A Tale of Two Cities is a novel that works on several levels. Most study it as social commentary about the French Revolution, but even those not interested in history will find it a book of interest, because it is quite possibly the most romantic love story ever told’.

1. Thomas
Carlyle
Charles Dickens
Alias
Boz
A PPT. By
Indranil Sarkar
Sapatgram College, Sapatgram, Assam
Contact-9859945270

2. • ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ (1859) is Dickens’s best novel. In the tale, the use of
historical technique is quite perfect. Dickens used the elements of history
not only to advance the plot, but also to show connections between life in
the eighteenth century and the novel. History is also used to show the
partnership between evil and history itself. Dickens showed how the people
felt about the government, how they acted, and what the end result was. He
showed many parallel connections between the novel and history including
characters, events, places, and overall feelings.
• The novel began in England and ended in England but the characters
dangled between Paris and London like a pendulum bob.
[London>Paris>London>>Paris>>>London] England tried to stay out of all
the fuss that was going on in France. A New Historicism of the novel has
shown the falsities of History revealing the realities.
• ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ is in reality a historiography of Victorian Age not
simply a history of the French Revolution. No actual people from the time
appeared in the book. Dickens purposefully borrowed only the components
of history in his novel. It’s a fictionalized history. Carlyle’s ‘French
Revolution’peeps at every page.

3. Even after 200 years the opening sentence of Dickens’s best novel ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ is
considered as an example of classic prose narrative. It reads -----
• 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.
• 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. In both
countries it was clearer than crystal to the lords of the State preserves of loaves and fishes, that
things in general were settled for ever.

4. The Story: Part-1
Dr.Manette, a French doctor has been held in the terrible
Bastille prison for 16 years. Marquis de Evermonde
did it by manipulating law. This was done because
Dr.Mannete came to know the evil acts of murder and
rape of a peasant girl and her brother and father by
the Evermondes.
• The story begins following the footsteps of Jarvis
Lorry, an old and responsible employee of Tellson’s
Bank which had branches in Both London and Paris.
He was also the trustee of Lucie Mannete, the
daughter of Dr.Mannete. Meanwhile Charles Darney,
the nephew of that evil Evermonde, fell in love with
Lucie without being aware of the story of Dr.
Mannete.
• Mr. Lorry felt it necessary to unite Dr.Mannete with
Lucie who was freed after the ‘Storming of the
Bastille’. He was found half crazy when his daughter
and Mr. Lorry met him in Paris. They took him back to
London and helped him to improve his health and
memory.
A Tale of Two Cities
Ultra-Condensed by Liz Coppla—
Doctor released,
Marquis deceased,
Darnay acquitted,
Monarchy submitted,
Marriage announced,
Darnay denounced,
Places are switched,
Blades are twitched,
Seamstress cries,
Carton dies.
Darnay marries,
The story ends----with dying Carton’s
claim;
‘At least a son
In each of your successive generations
Should be named after Carton’.

5. Story:Part-2
• Five years later Charles Darnay was accused of being a spy but due to his similar
appearance with Sydney Carton, the English pleader in the court room, he
escaped punishment. Both Carton and Darnay fell in love with Lucie.
• Darnay proposed Lucie. But, once when he went to France to help the tax
collector Gabelle, an earlier servant of their estate. He was arrested. Lucie and
Dr. Manate followed him trying to do their best when he was locked in a cell of
the prison of La Force.
• Finally, he was freed and was put in another room next day. This time Charles
was put to death. Finding no way to save Darnay, Carton decided to save him by
making a sacrifice for his own life. He exchanged position with Darney and was
guillotined. Darney returned to London and married Lucie.
• Dr. Mannete gradually returned to normal life.
• Carton remained the most popular hero in literature through his act of sacrifice.
The End

6. 1757-1794 : The Period represented in ‘A Tale of
Two cities’.

8. Plot Map of
A Tale of Two Cities

10. Storming of the
Bastille,14 July 1789.

11. • Though A Tale of Two Cities begins in 1770 with Doctor Nanette's release
from the Bastille and ends in late 1793 or early 1794, the story as a whole
covers a much broader period. In the larger view, the novel begins in 1757
(the year of Doctor Manette’s incarceration under the ancient régime) and its
final scene anticipates a post-revolutionary Paris. However, as a historical
novel organized around the events of the French Revolution (1789-1794),
the major historical features of A Tale of Two Cities are drawn from the major
events of the revolutionary period in France – the fall of the Bastille (July 14,
1789), the September Massacres (September 2-6, 1792), and the Reign of
Terror (1793-1794).

12. DR.Mannate Saint Antoine

13. of
Darney
Lucie

14. of

15. of
• Mr..Jarvis Lorry is one of the oldest
employees of Tellson's Bank, and he
frequently deals with the bank's offices
in London and Paris. He is a confirmed
bachelor and a man of business. He has
served the Manette family since
Dr.Alexandre Manette's imprisonment.
He takes Lucie Manette to Paris to
retrieve her father and is troubled by
what they will find on their arrival. All
through the novel he acts as a divine
angel to the main characters and finally
shapes the destiny of Darney and Lucie.
• He is one of the best character that
Dickens had ever created.
• He is the most important character in
the novel.
Source:-
http://www.ataleof2cities.com/cast-
biography & wikipedia.org

16. of

17. of
In order to understand the novel properly, a bit of Dickens’s personal life is required to
be known. ‘A tale of Two cities 'was Dickens’ last but one and acclaimed as his best
novel. He required to make it a perfect piece of literature to recover his lost
reputation. He thought of ‘French Revolution’ and asked his friend Thomas Carlyle
to tell something about the Revolution.(He was neither a philosopher nor an
intellectual.) Carlyle, it is said, oblized his friend’s request by sending ‘a cart load
of books’ to Dickens. Of which Dickens picked out only Carlyle’s ‘French
Revolution’ and kept it in the pocket of his overcoat till he finished the novel. As
such ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ is sometimes called the fictionalized history of the
French Revolution. The language of the novel is so poetic that a critic has gone to
the extent of calling it Dickens’ best poem not novel.

18. The significant court room.

20. • As John D. Rosenberg
observes in his
Introduction, The French
Revolution is “one of the
grand poems of
[Carlyle’s] century, yet its
poetry consists in being
everywhere scrupulously
rooted in historical
fact.”And Dickens’s ‘A
Tale of Two cities’ is the
fictionalized historicism
of ‘The French
Revolution’.

23. Sydney
Carton

24. Robespierre Guillotined

25. September
massacre

26. And lastly, one closes the book with the
following impression—
‘A Tale of Two Cities is a novel that works on several
levels. Most study it as social commentary about
the French Revolution, but even those not interested
in history will find it a book of interest, because it is
quite possibly the most romantic love story ever
told’.
****