PowerPoint for A Tale of Two Cities

1. A TALE OF TWO CITIES
By Charles Dickens

2. CHARLES DICKENS
• Born February 7, 1812 (Portsmouth, England)
• Father imprisoned for debt
• “Cast away at a young age”
• Began career reporting for London newspaper
• First piece published 1836 (Pickwick Papers)
• 1850s: father & daughter died; divorced
• Wrote Bleak House, Hard Times and Little Dorrit in this period
• 1865: train accident
• Died June 9, 1870 of stroke
• Buried in Poet’s corner, Westminster Abbey

3. HISTORY OF A TALE OF TWO CITIES
• Based on the French Revolution (1789)
• Written and published in 1859
• One of his last books completed
• First book coming out of his “dark period”
• Novels had a moral purpose: “to arouse innate moral
sentiments and to encourage virtuous behavior in readers”

4. STRUCTURE & STYLE
• Foreshadowing
• Fewer sub-plots/characters comparatively
• Did not fit into modern literary categories
(similar to Shakespeare)
• Genre: Historical Fiction
• Repetition
• Writing reflects mood

5. PLOT SYNOPSIS
A Tale of Two Cities is based on the French Revolution and the adventures of Lucie
Manette and her father, Dr. Manette. Lucie Manette, with the help of Jarvis Lorry,
attempts to rescue her father and gets stuck in a love triangle in England with Charles
Darnay, Mr. Stryver and Sydney Carton. When work takes Lorry and Darnay to France,
they fall into a serious dilemma and need to escape the madness of the
Revolutionists.
Meanwhile, Madame Defarge and her husband, Ernest Defarge, plan the French
Revolution and turn in their morals for loyalty to the new Republic. The multitude of
Dickens’ characters meet in France and an unexpected turn of events takes place to
conclude the virtuous story.

6. CHARACTERS:
• Lucie Manette
• Doctor Manette
• Jarvis Lorry
• Charles Darnay
• Sydney Carton
• Miss Pross
• Ernest Defarge
• Madame Defarge
SETTING:
• London, England
• Poor district in Paris, France: St. Antoine

7. SYMBOLS:
• Broken Wine Cask: blood shed
• Imprisonment
• Darkness/Weather: violence
• Sea/Fire: Anger/Hatred
THEMES:
• Sacrificial love
• Class inequality
• Value of life
• Family loyalty
• End does not justify the means

8. MEANING & SIGNIFICANCE
• Protests the cruelty and gruesome nature of revolution
• Urges readers to see all humanity as worthy of life and equality
• Illustrates sacrificial love that resonates deeply with the human soul

9. CRITICAL ESSAY
• Compares A Tale of Two Cities to A French Revolution (Carlyle)
• Accurate and detailed facts (e.g. number of prisoners escaped)
• “Everyone who has common sense should have an idea about the events transpiring
around him.”
• Criticized for drawing out emotions; not qualified to write on history