrible execution of Gaspard serves to create sympathy for events such as the storming of the Bastille. After the revolution turns bloody, however, the reader's sympathies are transferred to the doomed aristocrats awaiting execution.

y Class Struggle

The overarching theme of the novel is the struggle between those who have power and privilege and those who do not. At the beginning of the story, the French aristocrats exercise complete and more-or-less unfettered freedom to persecute and deprive those of the lower classes. This fact is harshly illustrated in Doctor Manette's prison manuscript which details how one of the Evrmonde brothers utilized his medieval privilege of harnessing a vassal to a cart and driving him like an animal to his death. It is also shown by Jerry Cruncher's insistence that the strict and violent sentence of quartering is "barbarous" and being told by the sanctimonious bank clerk that the law is just simply because it exists. Later, when the tables have turned, it is the peasants who use their newly discovered power to harshly persecute the aristocrats through mass executions and imprisonment. Darnay notes when he is first interred in La Force prison that the rough looking men are in charge and the prisoners are polite and civil. Jerry Cruncher is deeply affected by the revolution and he more than any other English character in the novel would have reason to be inspired by the uprising of the French poor. But as a good Englishman, his avowal that its bloody sights have caused him to reconsider his grave robbing occupation indicates that he, at least, recognizes the futility in avenging violence with violence.

y Self-Sacrifice

The novel's theme of self-sacrifice is best exemplified in the character of Sydney Carton whose willingness to give his own life for Lucie's happiness creates the means for Charles Darnay's salvation. He makes this willingness known well before the dangers of the revolution overtake the family when he says to Lucie: "If my career were of that bettter kindd that there was any opportunity or capacity of sacrifice in it, I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those dear to you" (149). This theme is furthered by the seamstress who accompanies Carton to the Guillotine who hopes that by her death her cousin, a long-suffering member of the peasant class, will profit by the bloody revolution. Charles Darnay is willing to sacrifice his own happienss when he returns to France in an attempt to save the life of his former servant. Furthermore, Doctor Manette is shown to sacrifice his own mental health when he suffers a relapse of his prison-born derangement by allowing the nephew of his nemesis to marry his daughter

y Prison Reform

As in many of Dickens' stories, prisons figure prominently in this novel. Imprisonment's ill effects upon the health of inmates is shown in Doctor Manette's mental illness and the pitiful state of shoemaking labor he is reduced to in order to survive. The oppressiveness of penal time is illustrated in the litany of "eighteen years" that Mr. Lorry dreams before retrieving the doctor, the count of the brutally tortured woman who lies bound and repeats her 12 count monologue until her death, and Charles Darnay's marking the hours by the chimes of the church bell. Dickens' descriptions of the harsh punishments given for minor offenses in both France and England connects the two regimes and serves as an implicit warning to Dickens' fellow countrymen that a bloody revolution is the result of wrongs done in the name of the people. The clerk at Tellson's fails to appreciate this relationship when Jerry offers his opinion that the punishment of quartering is "barbarous" and the clerk, echoing the sentiments of his government, he advises Jerry to "leave the law to take of itself". The clerk's matter-of-fact observation that "We all have our various ways of gaining a livelihood. Some of us have damp ways and some of us have dry ways" (57) reveals that the clerk has not considered that those whose ways are damp, and illegal, would want to change the prevailing mode of punishment.

"Recalled to Life"
y

Resurrection appears for the first time when Mr. Lorry replies to the message carried by Jerry Cruncher with the words "Recalled to Life". Resurrection also appears during Mr. Lorry's coach ride to Dover, as he constantly ponders a hypothetical conversation with Dr. Manette: ("Buried how long?" "Almost eighteen years." ... "You know that you are recalled to life?" "They tell me so.") He believes he is helping with Dr. Manette's revival, and imagines himself "digging" Dr. Manette up from his grave.

Jerry is also part of the recurring theme: he himself is involved in death and resurrection in way that the reader does not yet know. The first piece of foreshadowing comes in his remark to himself: "You'd be in a blazing bad way, if recalling to life was to come into fashion, Jerry!" The black humour of this statement becomes obvious only much later on. Five years later, one cloudy and very dark night (in June 1780[15]), Mr. Lorry reawakens the reader's interest in the mystery by telling Jerry it is "Almost a night ... to bring the dead out of their graves". Jerry responds firmly that he has never seen the night do that.[16]

y The opposite of resurrection is of course death.

Death appears quite frequently in the novel as well as resurrection. Dickens is angered that in both France and England, courts hand out death sentences for insignificant crimes. In France, peasants are even put to death without any trial, at the whim of a noble. The Marquis tells Darnay with pleasure that "[I]n the next room (my bedroom), one fellow ... was poniarded on the spot for professing some insolent delicacy respecting his daughterhis daughter!"[17]

Darkness and light

y As is common in English literature, good and evil are symbolize

with light and darkness. In particular, Lucie Manette is often associated with light and Madame Defarge with darkness. y Lucie meets her father for the first time in a room kept by the Defarges:." Lucie's hair symbolize joy as she winds "the golden thread that bound them all together". She is adorned with "diamonds, very bright and sparkling", and symbolic of the happiness of the day of her marriage. y Darkness represents uncertainty, fear and peril. It is dark when Mr. Lorry rides to Dover; it is dark in the prisons; dark shadows follow Madame Defarge; dark, gloomy doldrums disturb Dr. Manette; his capture and captivity are shrouded in darkness; the Marquiss estate is burned in the dark of night; Jerry Cruncher raids graves in the darkness; Charles's second arrest also occurs at night. Both Lucie and Mr. Lorry feel the dark threat that is Madame Defarge. "That dreadful woman seems to throw a shadow on me," remarks Lucie. Although Mr. Lorry tries to comfort her, "the shadow of the manner of these Defarges was dark upon himself". Madame Defarge is "like a shadow over the white road", the snow symbolising purity and Madame Defarge's darkness corruption. Dickens also compares the dark colour of blood to the pure white snow: the blood takes on the shade of the crimes of its shedders.