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The first contraposition to be met with in the novel (or should it rather be
France
England
She (France) entertained herself,
besides, with such humane
achievements as sentencing a youth to
have his (…) body burned alive, because
he had not kneeled down in the rain to
do honour to a dirty procession of
monks which passed within his view, at
a distance of some fifty or sixty yards.
The hangman (…) was in constant
requisition, and worse than useless; now
burning people (…) by the dozen, and now
burning pamphlets (…); to-day, taking the
life of an atrocious murderer, and tomorrow of a wretched pilferer who had
robbed a farmer’s boy of sixpence.
called a juxtaposition as yet) is the description of social evils and the state of
affairs in both France and England. “There were a king with a large jaw, and a
queen with a plain face, on the throne of England; there were a king with a
large jaw, and a queen with a fair face, on the throne of France.” Thus, the
anaphoric repetition makes clear that there was a great similarity in political and
social situations in two countries, the only ―considerable‖ difference being the
queen’s good looks or the absence of such. The conservative Albion and the
frivolous Gaul shared the absurdity of the laws and the blood of penal code.
Terrifying are the examples of the laws’ bestial cruelty:
The latter example imparts the idea of the crushing juridical machine, which
destroyed everybody methodically and monotonously, no matter whatever crime
one had committed. The impression of the overwhelming iniquity is well rendered
by the oxymoron used on the account of the outlaw who “gallantly shot” his
victim through the head. This figure of contrast emphasizes the misunderstood idea
of valour and the depravity of all the society in which murder could be taken for a
gallant deed. The picture is supported by the chiasmus: “the mob fired on the
musketeers and the musketeers fired on the mob”. Everything, it implicates, got
mingled in the society and nobody thought any of these occurrences much out of
the common way. To sum up the horrifying outline of the period Dickens
introduces the descriptions of execution in France and England, descriptions which
despite their seemingly casual character and the separated location in the novel,
are, nevertheless, an astounding testimony against the human atrocity. These are as
follows (the first case refers to the treason, the second – to the parricide):
41
England
France
He (the condemned) will be drawn on a
hurdle to be half hanged and then he’ll be
taken down and sliced before his own face,
and then his inside will be taken out and
burnt while he looks on, and then his head
will be chopped off, and he’ll be cut into
quarters.
His right hand (…) will be burnt off
before his face; (…) into wounds which
will be made in his arms, his breast and
his legs, there will be poured boiling oil,
melted lead, hot resin, wax, and
sulphur; finally (…) he will be torn limb
from limb by four strong horses.
Now, on juxtaposing the statutes and social establishments of both countries,
Dickens turns exclusively to France, presenting the French nobility and the very
“Bull’s Eye” of the Royal court in the impressive figure of Monseigneur, one of
the great lords in power at the court; thus describing the corruption and iniquity of
the nobles, that would result in the insurrection of the 14th of July. Monseigneur is
initiated in the novel with the metaphor that denounces him of “rapidly
swallowing France” as he swallows his chocolate. This device evidently pursuits
the double aim – to emphasize the Monseigneur’s habitual gorging himself amidst
the surrounding poverty and to attribute to his appetite some ogreish tint as he was
sucking the life out of the people. The whole useless, good-for-nothing, terribly
extravagant and depraved smart set was impersonated in the fat figure of
Monseigneur. The picture is completed with the “military offices destitute of
military knowledge; naval officers with no idea of a ship; civil officers without
a notion of affairs; brazen ecclesiastics, of the worst world worldly, with
sensual eyes, loose tongues, and looser lives”. – This notable, very Dickens – like
allogism sets out the rotting and declination of the luxurious empire where
everybody who had any power either secular or ecclesiastical was totally unfit for
their several callings. The fact is that “the leprosy of unreality disfigured every
human creature in attendance upon Monseigneur.” Thus, the apt metaphor
compares the state of affairs in the country to the foul disease which corrodes the
body of the state just like the leprosy eats away the human body. It contributes a
lot to the gloomy atmosphere of the chapter and plainly intimated that the ―body‖
i.e. “the system rooted in a frizzled hangman, powdered, gold-laced, and
white-silk stockinged” would very soon be rotten through and through, down to
its very core.
Later on Dickens will show the revolutionary shoots of the dragon’s teeth
sown by the gentle-born imposters, plunderers and profligates. The blindness,
rashness and criminal negligence of the subordinates will lead to such state of
things when the shining Bull’s Eye of the court is gone. “It had never been a
good eye to see with”, – observes the author, – “had long had the mote in it of
Lucifer’s pride, Sardanapalus’s Luxury, and a mole’s blindness – but it had
42
dropped out and was gone”. – Here is the most excellent example of
convergence. This sentence needs special attention being also a perfect example of
the infinite variety of Dickens’ stylistic means. It begins with the transference of
meaning based on the associated likeness between the creams of the royal society
and the very centre of the target. These two notions sharing the quality of
importance and the exposure of the eyes constitute a vivid metaphor of the Bull’s
Eye, which being also treated as not “a good eye to see with” is transformed into
the pun. Then follows a metaphoric allusion to the Holy Scripture and to the old
myth about the extravagant king: “the mote of Lucifer’s pride, Sardanapalus’s
luxury etc.” (See Matt.7:3 – “Why do you look at the mote that is in your
brother’s eye, but do not see the beam that is in your own eye?”) This gorgeous
cluster of stylistic devices well renders the intensity of the aristocrats’ outrage and
prepares the reader for the people’s universal recoil to the immense transgressions.
“Like the fabled rustic who raised the Devil with infinite pains, and was so
terrified at the sight of him that he could ask the Enemy no question, but
immediately fled; so, Monseigneur, after boldly reading the Lord’s Prayer
backwards for a great number of years, and performing many other potent
spells for compelling the Evil One, no sooner beheld him in his terrors than he
took to his noble heels”. – What strikes the reader is that through the entire
sentence there runs the metaphoric representation of the revolution in the images of
the old legend about the wisard’s disciple and the devil (who in his turn is
presented through the synonymic repetition: the Devil – the Enemy – the Evil
One). Isn’t it wonderful, the way Dickens arranges his view of the French
revolution within the boundaries of the ancient fairy-tale? First, the nobles
personified in Monseigneur are metaphorically compared to the foolish rustic
youth who took “infinite pains” to raise the devil, i.e. who aroused the people to
riots by violent excesses of power. The impression is strengthened by the allusion
to the ancient superstition that the magicians and warlocks are reading the Lord’s
Prayer backwards in witchcraft practices. This allusion calls forth the idea of all
Christian virtues trampled on by the impious aristocrats, whose deeds were equal
to the black magic. They did nothing but perform “potent spells for compelling
the Evil One” (figurative periphrasis) that is they incessantly misused and
perverted their high privileges and neared to the hour of vengeance.
So, this indivisible tangle of stylistic devices is pinned together with the final
brilliant attack against the contemptible Monseigneur: no sooner had he beheld the
revolution outbroken, than “he took to his noble heels”. Here zeugma restores the
literal primary meaning of word ―heels‖ by violating the phraseological unit. The
word ―heels‖ is almost lost in the phraseological unit ―to take to one’s heels‖
43
which means ―to run away‖. Attaching the qualification of the heels to the unit the
author revives the meaning of the word and the description of Monseigneur who
cowardly deserted his post and evaded the responsibility becomes very fresh and
original acquiring the fiercely derisive colour.
Thus, the reader enjoys the splendour of Dickens’ vocabulary and gets a huge
amount of information concerning the situation in France (the poetry and emotive
contents of the extract for its ―hugeness‖) without even noticing that all this is
concentrated in ONE sentence!
So, the reader is thoroughly informed that nothing was omitted to be done that
had led to the furious outburst of the people’s wrath. Much earlier Dickens
managed to fill the reader with confidence that this outburst was inevitably
coming; managed by personifying Death as a terrible Woodman who marked the
trees for future guillotines (the exact denomination – “a certain movable
framework with a sack and a knife in it, terrible in history” – contains in itself
the vast material for analysing) and representing Fate as a Farmer whose rude carts
would soon be transformed into the tumbrils of the Revolution. These manifold
stylistic means prepare the setting and when the Terror begins the reader is
disposed to justify the atrocities of the risen mob. But this is where Dickens’
preoccupation with contrasts reveals itself with particular vividness. Well may the
suffering people be pitied and lamented over, UNLESS they fight back and turn
into the blood-stained and blood-thirsty savages. The fact is that the people’s
blood, suddenly of some value, after many years of worthlessness, is avenged by
the ferocious massacre. Could that possibly be approved by Dickens, the
humanist? By no means. As long as the oppressed ―scarecrows‖ are the suffering
party they are ―the people‖; no sooner they took arms and Dickens called them
―the mob‖. The victims instantly turned into the butchers, for no revenge can be
just, thought Dickens, and those who perform it are none other than “lost spirits”.
Thus, almost in the spirit of romantic contrasts took place the transformation and
reversal of the parties: Madam Defarge and her friends – firy patriots, Madam
Defarge and her friends – fierce murderers; the royalty and nobles – haughty
oppressors, the royalty and nobles – dignified martyrs.
The abominable degradation of late sufferers was presented in the impressive
description of Carmagnole – the revolutionary dance, “a something one innocent,
delivered over to all devilry – a healthy pastime changed into a means of
angering the blood, bewildering the senses, and steeling the heart. Such grace
as was visible in it made it the uglier, showing how warped and perverted all
things good by nature were become”. – Everything got mutilated and distorted,
Dickens implies, when justice turns into revenge, and redemption into slaughter.
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All that had always been, was now gone forever and it is not accidentally that
Dickens speaks very Hamlet-like about the “disjointed time”.1 The society got
depraved and disintegrated from top to bottom; good and evil were intermingled
and nobody discriminated between them any longer. The vivid testimony to this
statement is the description of the tribunal which should be the body of justice but
“of whom some members were asleep and some awake, some dirty with
murder and some clean, some sober and some not”. – Here Dickens felt
intuitively that antithesis is the most suitable device to express the absurdity of
turbulent times. Truly did Isaiah say: “We look for justice, but there is none; for
salvation, but it is far from us”.
2
And above all crimes, bloodshed and iniquity
there rose their horrifying symbol – a dreadful machine of destruction – La
Guillotine. “It superseded the Cross. Models of it were worn on breasts from
which the Cross was discarded, and it was bowed down to and believed in
where Cross was denied”. – The sign of salvation – and the sign of regeneration
of the human race. The sign of Mercy – and the sign of Vengeance. The sign of
Love – and the sign of Inexorability. Life and Death clashed in intent strife. Still
the mob preferred the latter. Could Dickens sympathize with them? Not he. He
foresees their fall, for the only mature fruit of their rebellion – the Guillotine – is
sure to devour her creators. “They made idols for themselves, that they may be
destroyed”. (Hosea. 8:4)
Yet Dickens is emphatic in his belief that the terrors of the revolution were
just the due recompense for the evil ways of the downright wicked rulers. The
resources of the nation were expended not on the works of public utility but on the
personal aggrandizement of the nobles. In the means they took to gratify their
passions, they showed themselves to be little better than savages (See the
astounding story of the rape of the peasant girl, of her family’s bloody
extermination, and of Doctor Manette’s prolonged imprisonment). The coming
revolution was the direct outgrowth of the nobles’ unholy self-indulgence. Because
of their extravagant expenditures in the maintenance of the luxurious royal court,
they resorted to forced labour and heavy taxation. Bitter opposition to their rule
thus engendered the distresses to come. “For whatever a man sows, that and that
only is what he will reap” (Gal. 6:7) says the Bible and Dickens echoes it with
Charles Darnay’s words: “Good could never come of such evil, a happier end
was not in nature to so unhappy a beginning”.
1
See W. Shakespeare ―Hamlet‖: ―The time is out of joint, o cursed spite – That ever I was born to set it right.‖
2
As ―A Tale of Two Cities‖ is called ―the most Christian‖ of all Dickens’ novels, it will be justified to bring
forward some quotations from the Holy Scripture, thus drawing the parallel when appropriate between the writer’s
creation and one of the sources of his inspiration i.e. the Bible. The more so, as there are many scriptural allusions in
the novel and even direct quotations.
45
So, boldly contraposing eager expectations of better life and their morbid
realization that set the people of one country against each other in deadly feud,
Dickens achieved great emotional effect through antithetic literary constructions.
Consequently, antithesis being the leading stylistic principle underlying the whole
novel, is applied to lay bare the contrast between the society disintegrating and the
society gathering its minutest forces in self-destructive up-heaving. But it is
precisely in these masterly contradictory characterizations and their manifold
stylistic means that the writer’s art lies.
***
―A Tale of Two Cities‖ – the first of Dickens’ ―tale‖ novels – has no division
of good and wicked concerning the characters. Even for the antagonists the author
seeks for the motives that explain if not justify their behaviour. In protagonists,
likewise, he reveals blameworthy qualities; they are by no means irreproachable.
His characters are not the bearers of one static quality any longer, but are torn
asunder by the contradictory emotions impossible for his early heroes as Nicholas
Nickleby, Martin Chuzzlewit and the like. The Mask and the Face under it is an
old problem of Dickens, but now it got the new philosophically realistic
realization. In his early works the mask – be it good or evil – had nothing for it was
the essence of the personality much like in commedia dell’arte. Later the mask
began to come gradually off, sometimes even showing the face to be better.
In ―A Tale of Two Cities‖ the duality of the human nature is transmitted by
the pairs of doubles. There are even physical counterparts – Darnay and Carton.
They are, nevertheless, the opposite characters, linked together by the appearance
of great resemblance and by the love for Doctor Manette’s daughter Lucie. On the
whole, drawing the pairs of ―twins‖ Dickens resorts not only to contraposing two
separate characters as in the case with the said Darnay and Carton; nay, he poses
one character as a contrast to several personages at once; e.g. Carton and Darnay –
Carton and Stryver. The whole system of images in the novel is permeated with the
antitheses.
Carton and Darnay being the mainspring of the plot are therefore the vehicle
of author’s self-expression; the action and the denouement are determined by the
unusual outward likeness of two young men. Sydney Carton is a talented though
sinking young lawyer. He drinks and gets entangled with the chance affairs
thinking himself a lost man. Then he meets Lucie Manette whose heart belongs to
another. Lucie loves Darnay and Carton fills her with compassion at best. At the
time none other than Carton twice saves Darnay’s life and takes death at the
guillotine in his stead.
46
Whereas Charles Darnay is a model hero, a true Dickensian protagonist
Darnay “was plainly dressed in black”
Carton wore an “untidy wig” and a “torn
gown half off him”
Darnay’s “hair (…) was gathered in the
ribbon at the back of his neck”
Whereas Carton wore “his long brown hair
all untrimmed hanging loose about him”
Dickens marks “the sunburnt cheek” of
one and -
the “wasted air” of the other
Darnay “was quiet and attentive” and
“grave” and “composed”. “His condition
was that of a young gentleman”.
As for Carton, there was “something
especially wreckless in his demeunour”,
that gave him “a disreputable look”.
endowed with almost all manly virtues imaginable: he is resolute, energetic, brave,
self-sufficient, self-dependent, self-confident – to be continued with a long row of
―self‖ adjectives. Undoubtedly, by his inner qualities Charles Darnay is much more
the hero of the Dickens the readers got used to than the debauched Carton.
Nevertheless, it was Carton who accomplished a noble deed. Here Dickens settles
the most difficult question of man’s nature, true and imaginable, of aspect, genuine
and assumed.
In the court-scene that introduces them to the novel, the juxtaposition of two
men is carried on all levels. First, their appearance is contrastingly opposed,
though “they were sufficiently like each other to surprise (…) everybody
present”. Every little detail about their looks is carefully collected and presented
to the reader:
The dress
The hair
The features
The general aspect
Thus, describing two most unlike young men (despite their physical
resemblance) Dickens would have seemed to aim at acquiring the readers’
sympathy for one and rousing the readers dislike for the other, if it were not for the
countless ―buts‖ sprinkled on Carton’s description. He behaved very unrespectfully
and distractedly in the court, BUT he noticed Lucie’s sickness; he spoke carelessly
and insolently to Darnay, YET he saved his life by the well-timed interference in
the proceedings; he looked slovenly and debauched, SAVE for his momentary
earnestness that strengthened his natural resemblance to Darnay. Whenever
Dickens speaks of Carton the text is full of reservations. With Darnay everything is
definite, precise and clearly outlined. No blurred adjective ever misted his image.
He is so very positive, though not absolutely insipid, that all his emotional
47
movements (and noble movements are these) are easily perceived and even
Darnay
Carton
“I love your daughter fondly, dearly,
disinterestedly, devotedly. If ever there were
love in the world, I love her.”
“Don’t be afraid to hear me. Don’t shrink from
anything I say. I am like one who died young. All
my life might have been.”
predicted. That doesn’t mean his being sickly-sweet, on the contrary, he is rather
human, liable to doubts and remorse, but there is really a certain amount of
uniform goodness in him that prevents him from being a full-length portrait of a
man. Darnay is a static character; on the last page he is exactly what he was on the
first, and this spiritual inertness creates, perhaps, the most striking contrast to
Carton’s inner dynamism.
Weak and dissipated, wasted and desponded, Carton still possesses such trueto-life vitality as makes him an impressive and profound figure. Carton’s strife
with his very self, the complexity of his motives and his ways, his numerous lapses
and final victory are written with the hand of a genius.
To confirm the idea of the opposition of those two characters one may well
resort to their declarations made to one woman – Lucie Manette – and compare
them. Darnay, as a true victorian protagonist, keeps modestly on the background
and would never confess his love to Lucie personally, unless he had an approbation
of her father, though his generosity, as well as good understanding, urges him to
disclaim any paternal influence that Doctor Manette would have in his devoted
daughter in the matrimonial manner. All that is noble, devoted and prudent
revealed itself in his deferential proposal, delivered in “a tone of fervent
admiration, true homage, and deep love”. With Carton, on the contrary, it is the
“fixed despair of himself” with which this “self-flung away, wasted, drunken,
poor creature of misuse” expressed his affection. He never mentioned, nor did he
ever hope of any return. Unlike Darnay he didn’t need the mediator of a father, for
he hadn’t the slightest doubt as to Lucie’s feelings toward him. Quite undeserving
as he knew himself to be, he came straight to his lady and told her what rose out of
his soul. Darnay strove to acquire Lucie’s love – Carton renounced it from the
first; Darnay wanted to deserve Lucie’s confidence – Carton was sure of it,
therefore he sought none. Somehow he knew Lucie better, than his happy rival, if
the word ―rival‖ can be used where chances are so unequal. There is a gradation in
both men’s declarations –
– but in the first case it is hope that increases, and in the second – it’s opposite
– hopelessness. Darnay is far from being cock-sure or conceited, but he is certainly
not desponded of ever gaining Lucie’s affection, he is already half-aware of it. He
says to Doctor Manette: “If Miss Manette held me at this moment in her
48
innocent heart – do not think I have the presumption to assume so much – I
could retain no place in it against her love for her father”. – this concession
(marked out even syntactically with two dashes) of a whole-hearted man with clear
conscience and unpolluted memory, only intensifies the cheerful prospects
awaiting for the handsome, attractive and noble suitor and makes a striking
contrast to the lot of his degraded counterpart who is so humble in his claims
doesn’t even dare to hope. And Carton indeed thus expressed himself addressing
Lucie: “I know very well that you can have no tenderness for me, I ask for
none; I am even thankful that it cannot be”.
Corrupted, ruined, incorrigible as he is, and oh! so miserable, Carton stirs
much more in the heart of the reader than Darnay, altogether good and correct. In
the final analysis his image appears to be deeper and keener on all hands than that
of his regular antipodes thanks to sheer force of inner contradictions truthfully
conveyed by the author. And here one comes close to another level of contrasting
used by Dickens who not only depicted the most subtle strings of another’s soul,
but interwove them so, as to make impossible any decomposition into vice and
virtue alloyed in a compound mixture called human personality. Creating his hero
the writer endowed Carton with a broad emotional amplitude that allowed him to
go quickly from one extreme to another. The ―seesaw Sydney‖ can in one and the
same breath be reckless and cautious, revealing his spiritual entanglement that
ranges wide from defiant to tender, from humble to negligent. This peculiarity also
accounts for Carton’s inability to stay out of abominable pit of degradation
whereto he gradually descended. This instability of his nature drove him to hard
drinking and humiliating drudgery for his prosperous companion’s benefit; the
same snatched him out of his aimless life and urged to pluck up his spirit and
gather all strength for the desperate stake. The light and the shadow masterly
mixed in his image make him so intensely alive! It is almost the pendulum case,
when to get at the extreme point one must start the opposite spot: the farther the
reach, the greater the swing. Carton stewed in corruption and fell deeper than
Darnay ever could be able to fall under any circumstances, yet only in their last
mutual scene within the walls of Conciergerie when Carton came to change places
with the tomorrow’s condemned, he showed more resolution, courage and
unselfishness than Darnay showed in the whole novel.
So, summing up the creative method used by the author in this book we must
notify that applying for the antithesis he chose the best possible device to stress the
social contradictions and to focus the characters he wanted to single out among the
background of traditional or secondary personages.
49
Тест для самоконтроля с ключами
Указание: В каждом задании выберите один ответ. Номер выбранного ответа укажите
в специальном листе для ответов
1. Stylistics was defined as ―the study of synonymic language resources‖ by______________
a. N. Amosova c. R. Jacobson
b. Ch. Bally d. Ch. Shannon
2. The theory of information was worked out by______________
a. Ch. Bally c. Ch. Shannon
b. I. Galperin d. I. Arnold
3. In terms of information theory ―language‖ may be regarded as a _____________
a. code c. sign
b. channel d. context
4. M. Riffaterre is the author of______________
a. Cultural context c. Verbal context
b. Linguistic context d. Stylistic context
5. ______________ does not include Colloquial style into the classification of functional styles
a. I. Galperin c. I. Arnold
b. M. Kozhina d. A. Morokhovsky
6.The structure of business letters contains the following parts except_____________
a. the draft c. complimentary clause
b. salutation d. the closing
7. One of the following features of the newspaper functional style is not inherent to the lexical
level____________
a. newspaper clichés c. non-term political vocabulary
b. attributive noun groups d. abbreviations
8. This substyle is not included into the belles-lettres style
a. drama c. essays
b. emotive prose d. poetry
9. This group of words does not belong to special literary vocabulary
a. terms c. slang
b. poeticisms d. archaic words
10. Words denoting notions of some branch of science are called_____________
a. dialectal words c. literary coinages
b. barbarisms d. terms
11. The primary meaning of the word is called______________
a. denotation c. derivation
b. connotation d. deviation
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