Charles Dickens: Hard Times - Book Report/Review Example

DICKENS The Victorian England was marked by rapid industrial growth resulted in changes, especially change in the society, organization and attitude of the people. The escalation of industrial cities and railways brought incredible change in the life of the common people. The invention of new machines led to the unemployment and the people from different countryside was forced to search for better paid works. Carl Max, through his nonfiction and the contemporary literary men, through their fiction delineated the realistic picture of the working class. Charles Dickens tried to display the evils of the society due to industrial revolution through his stories and characters. The social setup of Dickens Novels reflects the tedious and ambiguous working of the social background. ‘Hard Times ‘symbolically presents the dimness that dominated in the society due to inequality. The characters depicted in the novel obviously exhibit the Victorian stance. The sufferings of working class who are really the victims of industrialization and socialization are clearly drawn in the novel in a wonderful approach. The main characters Stephen Black Pool, Mr. Josia Bounderby and Mr. Thomas Grandgrind represent the different classes that were in industrial England. Mr. Bounderby is the owner of a factory in ‘Coketown’. That is a place of utilization and inconsistency. The description of the place where Dickens sets his story should be noted “It was town of machinery and tall chimneys, out of which interminable serpents of smoke trailed themselves forever and ever and never got uncoiled. It had a black canal….. and a river that ran purple with smelling dye….piston of the steam engine…like the head of an elephant….” . Thus it is clear that the period replaced man with machines. According to Thomas Carlyle the era can be called a ‘Mechanical age’. Gradgrind runs a school which is only a place for inculcating his personnel philosophy to the children. It is place where children are taught to behave according to certain predestined rules and thus converting them to little machines. He considers children’s mind as vessel to be filled with ideas or facts. Thus he teaches his students to fuse to facts than fancy. “Now that what I want is facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but facts, Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out nothing else, this is the principle on which I bring up my children this is the principal on which I bring up these children, stick to the facts sir”. These harsh words spoken to the children in the school bring the reader into the utilitarian way of thinking. Dickens tries to delineate the facts of depersonalization and dehumanization caused by industrial revolution. Gradgrind’s children Louisa and Tom are also victims of his philosophy and that results in their failure in a societal life. Louisa says “I can’t talk to you so as to lighten your mind for I never see any amusing sights or read any amusing books”. Tom says “I wish I could collect all the facts …and all the figures and .I wish I could put a thousand barrels of gunpowder under them and blow them all up together.” Sissy also suffers for her future studies in the school. Tom, Louisa, and Sissy came out of Gradgrind’s school as unsuccessful products of the education they received there. Tom is a apprenticed to Bounderby. Louisa unwillingly agrees to marry Bounderby only for the sake of Tom. Sissy becomes adopted child of Gradgrind. The destiny of the workers in the factory of Bounderby is worse. They are always threatened by Bounderby and treated as emotionless objects. Dickens portrays the lower class also as victims to the mechanization. The lower class is forced to confine them in a world which is strange to imagination and fancy. Stephen Blackpool, one of the ‘Hands’ in the factory, pays his drunken wife to keep away from him. Being poor he was forced to endure an unhappy life without getting a divorce and can never enjoy happiness with Raichel. John Biard in ‘Divorce and matrimonial causes’ explains the rigid matrimonial laws of that time and its effects on the society, especially poor class. The contemporary issue was well explicated through the life of Stephen Blackpool. Having an uncaring attitude toward the plight of the poor, Bounderby dismisses Stephen’s request for a divorce. He simply views the request for help as an attempt to avoid his responsibilities and rightful obligations by seeking an easy way out of his marriage. “He confines his feelings in these words “It’s all a muddle”. Even justice is based on money which leaves all privileges to the rich and obligations to the poor. According to Thomas Malthus “the increasing wealth of the nation has had little or no tendency to better the conditions of the poor”. Stephen lives a life of toil and poverty. Dickens portrayed the life of Stephen and Bounderby in contrast. The strained relation between the poor and rich is illustrated though the life Stephen Blackpool. Stephen being refused to join hands with the union against the factory owners suffers a lot. Here dickens tries to blame the trade unions who fight blindly against their factory. Here he criticizes the social agitators who use the laborers for political purpose. Stephen is forced to leave the factory and seeks a job in a new place. Dickens consciously writes about the new landscape in more admirable way, “so strange to turn from chimneys to birds. So strange to have roads dust in his feet instead of coal girt”. Later we find that he is punished for the crimes of Tom and become a martyr. He carries the pain throughout his life. The word he speaks at the end reveals that he is aware of the worse situation prevailed in the society, “If the things that tooches us, my dear, was not so muddled I should’nha’ had’n been, by my fellow weavers and workin’ brothers, so mistook. If Mr. Bounderby had ever know’d me right…if he ‘d ever know’d me at aw..he would’n ha’ took’n offence wi’ me. He would’n ha’ suspect’n me, But ..”. Here Blackpool speaks clearly of the injustice towards the poor. Stephen is represented as a noble lower class man tortured for others. Dickens’ characters are deplorable or damnable in one way or other. Louisa Gradgrind is the most pitiable one among them. She lives in both ‘worlds’, the world of facts and world of fancy. The loveless marriage of her with Mr. Bounderby is a failure. Life should be a fusion of facts and fancy. Fact alone cannot make the life pleasurable. Dickens evokes the importance of imagination as a force that can work against the mechanization of human nature. The life of Louisa exemplifies this. She urges to get out of ‘Gradgrind system’. But she never turns away from fidelity towards her spouse. She stops her relation with Harthose. Later it is Louisa who convinces her father of uselessness of the philosophies on life. The role played by Sissy is much different from that of others since she is an outsider. She acts as a mediator of both the worlds. She never becomes a victim of the mechanical world created by Gradgrind and also succeeds in introducing love into the family. The story continues with the suffering of all the characters in one way or other. Dickens explicates the pressure of utilitarianism and industrialism in nature as well as in animals. Towards the end of the novel Gradgrind realizes the danger and gradually embraces new ideas. He expresses this thought in a conversation with Mr. Sleary when talking about dogs “Their instinct is surprising…” Dickens succeeded in differentiating the capitalist mill owners and the undervalued workers of the Victorian England. He was an orator of human equality. Being an opponent of urbanization and industrialization Dickens warns the society. As an eminent writer he presented the problem of an era effectively and also proposed solution for it. Urbanization and Industrialization were hall marks in the history of human being. The most desirable thing that should be done is creating a suitable atmosphere for the working class to achieve their rights and saving the nature from pollution. Dickens leaves the solution to the readers “Dear reader! It rest with you and me, whether in our two fields of action, similar things shall be or not. Let them be. We shall sit with lighter bosoms on the hearth, to see the ashes of our fires turn gray and cold”. Work cited Dickens, Charles, Hard Times ,New York, Dover Thrift ,2001. Read More