The Annotated A Tale Of Two Cities

*This book was previously released under the title "A Tale of Two Cities: A Reader's Companion."* You've read "A Tale of Two Cities"-perhaps more than once. But what are gaols, bumpers, tocsins, farmer-generals, and the Court of King's Bench? Where are Shooter's Hill, Temple Bar, and La Force, and who on earth was Mrs. Southcott? And did all those starving French people have baguettes in mind when they wanted bread? "The Annotated A Tale of Two Cities" is not a literary analysis of Dickens's novel, but a source of information for the new reader, the longterm fan, and the student, about things, people, places, and events mentioned in the text. In 780 notes to the unabridged novel, historical author and independent scholar Susanne Alleyn explains Dickens's references to things and places familiar to 19th-century Londoners, illustrates his many literary allusions and Victorian expressions, and provides an in-depth, factual background to his gripping but often misleading depiction of the French Revolution-a period that owes much of its distorted image today to the popularity of "A Tale of Two Cities" itself.

A Tale of Two Cities (1859) is the second historical novel by Charles Dickens, set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. It depicts the plight of the French proletariat under the brutal oppression of t+E3he French aristocracy in the years leading up to the revolution, and the corresponding savage brutality demonstrated by the revolutionaries toward the former aristocrats in the early years of the revolution. It follows the lives of several protagonists through these events, most notably Charles Darnay, a French once-aristocrat who falls victim to the indiscriminate wrath of the revolution despite his virtuous nature, and Sydney Carton, a dissipated English barrister who endeavours to redeem his ill-spent life out of love for Darnay's wife, Lucie Manette.

Since its publication in 1859, A Tale of Two Cities has remained the best-known fictional recreation of the French Revolution, and one of Charles Dickens’s most exciting novels. A Tale of Two Cities blends a moving love story with the familiar figures of the Revolution—Bastille prisoners, a starving Parisian mob, and an indolent aristocracy. Taking the form of a sourcebook, this guide to Dickens's dramatic novel offers: extensive introductory comment on the contexts and many interpretations of the text, from publication to the present annotated extracts from key contextual documents, reviews, critical works and the text itself cross-references between documents and sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticism suggestions for further reading. This volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of A Tale of Two Cities and seeking not only a guide to the novel, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds Dickens' text.

A collection of various pieces of poetry and prose.

Often criticised for its melodramatic 'soap-opera' plot, Dickens' bold treatment of the violence and terrors of the French Revolution is still widely read and enjoyed today. This text looks at critical themes in the novel, as well as looking closely at the context in which it is set

"Charles Dickens' historical novel A Tale of Two Cities follows the life of Doctor Alexandre Manette following his eighteen-year imprisonment in the Bastille. The text of the novel is based on the first edition published by Chapman and Hall (1859) and reproduces the original illustrations. The text is accompanied by explanatory footnotes and a note on the text and illustrations. "Contexts" includes selections by Charles Dickens on France and the French, contemporary responses to the French Revolution and its aftermath, writings and correspondence on the composition of A Tale of Two Cities, and theatrical adaptations during the nineteenth century. "Criticism" features contemporary reviews and responses, followed by essays that examine the style, sources and inspirations, and historical framework of the novel, in addition to other critical viewpoints. A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are included"--

First published in 1993. This annotated bibliography covers all material relating to A Tale o f Two Cities from Dickens’s first hints of it in his Book o f Memoranda to critical studies published in 1991. It is divided into three main parts: “Text,” “Studies,” and “Selected Bibliography.”

A Tale of Two Cities, novel by Charles Dickens, published both serially and in book form in 1859. The story is set in the late 18th century against the background of the French Revolution. Although Dickens borrowed from Thomas Carlyle's history, The French Revolution, for his sprawling tale of London and revolutionary Paris, the novel offers more drama than accuracy. The scenes of large-scale mob violence are especially vivid, if superficial in historical understanding.The complex plot involves Sydney Carton's sacrifice of his own life on behalf of his friends Charles Darnay and Lucie Manette. While political events drive the story, Dickens takes a decidedly antipolitical tone, lambasting both aristocratic tyranny and revolutionary excess-the latter memorably caricatured in Madame Defarge, who knits beside the guillotine. The book is perhaps best known for its opening lines, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," and for Carton's last speech, in which he says of his replacing Darnay in a prison cell, "It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known."

A Tale of Two Cities differs essentially from all of Dickens' other novels in style and manner of treatment. Forster, in his 'Life of Dickens,' writes that "there is no instance in his novels excepting this, of a deliberate and planned departure from the method of treatment which had been pre-eminently the source of his popularity as a novelist." To rely less upon character than upon incident, and to resolve that his actors should be expressed by the story more than they should express themselves by dialogue, was for him a hazardous, and can hardly be called an entirely successful, experiment. With singular dramatic vivacity, much constructive art, and with descriptive passages of a high order everywhere, there was probably never a book by a great humorist, and an artist so prolific in conception, with so little humor and so few remarkable figures. Its merit lies elsewhere. The two cities are London and Paris. The time is just before and during the French Revolution. A peculiar chain of events knits and interweaves the lives of a "few simple, private people" with the outbreak of a terrible public event. Dr. Manette has been a prisoner in the Bastille for eighteen years, languishing there, as did so many others, on some vague unfounded charge. His release when the story opens, his restoration to his daughter Lucie, the trial and acquittal of one Charles Darnay, nephew of a French marquis, on a charge of treason, the marriage of Lucie Manette to Darnay,— these incidents form the introduction to the drama of blood which is to follow. Two friends of the Manette family complete the circle of important characters: Mr.