evoking sympathy. tense: The narrative is presented in the past tense; however‚ at the end‚ the narrator reveals what the future will bring to each of the main characters. setting (time): The middle of the nineteenth century setting (place): Coketown‚ a manufacturing town in the south of England protagonist: Louisa Gradgrind major conflict: Louisa Gradgrind struggles to reconcile the fact-driven self-interest of her upbringing with the warmth of feeling that she witnesses both in Sissy
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Hard Times: Struggle of Fact vs Imagination and Struggle Between Two Classes Charles Dickens’ novel‚ Hard Times‚ is a story of two struggles--the struggle of fact versus imagination and the struggle between two classes. It takes place in Coketown‚ and industrial-age English city. The novel is divided into two sections. One deals with the struggle of upper class members of society and their struggle to learn the value of imagination. The other involves a working class man who is trapped
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Satire is defined as a literary work in which human vice or folly is attacked through irony‚ derision‚ or wit. Voltaire‚ George Orwell and Charles Dickens used satire to provide a humorous perspective to the social‚ political and ideological views of their times. Candide by Voltaire‚ Animal Farm by George Orwell‚ and Hard Times by Charles Dickens are very successful in using satire to show the flaws of each era ’s current views. Voltaire‚ Orwell‚ and Dickens use different forms of satire to make
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there are many complexities linked to these characters‚ some do not appear to be as complex but in actuality they are. A strong example would be Josiah Bounderby‚ the wealthiest character in the novel. Mr. Bounderby is a factory and bank owner in Coketown‚ the industrial town in which the novel is set. He claims that he came from nothing to riches and has no problem exclaiming the trials and hard times that he went through to get to where he is now. While the people who hear these stories have no
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Short Summary Mr. Gradgrind is a man of "facts and calculations." He identifies a student‚ called Girl number twenty‚ who replies that her name is Sissy Jupe. Gradgrind corrects her that her name is Cecilia regardless of what her father calls her. Jupe’s father is involved in a horse-riding circus and this is not respectable‹in Gradgrind’s opinion. He advises Cecilia to refer to her father as a "farrier" (the person who shoes a horse) or perhaps‚ a "veterinary surgeon." Sissy Jupe is a slow learner
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Analyse Dickens presentation of the conflict between fact and fancy in ‘Hard Times’ The novel Hard Times by Charles Dickens epitomises the social‚ political and economic values of Victorian England. Dickens attacks the conditions and exploitation of the workers by the factory owners‚ the social class divisions that favour dishonesty over honesty depending on the hierarchy of class status. He finds the utilitarian (fact) school of thought where facts and statistic’s are emphasised at the expense
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In Dickens’s Hard Times‚ there are many symbols that run through the novel. These symbols stand for much more than just word you would come across multiple times as you read. Each symbol can mean something about human nature‚ human relationships‚ morality‚ and even about our society. Each symbol can have a different meaning to all of us. The symbols that came up frequently and that stood out to me as I read were staircase‚ Pegasus‚ smoke serpents‚ and fire. The first symbol that stood out to me
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took place during the 1850s. The ill effects of Victorian Utilitarianism are upheld in this moralistic vision of the writer. Unlike most of his novels‚ ‘Hard Times’ is not based in London but in the red and black seemingly monotonous structures of Coketown. That being said‚ it still realistically allows the reader to observe the systems and structures of society forced to face various economic and social hardships. What preserves the novel as a social commentary is that the struggles in life and human
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INTRODUCTION Utilitarianism is the assumption that human beings act in a way that highlights their own self interest. It is based on factuality and leaves little room for imagination. Utilitarianism dominated as the form of government in England’s Victorian age of eighteenth century. Utilitarianism‚ as rightly claimed by Dickens‚ robbed the people of their individuality and joy; deprived the children of their special period of their lives‚ ’Childhood’ and deprived women of their inherent right of
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Alice Rino Karri Harris ENG403B 10 March 2014 Hard Times Essay The novel Hard Times‚ by Charles Dickens was written in 1854 based on the idea that logic and fact helped advance society more than fancy and imagination did. Dickens was concerned with the gloomy lives and social problems of mid-nineteenth-century England’s working class and Hard Times was his way of expressing his thoughts. He addresses these problems through three divided sections of the novel where logic‚ reason‚ fancy and
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