Book I Chapter 1
“The Period”
Plot Summary:
• The narrator is recalling an age of co-existing extremes. It was the
best and worst of times, a time of hope and despair, etc. England
and France are both ruled by monarchies. Treaties have long been
settled. It is the year 1775.
• England turns its interests to spiritual matters, though it keeps an
ear out for news coming from America. France concerns itself
with making and spending money. Horrific punishments for small
crimes are being sentenced to the condemned. There are those
working silently towards Revolution, for speaking aloud would
brand them traitors.
• England is being plagued by crime, mainly burglaries in the cities
and highways. Carrying the mail is a risky job, and often it is
waylaid. The gallows are busy, and make no distinction between a
petty thief and a murderer.
DISCUSS: How do Dickens’ diction and syntax choices reflect the overall tone of each
of these passages? How can you tell that TTC is political in nature whereas Great
Expectations is about character?
Opening lines from A Tale of Two Cities:
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,
It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,
It was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity,
It was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness,
It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair,
We had everything before us, we had nothing before us,
We were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going the other way –
In short. The period was so far like the present period…”
VS.
“My father’s family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip,
my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more
explicit than Pip. So I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.”
Topical/historical references in Chapter One
Royalty:
The two kings with “large jaws” and their queens, one fair,
one plain, are the monarchs of England and France George III and Charlotte Sophia (England), Louis XVI and
Marie Antoinette (France)
Visions, spirits, and spectres:
- Mrs. Southcott was a religious visionary
- The “Cock-lane ghost” was an 18th century poltergeist
- Moving to his own time, Dickens involves the “spirits of
this very year past,” meaning those spirits raised by D.D.
Home, a popular Victorian medium
“Congress of British subjects in America”
Refers to the Continental Congress, which sent a petition
of grievances to the British Parliament in 1775
Literary Devices:
Parallelism: The opening words form a good example of parallelism--the repetition, for
emphasis, of a grammatical structure. Here and elsewhere Dickens relies on parallelism
to balance opposing pairs, to make contrasts and comparisons. Look closely for dual
themes and characters, even (in Book the Second) for dual chapter titles. Most
elements in the story have, if not an equal, at least an opposing element.
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times..." (5).
Paradox: Dickens uses paradox to establish one of the main themes of the novel, that
during every age, people experience the same struggles, difficulties, and joys. Dickens
uses this theme to create universal appeal for the audience. He talks about every age
having "wisdom" and "foolishness," "light" and "darkness," "hope" and "despair“ (5).
Anaphora: Dickens uses the deliberate repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning
of several successive verses, clauses, or paragraphs to balance two completely opposite
ideas, show an equal match in the struggle between each idea, demonstrate tension
between opposites (or doubles, or even groups of people, like nobility vs. commoners)
and show a constant state of struggle between black and white ideas.
"It was… it was…" (5).
Also watch for these literary devices:
Allusion
Allegory
Antithesis
Juxtaposition
Euphemism
Repetition (anaphora)
Symbolism
Shift in tone/narrative stance
Essential Quote
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was
the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the
epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the
season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the
spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had
everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all
going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other
way – in short, the period was so far like the present period,
that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being
received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of
comparison only.” (5)