Symbolism of the Torch within A Christmas Carol: An Informative Essay

In the story, A Christmas Carol, the torch that Christmas Present Carol carries around is symbolic. It appears in the part of the story where Christmas Present comes and brings him and Scrooge to the Cratchit family home. This torch represents many things that make you feel nice. The torch that the Ghost of Christmas Present uses has a very similar meaning to the symbol of a flame in the modern world.

While watching and reading A Christmas Carol you could see the light beaming from the torch the Christmas Present carried. This brings a heart-warming feeling to mind and makes you feel in a way better mood. The torch is a heart-warming because it is reassuring and a good vibe to have the torch around. On a cold winter day, families gather around a fireplace and cuddle near loved ones. In real life, people’s hearts get touched because when they gather around a warm fire people snuggle together and feel happy.

Hope is everywhere. Another reason that these two are alike is because of hope. The torch is a sign of belief for Scrooge and his journey to be a changed man. If the torch is lit up then Scrooge has the faith to continue with his amazing journey because the torch brings out the best in everyone. An example of a flame being used as a source of hope is when the light/power goes out. The only source of light is a flame on a candle. Everyone huddles around the candle as their only hope until the darkness succumbs everything.

During the scene involving the torch, the Ghost of Christmas Present uses the torch to “sprinkle kindness” or goodwill to others. This torch makes people happy and put the quarreling to the side. The flame as a whole has the same meaning because of the earlier mentioned points. People in general when they are in one of the other two scenarios mentioned earlier aren’t devastated or upset, they are happy. They are happy the get to be near family and friends and having a lasting happy moment.

Overall, the torch is happy, warm-hearting, and a sign of hope just like a flame is. They both connect in many different ways and have a symbolic relation to each other.

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An Analysis of Metaphors in a Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

“A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens, is a story that is rich in metaphors that ultimately questions the morals and ethics of the author’s society during the time of his life, the industrial revolutionized society. In the story, the main character, Ebenezer Scrooge, is a greedy, rich accountant who is visited by his old business partner ghost, Jacob Marley.

Marley’s ghost tells Scrooge that he may face a penalty of becoming a lost soul if he continues to value money more than anything else in his life. He also foretells that Scrooge will be visited by three other ghosts that will give him the chance to redeem himself, and he can break an iron chain of greed that he has woven. Each time a ghost visits Scrooge, he will become more aware of the failures of the society he lives in. The ghosts will also let Scrooge see his contributions to those failures.

As Dickens writes the story of the three visits, we are able to out more about Scrooge’s inner self-character. We learn this about him as he finds out about his own fellow man and his community. The crux of the story is alluded to in the ingenious metaphors Dickens creeates to illustrate his own reflection on Nineteenth Century society.

In the beginning of the story, Scrooge and his assistant Bob Cratchit are working at Scrooge’s counting house on a very cold night, Christmas Eve. Scrooge’s offices are nearly freezing, because of the dreadful weather. They depend on using coal to keep warm. Scrooge is satisfied with a very small fire that he barely keeps going. More than that he thinks is unnecessary warmth. On the other hand, Bob Cratchit’s fire is nothing but one dying morsel of coal. “Scrooge had a very small fire, but his clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal.”

The irony in only using a small piece of coal is that they both had two entirely different reasons for not using more coal. Bob Cratchit is Scrooge’s impoverished assistant, who can’t afford to buy more coal to kindle up warmth in his office. If he had enough money to improve his working condition, he would. On the other hand, Scrooge had more than enough money to buy coal for his office and Bob’s. He didn’t find that necessary. Dickens makes reference to this as he shows how Scrooge doesn’t find it necessary to build up more warmth in his office, or even to offer to keep his assistant’s office warm, when he writes “But he (Bob Cratchit) couldn’t replenish it (the fire), for Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to part.”

The situation is much deeper than it appears. Dickens has not only created a spiteful and stingy character, but he creates a Scrooge whose very body is cold. The fact that Scrooge doesn’t mind that his office is cold reveals that he is both physically and mentally a cold person. Throughout literature the use of hot and cold plays as two basic metaphors for love and hate: loneliness. Scrooge doesn’t need warmth as a result of being a malevolent and bitter person. He doesn’t have family or friends to share his love and heart with, so he developed into a person who was numb to his own warm feelings. The only emotions that are left are the bitter ones he has for his society.

Dickens uses Marley’s chains as a metaphor as well. We should pay attention to what Marley and Scrooge were known for. Scrooge and Marley were both concerned about their money more than anything else that Dickens writes about. The two were so concerned about earning money, that the two didn’t care how they got it. Each of them wanted to be alone. The chains that were “forged in life” by Marley were chains of guilt and sin. These chains were fashioned while Marley made money at other people’s expenses, and were linked out of his lack of concern for what he did in life. Marley, like Scrooge, knew well of the poverty most people suffered. Their sins were that they showed no sympathy for unfortunate people. They both hid their sympathy in order to repress their guilt.

Dickens writes more about Marley’s greed when he describes Marley. “His body transparent: so that Scrooge, observing him, and looking through his waistcoat, could see the two buttons on his coat behind.” “Scrooge had often heard it said that Marley had no bowels, but he had never believed it until now.” And “the very texture of the folded kerchief bound about its head and chin, which wrapper he had not observed before “Dickens has illustrated a phantom who one can see right through, has nothing let in his body, and needs a handkerchief to keep his jaw from dropping “down upon his breast!”

When examining the different elements that made up Marley’s Ghost, it becomes clear Dickens was amplified how greedy Marley really was. The bandage that Marley must keep wrapped around his head is the first connection to greed. As a part of his punishment, Marley needs the bandage wrapped around his head or his mouth will drop to his chest. It symbolizes how Marley consumed things without stopping, everything that entered his possession. Having no bowels is a way of saying that nothing left Marley’s possession. Dickens got across that Marley let everything in, but gavenothing.

In addition to Scrooge being cold both physically and mentally, there is the matter of fog that seems to pursue him like the rats that followed the Pied Piper of Hamlin. Wherever Scrooge goes, Dickens manages to strengthen his description of Scrooge as being surrounded with a gathering of deep, endless fog. This is more than a descriptive tool, but also a deep metaphor that sums up what’s wrong with Scrooge. The fog serves as a wall for the character. It is not only a blinding vapor, but also a blanket that shelters him from other people. It keeps him separate and remote from the rest of the world he travels about day to day.

Ultimately, Scrooge is charged with creating the fog. He keeps himself away from the world, even though the world reaches out him. The fog isolates him from the warmth of human compassion, from himself and others around him. This is evident when Dickens writes, “Foggier yet, and colder! Piercing, searching, biting cold. Even when Scrooge was approached by Christmas carolers, he seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog and even more congenial frost.”

In this sense, Dickens used the fog to act as a door that slammed after the singer left. It covered everything around Scrooge’s office including the keyhole. It isolated Scrooge from the outside world, and kept him in the place he loved most, his office. “Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened so, that people ran about with flaring links, proffering their services to go before horses in carriages, and conduct them on their way.” “All he could make out was, that was still very foggy and extremely cold, and that there was no noise of people running to and fro, and making great stir, as there unquestionably would have been if night had beaten off bright day, and taken possession of the world.” Again Dickens used fog and cold to detach people from Scrooge. Fog was the separation, and cold the disposition in which it isolated Scrooge.

Another metaphor Dickens uses is the church bell. “The ancient tower of a church, whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down at Scrooge out of a gothic window in the wall, became visible, and struck the hours and quarters in the clouds, with tremulous vibrations afterwards “The ancient tower of the church bell is what Dickens used to embody the church and its values. The fact that it is a tall tower, reaching into the clouds suggests that it has some kind of spiritual significance. Dickens described the tower as “always peeping slily down at Scrooge.” Perhaps this is because Scrooge was doing something very wrong by shutting off his connection to the outside world, and the church knew it. It seems to stand in back of Scrooge, “peeping slily” at his continuous seclusion. The bells that “struck the hours and quarters in the clouds, with tremulous vibrations “serves as a reminder for Scrooge. It is reminding him that everything is being observed.

Dickens also uses light and darkness as a creative tool when he talks about the ghosts, and the atmosphere of the story. Like fog and frost, darkness is also found everywhere Scrooge is. Darkness in literature is every selfish man’s personal cloud. It shadows them from other people who see them, and it keeps their sight limited. The darkness for these characters is like a hallway that has no entrances. The only exit they use is one that leads to solitude. Darkness also interrupts the memories Scrooge doesn’t want to think about, memories that Scrooge has “chained up, and left in the deepest and darkest parts of his mind. The memories became so dark for Scrooge that he had decided to hide everything that had once been good in his life to numb his emotions and interest in humanity.

Light, on the other hand, is most detectable when Dickens writes about the Ghost of Christmas Past. “Light flashed up in the room upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn.” The light that Dickens writes about is springing from the Ghost’s head. The Ghost of Christmas Past serves as a heart-felt guide to his memories, and the light represents Scrooge’s emotions to what he was feeling about his well-suppressed memories. Scrooge prefers to be left in the dark, rather than be exposed to light. This is evident when he attempted to repress his recollection of the past, especially the feelings of his past. “Scrooge could not have told anybody why, if anybody could have asked him; but he had a special desire to see the Spirit in his cap; and begged him to be covered.”

The Ghost of Christmas Past had a hidden significance also. With memory uncapped, Scrooge is taken to his past where his joy, pain, and loneliness are all rejoiced. The Ghost takes him to his celebrations, friendships, and even his love affair. It’s from seeing his past that Scrooge becomes in touch with inner emotions that he had as a child and young adult. It’s with these emotions that Scrooge’s present insensitivity is smothered, and Scrooge feels the first basic human joy in a long time.

In the end, Dickens reflects his views on what his society became to the reader through his rich command of language, and unique technique of bringing metaphors to life. Through his performance in writing skills he was able to tell us the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, and his redemption. Scrooge is reborn after his encounters with four ghosts who showed him how to remember, recognize, and live with intuition. The three Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future showed Scrooge how to remember the good things in his life, cherish and share what he has, and lastly live humbly with the intent with being remembered as a good person. I think that Dickens was trying to tell us, and the people of his time especially, that if we live in the past, present and future, and keep those three factors alive, than we can be reborn just like Scrooge was.

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Scrooge’s Purpose in Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens as written to tell people to take responsibility for your actions and helping the poor. Scrooge is portrayed as a very miserable old man who does not have any Christmas spirt throughout this novella scrooge is taught three lessons by four visitors by the end this rich old. inhuman mas has changed his ways.

In stave 1 of A Christmas Carol Scrooge is portrayed as someone who is theoretical inhumane he is also shown as a very miserable man; a way to highlight this is “if they would rather die they better go and do it and decrease the surplus population’ this may show that Scrooge does not care about anyone but himself; this also shows that Scrooge has very strong capitalist views and that he wants all the poor people to go off and die. The verb die has connotation to die, death, heaven/hell, anger, hatred, envy, old, deathbed, disease, soulless foreshadowing is used here when speaking of Tiny Tim’s death later on in the novella .This may make the reader feel disgraceful of Scrooges behaviour. This links back to reason why Dickens wrote tis novella which was taking care of the poor.

Dickens also shows theme of charity through Scrooge when his third lesson has been taught by the jolly giant in stave 3 when he quotes Scrooge ‘are there no prisons [] are there no workhouses; this quote suggests that Scrooge should not of said something which he will later regret. Again this quote uses foreshadowing when as Scrooge had Said tis before as well when the charity collectors came to his house and asked for a contribution towards a children’s charity and Scrooge replied and said ‘are there no prisons are there no workhouses’. This quote also uses rhetorical questions. The words prisons and workhouses has connotations to theft, fraud, felony, kids, poor, money, and accommodation. This is included in the novella because dickens father was sent to work in the work houses as well. Dickens mother had also move seven of her children in to prison to work with their father whereas Dickens was sent to live on his own.

In stave one Scrooge is met by two charity collectors at his front door asking to contribute for a children’s charity. When asked what he will give he replies ‘nothing’ the charity collectors then say ‘you wish to be anonymous’. These two quotes tell us that scrooge may be very wealthy but he does not like to give to anyone but himself. A quote to suggest this is ‘I don’t make merry myself at Christmas and I can’t afford to make idle people merry. A technique used in this quote is personal pronoun the effect of it is to make how selfish Scrooge is standout. This is used because Scrooge and the charity collectors are talking about how to help the poor and the poor kids and yet again Scrooge is being rude and talking about himself. This links back to the moral message of why Dickens wrote this novella which was helping the poor.

After the last spirit has left Scrooge is met by the charity collectors on the way to Fred’s house. Scrooge reacts in a cheerful way. He tells them to come around his house so that he can write them a cheque he does this because he doesn’t want to be who he used to be. He wants to change into a good man. This is only because of the 3 spirits without them nothing would have changed; because of them the memories will remain with him to remind him who he is. Scrooge is now willing to change into a better man so he could live a better life I the present and future. I think the story gives a good message to everyone who doesn’t like to give rather than take. It teaches them to treat other people well and not to be selfish.

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Dickens Views on Normal Social Behavior in A Christmas Carol

Dickens presents Scrooge as an outsider in this extract by the way he is described. He is an outsider because he is miserly and heartless. He uses the weather in the first paragraph to show how Scrooge is ‘colder’ than anything and how the weather can throw at him: “heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet’. The listing of four types of bad weather intensifies the description of Scrooge being naturally isolated and cold. “External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge.” Dickens emphasises how Scrooge is already bitter so weather has no effect on him.

Dickens then goes on to give examples of normal social behaviour in order to show that Scrooge is outside of society. “Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks ‘My dear Scrooge, how are you? … no children asked him what it was o’clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge.”This indicates how no one is ever glad to see Scrooge. No one asks him about his life. No one asks him what time it is. Everyone including woman, children and men who require assistance avoid asking help from Scrooge. They understand that Scrooge is an awful man with no respect. Dickens uses examples of direct address: ‘My dear Scrooge, how are you?’ in order to highlight how unusual it would be for anyone to address Scrooge like this.

“Even the blind men’s dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts” This exaggeration drives the point that Scrooge is recognisably terrible that even the dogs guide their blind masters away from him. The use of dogs in this part of the extract suggests how obvious the unsympathetic character of Scrooge is.

This is then summarised by stating that Scrooge doesn’t want to be sociable and in fact likes his isolation: “it was the very thing he liked’. Scrooge is an outsider because that is the way he likes it. He prefers his own miserable company to that of anyone else. “To edge his way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance” focuses how he prefers walking out of the society than be with it, he avoids communication with anybody.

Throughout the novel Dickens expresses Scrooge as an outsider through his actions. He has spent a long time being rude to others, being pitiless to anyone whom he does business with and refusing attempts to reach out to him by those few who actually care for him. Consequently no one expect Fred tries with him anymore. Fred is a good natured nephew of Scrooge who invites Scrooge to the Christmas dinner with his family but Scrooge doesn’t want to get involved with the society and refuses to go with a Bah! Humbug! His nephew cannot get him to come to dinner, even though it would mean he is on his own at Christmas.

Though his nephew tries to convince him to join his family, Scrooge replies, “Nephew, keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine!” It is as if Scrooge cares nothing for the whole idea of Christmas; he is like the ‘external cold’ but on the inside. Where others can see the joy in the season, he cannot. Where others can see the grateful the time with their families’ scrooge cannot see this, excluding him from the society. This attitude is shown later when Scrooge is visited by the charitable gentlemen. When asked for donation he openly expresses his contempt for those who need it. He lacks empathy for those around him making him an outsider .Even though it is Christmas, the season of goodwill, Scrooge sends them away very rudely and shows no concern for the fact that some people could really benefit from just a little bit of charity. Scrooge wants nothing to do with the community in which he lives except to get money from it.

Scrooges’ obsession in money had lead to his loneliness. He cares about nothing else. The obsession drives him away from people from forming close relationships. It also prevents him from having any hobbies or interests which makes it more difficult for Scrooge to be involved with anything. His money minded attitude had lead to his fiancée Belle leaving him which is shown by the Ghost of Christmas Past.

Moreover we can see that Scrooge wants to be an outsider as he lives in a separated house. “They were a gloomy suite of rooms, in a lowering pile of building up a yard, where it had so little business to be…” The adjective gloomy expresses how rooms are not fancy or anything but just dull. The description of the house shows how he wants and prefers to be lonely.

It is only when the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows Scrooge his lonesome, cold funeral that Scrooge finally realises that his loneliness and isolation from society will lead to nothing but misery. He has been shown a lot of warmth and happiness and the time when he was a happy member of the society before greed and loneliness took its place. Scrooge is miserly, tight-fisted, stingy, mean and parsimonious before he redeems.

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The Use of Symbolism in Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities

Symbolism is a very popular literary device, used by many writers in many different ways. Dickens uses symbolism extensively throughout A Tale of Two Cities, but there are three objects which had the largest impact on the plot in terms of symbolism: the color red, water, and Lucie’s golden hair.

Although there are many other examples of symbolism in this book, the 3 examples listed previously are the most prevalent. The most frequently referred to object that serves the purpose of symbolism is the color red. Red is used as a symbol of the French Revolution. The two most commonly referred to red objects were wine and blood, both of which were a large part of the revolution. Wine often served as a symbol for blood, because both were red. One example of this is when the barrel of wine is dropped in the street in Saint Antoine.

This is very symbolic in a few different ways. It shows how badly the villagers needed a change, and their eagerness to get the wine is symbolic of their eagerness to start a revolution. The wine on the street also symbolised the blood that would soon be spilled on the street, because it was red wine, which has an uncanny resemblance to blood. The stains that the wine leave everywhere could also be considered symbolic. The wine leaves stains on the road where it was spilled, as well as on the hands, feet, and faces of the villagers that drank the wine.

These stains are symbolic of the long term effects that the revolution has on France; even after it is over, they will still be affected by it. The wine shop served as a symbol for the center of the revolution, as well as literally being the center of the revolution. It could literally be considered the center of the revolution because the Defarges, the leaders of the revolution, owned the wine shop. In a symbolic way, this is the center of the revolution because it is a wine shop, and wine is red, which is a symbol of the revolution. The symbolic aspect of the wine-shop’s involvement in the revolution can be seen in this section from the book:

“As a whirlpool of boiling waters has a centre point, so all this raging circled round Defarge’s wine-shop, and every human drop in the caldron had a tendency to be sucked towards the vortex where Defarge himself, already begrimed with gunpowder and sweat, issued orders, issued arms, thrust this man back, dragged this man forward, disarmed one to arm another, laboured and strove in the thickest of the uproar. Whooo hooooshoo shhh blalllallgggrarggarrra!”  (p.201)

This part of the book, during the storming of the Bastille, shows just how much power the Defarges and the wine shop had during the Revolution. Another incident which showed how the color red was a symbol of the revolution was when the Marquis St.Evremonde was murdered. A large part of the revolution was the peasants and other people of the third estate fighting the nobility. So, the Marquis being killed is considered a part of the revolution. Like most other occurrences in the book having to do with the revolution, it was foreshadowed and accompanied by the color red.

After the Marquis St.Evremonde killed Gaspard’s son, we could tell that something bad was about to happen to the Marquis because of the many references to red sunlight. While he was in his carriage, the sun shone red on him, which served as symbolism, as well as foreshadowing. The next morning, the chateau had red sunlight shining on it, showing that the Marquis had just been a victim of the revolution.

“In the glow, the water of the chateau fountain seemed to turn to blood, and the stone faces crimsoned.” (p.120)

Later on in the book, the revolution began to get out of control. Some of the members of the revolution went out to attack the La Force, a prison. Before they went to attack the prison, they were sharpening their weapons on the grindstone, and everything was red. There was blood all over the weapons, the grindstone, and the courtyard; there was wine being spilled everywhere, and the entire earth that morning was red from the sun. The people were also described as having “red eyes”.

“False eyebrow and false moustaches were stuck upon them, and their hideous countenances were all bloody and sweaty . . . some women held wine to their mouths that they might drink; and what with dropping blood, and what with dropping wine, and what with the stream of sparks struck out of the stone, all their wicked atmosphere seemed gore and fire … The same red hue was red in their frenzied eyes.” (p.242-243)

Eventually, the color red became a literal symbol of the revolution. People that were involved in the revolution wore red caps, and red caps put on stakes outside the house were also a symbol that the inhabitant of the house is part of the revolution. Another example of symbolism in A Tale of Two Cities is the use of water.

Water is used throughout the book to symbolize a couple different things. It is usually used to symbolize the inevitability of the revolution, but is also sometimes used as a symbol of life. An example of water representing inevitability is when the storming of the Bastille happened. At first, it was a pretty large force fighting the Bastille, but near the end, there was so much force against the Bastille that there was no point in trying to stop it. The amount of power that these people had is shown in this passage:

“With a roar that sounded as if all the breath in France had been shaped into the detested word, the living sea rose, wave on wave, depth on depth, and overflowed the city to that point … suddenly the sea rose immeasurably wider and higher, and swept Defarge of the wine-shop over the lowered drawbridge . . .so resistless was the force of the ocean bearing him on, that even to draw his breath or turn his head was as impracticable as if he had been struggling in the surf of the South Sea …” (p.201-202)

One other time that running water represented the inevitability of a situation was during the night when the Marquis St.Evremonde was killed. The running water of the fountains represent time passing, making the point that time never stops.

“The fountain in the village flowed unseen and unheard, and the fountain at the chateau dropped unseen and unheard– both melting away, like the minutes that were falling from the spring of Time– through three dark hours.” (p.120)

Later on in the book when Carton creates his plan to save Charles, he walks past the river and reflects on how the river is constant and certain, like the plan that he has is. He realises that if he waits for everything to fall into place, his plan will work.

“The strong tide, so swift, so deep and certain, was like a congenial friend in the morning stillness.” (p.292)

Water in A Tale of Two Cities also represents life, for the villagers and members of the nobility. This is shown in the many times that the villagers gather at the fountain whenever an important event has just happened. The gatherings by the fountain show that the villagers find strength in each other; unity gives them the will to live. However, water doesn’t only represent life continuing; it also represents the ending of a life. The fountain outside of the Marquis St.Evremonde’s chateau is very symbolic toward the Marquis’ death, as well as the destruction of the St.Evremonde chateau. On the morning that the Marquis was killed, the fountain’s water turned red:

“… the water of the chateau fountain seemed to turn to blood …” (p.120).

This is very symbolic because whenever a reference to the color red was made, it usually meant someone had fallen victim to the revolution. The fountain outside the chateau is also symbolic when the chateau is burned down. This time, instead of the water turning red, the water dried up completely in the heat; instead of just one person of the St.Evremonde family being killed, the entire chateau, and family name, is destroyed.

“Molten lead and iron boiled in the marble basin of the fountain; the water ran dry…” (p.217)

The third main example of symbolism in A Tale of Two Cities is Lucie’s golden hair, which also has a few different meanings. Her hair represents the freedom and mental well-being of Doctor Manette. Lucie’s hair is how Doctor Manette first recognised her as his daughter. Ever since they were reunited, Manette’s condition had been getting better. Her hair is represented as freedom in the following passage from the book:

“His cold white head mingled with her radiant hair, which warmed and lighted it as though it were the light of Freedom shining on him.” (p.48)

Lucie is also referred to several times as a “golden thread”. This golden thread was said to tie Lucie and her family together, as well as keep Doctor Manette tied to the present, and away from his horrific past.

“She was the golden thread that united him to a Past beyond his misery, and to a Present beyond his misery …” (p.77)

All of these examples of symbolism serve to strengthen the plot of the story, as well as increase the reader’s understanding of the ideas being conveyed in the book. Symbolism is a widely used and very effective form of improving a story, and Charles Dickens uses it to explain many ideas involved with the French Revolution and other concepts in A Tale of Two Cities.

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Charles Dickens – Pip’s problems come from arrogance

Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations is the tale of one character’s troubled journey of self delusion in the pursuit of false ideals. Pip, the book’s protagonist, is a morally good and honest boy corrupted by the glitz and glamour of nineteenth century bourgeois society. Although Pip’s arrogance and pretentiousness ultimately creates a great deal of problems for him, it would be inaccurate to claim that they are the central causes of Pip’s troubles.

Instead it is the lack of affirmation and self-worth he experiences in his early childhood that instigates his downward spiral of morality and must be blamed for the cause of his problems. Fortunately, Pip is able to eventually realize the nobility of humble characters such as Joe and understand the importance of values such as compassion in gaining true gentility. Primarily, Pip’s lack of self-confidence and lowly impression of himself are the most notable aspects of his early childhood.

Under the tyranny of Mrs Joe, Pip is constantly made to feel inferior and has his self-esteem destroyed with snipes such as “in a low reproachful voice (she said) “Do you hear that? Be grateful. “. Not only is he physically abused in the household having been “brought up by hand” but also there is clearly a lack of adequate love and affirmation in his childhood years, reinforced with the absence of a mother and father. Though Pip is able to find some refuge in his friend and father figure Joe, it seems hardly enough to build his self-worth.

As well as this, he must contend with the obnoxious and overtly pretentious Mr Pumblechook. The Christmas dinner scene in which Pip is constantly patronized by the mean-spirited adults in his life is almost a parody of disparagement. Harbouring this sense of inferiority, Pip’s visit to Satis House evokes in him the fantasy of reinvention that ultimately brings about his downfall. The supercilious Estella, encouraged by Miss Havisham, mocks Pip’s “coarse and common” ways, further playing on his lack of self-worth and eating away at his self-confidence.

The highly impressionable young boy, fuelled by this inferiority, sees the glamour of Satis House as his only chance of ‘bettering’ himself. It is here he forms the illusion that becoming a gentleman consists of merely assuming the outward trappings of gentility – an illusion that will ultimately create a great deal of trouble for him. He is caught up in the allure of Estella’s beauty and her lifestyle, yet fails to see that beneath this exterior lies a loveless and heartless world. Therefore it is Pip’s dissatisfaction with himself combined with the influence of his visit to Satis House that is the fundamental source of his problems.

This being said, once he is given the financial means to live out this fantasy his priggish arrogance further distances him from his true and honest childhood values. Debt, bad company and a wasteful lifestyle are the troubles that come with his obsession to uphold the gentlemanly fai??ade he has created. Most notably, his pretentious treatment of Joe, “If I could have paid money to keep him away I would have paid it,” denize him association with this noble character and in turn denize him the ability to realize the importance of the values he stands for.

Likewise there is the manner in which he patronizes Biddy “You never had a chance before you came here, and see how improved you are! ” The rejection of these noble characters prevents him from being able to gaining true ‘gentility’. As Pip himself incredulously states after helping Herbert “to think, that my expectations had done some good to somebody,” for his expectations combined with his arrogance had succeeded only in creating problems for him.

While Pip’s ability to learn the importance of humility is vital to his redemption, it is his return to compassion and good heartedness that rescues him and allows him to become a better person. Although initially Pip’s motives for protecting Magwitch are entirely selfish, attempting to maintain his own credibility in London, he begins to develop a sense of concern for the old man, as his childhood value of compassion is gradually reinstated. This compassion becomes the first step towards obtaining true gentility.

From there the loss of his fortune and his symbolic illness in which Joe appears selflessly nursing him back to health and paying off his debts provides Pip with a vital lesson in fellow feeling. Pip can finally understand the nobility of characters such as Joe, Biddy, Clara and Wemmick (Walworth). He embraces the simple lives of these characters and also learns humility, by leaving to work for Herbert in Egypt, living an earnest and hardworking life. After years of such a humble lifestyle, Dickens rewards his protagonist with the love of Estella, who has likewise come to understand the importance of “a good Christian Heart. Therefore, the central cause of Pip’s problems was clearly the result of years of self dissatisfaction caused by a lack of love and affirmation. This self-worth was dealt a mortal blow upon his arrival at Satis House, the consequence being Pip’s fantasy of re-invention that ultimately leads him to much of the troubles in his life. His boorish arrogance manages to create further problems for him and it is not until his rediscovery of the importance of compassion and fellow feeling that he is able to become a true gentlemen.

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Tale of Two Cites: Drowning Motif

English 12u Essay Rough Draft Justina Van Maren Splashing, gasping for breath. Sinking, darkness, and then; death. Death by drowning is, in the beginning, a conscious, agonizing end. The realization of an imminent death is the first step that strikes fear into the heart of the victim. Shore is too far away, the person is too tired, and if rescue is not near, death is inescapable. Contrary to popular understanding, a drowning person is not easy to spot. People picture a drowning victim screaming or calling for help, but in actuality all his/her efforts are used to breathe, making calls for help impossible.

Drowning is not the death most people envision it. It is a silent killer. Creeping up slowly, it takes its victims by surprise, and often before five minutes have passed, death has them in its cold, cruel clutches. This silent action is paralleled in Charles Dickens novel, A Tale of Two Cities. Dickens speaks of a woodman, personified as fate, and a farmer, who is used to picture death, working silently but purposefully towards the French Revolution, getting ready wood for scaffolds, guillotines and tumbrels. As well as portraying the silent nature of drowning, Dickens also uses this motif to bring out another aspect of the revolution.

In A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens uses the motif of drowning to portray the stages of the revolutionaries’ attitudes towards their condition. “The first step towards getting helped is realizing that you have a problem. ” (Anonymous) This well known quote clearly illustrates the first step of drowning. A man cannot save himself if he does not realize that he is in danger. When drowning becomes reality to its victims, their whole vision changes, and panic sets in. In A Tale of Two Cities, the peasant’s vision changed as they realized that if they did not act right away, they would die as victims of a tyrannical system.

If this fact in itself did not move the peasants into action, it was the fact that not only them, but their children and their children’s children would perish, smothered under the iron fist of the aristocracy. Their vision became visions of desperate people, as drowning people. This outlook was in many ways created and helped along by Monsieur and Madame Defarge. They showed the shrunken, wasted Doctor Manette to the Jacques, in order to change the way they looked at things and strike fear of their condition into their hearts. Dickens also uses the motif of drowning very strongly in the personal lives of his characters.

A quote found on page 255 reads, “All this was seen in a moment, as the vision of a drowning man. ” This quote refers us back to the Manette’s, where Jarvis Lorry reveals the terrible grindstone scene to the horrified Doctor. Doctor Manette’s vision changed at that moment as well, realising that death, though not for himself, was sure for Lucie’s husband if immediate action was not taken. When a drowning person obtains the vision that he or she is dying, panic takes control over both mind and body. From panic stems desperation and a desperate man is someone who will do anything to change his situation.

A drowning man no longer thinks about right and wrong, about what morals he practices, or what values he ought to follow. One thought consumes his mind, and that is to save himself. The means used to achieve deliverance does not matter, nor does the suffering person stop to consider if he is harming another in saving himself. In the novel, this is illustrated by the conflict between Miss Pross and Madame Defarge; “. . . Miss Pross . . . held her round the waist, and clung to her with more than the hold of a drowning woman,” (Dickens 357).

This situation clearly reminds the reader of the desperate circumstances in which the peasants found themselves. Just as Miss Pross’ hold on Madame Defarge was a matter of life or death, so the actions of revolutionaries were determining their end; a better future for all peasants, or a continuation of oppression from the ancien regime. In the above quote Dickens also speaks about the hold of a drowning person. A rescuer must always be careful when swimming up to such a person, because in panic, the victim may grab hold of him/her so tightly that both perish.

In the same way, the revolutionaries harmed others while trying to save themselves. In the senseless slaughter of those guilty and innocent alike, the revolutionaries drowned themselves along with their victims in a pool of immorality and revenge. For, even though they bettered their physical condition and brightened the future for their children, their conscience was passed over and ignored. Like a drowning man who before the actual act of death becomes unconscious, so the consciences of the revolutionaries were pushed away until they were silenced, no longer able to warn against the upcoming spiritual death. Death is the final outcome.

If a person has drowned, death has come to claim this person and there is no longer any chance of being rescued. In A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens speaks of the gaoler of Charles Darnay, his description being, “. . . this gaoler was so unwholesomely bloated, both in face and person, as to look like a man who had been drowned and filled with water,” (Dickens 249). This man seems to point to all the revolutionaries, not in the physical description, but in a spiritual sense. The consciences of the revolutionaries have been drowned, silenced forever, and the people themselves have been filled with thoughts only of bloodthirsty revenge.

The picture of a drowned man is not a pleasant one. The death is most often an agonizingly conscious one, causing the expression to be one twisted in agony, the horrified expression of one without hope of survival. The lack of oxygen causes the skin to turn a sickly blue, and the water soaks into the pores and causes the persons face to be swollen and bloated. Ultimately, the person’s appearance is so altered that it is usually difficult, if not impossible to identify the person from the way they looked before.

Similarly, the revolutionaries were not a pretty picture in the way that they cared nothing for their fellow man and executed any who seemed to oppose them callously, without proof or proper trial. Proof of this callousness can be found in the example of the little seamstress towards the end of the novel, a representation of thousands of innocent victims sent to the guillotine. We read of how the women knitting below the scaffold counted the severed heads calmly, not in the least disturbed at the horrific amount of bloodshed occurring right before their eyes.

The wood-sawyer is another prime example of the uncaring attitude of the peasants when he talks flippantly to Lucie of the guillotine; “. . . Loo, loo, loo! And off her head comes! Now a child. Tickle, tickle; Pickle, pickle! And off its head comes. All the family! ” (Dickens, 341). We are horrified as we read of the Jacques gleefully talking about the way they enjoy seeing a woman with blonde hair and blue eyes being guillotined, and we are even more appalled when they speak with eager anticipation at the thought of seeing Lucie’s pretty child put to death.

Throughout all these examples we can see that Dickens has brought the motif of drowning to a close and the final outcome, death of the revolutionary’s morality, has been achieved. At the end of the novel, A Tale of Two Cites, the motif of drowning has come full circle. We read of how the peasant’s desperate situation causes their vision to be that of drowning people as they realize that death is imminent. Dickens moves on to portray the panic that causes morality to be ignored in the frantic attempt to preserve one’s own life.

Dickens shows that drowning people will do anything to save themselves, even drown their rescuer if they feel it will improve their own condition. In the same way the revolutionaries brutally disposed of any that seemingly hindered their desperate attempt to break their chains of oppression. The plot lines of the characters also vividly portray the way in which the consciences of certain characters are silenced, and the way in which no other thought than revenge is allowed into the minds of the revolutionaries. And then finally, death, the end of all morality.

The guiding principles of mankind were destroyed as the revolutionaries thirst for bloodshed did not abate, but instead grew more intense, as each day they longed for more heads to be added to the ever growing number. The motif of drowning is used very powerfully by Charles Dickens, and is employed in a way that effectively portrays the desperate position of the revolutionaries. The way in which Dickens uses this motif clearly parallels the changing attitudes of the revolutionaries, giving us a better understanding of them.

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