GCSE Coursework Essay
Charles Dickens, Hard Times
In this novel by Charles Dickens I will be studying the ways in which two characters change throughout the novel. The two characters that I’m going to look at have changed significantly by the end or towards the end of the novel, compared to their character at the beginning. These people are Sir Thomas Gradgrind (the main character) and his daughter, Louisa. The change in these two characters is important because it also embodies the theme of the novel, that is change.
Firstly I’m going to look at Louisa, whose character really opens up as the novel moves on. At the beginning she acted a lot as if she was just ‘another product’ of her father’s upbringing (something I’ll also come on to when I look at Mr. Gradgrind). Due to this, she is possibly even more utilitarian than he is. This means that it’s the greatest good for the greatest number. This could be the reason as to why she is emotionally repressed, where she is unable to recognize or express her emotions: ‘As he now leaned back in his chair, and bent his deep-set eyes upon her in his turn, perhaps he might have seen one wavering moment in her, when she was impelled to throw herself upon his breast, and give her the pent-up confidence of her heart.’ It can be said therefore, that Louisa does not embody the idea of Victorian femininity (sensitivity, compassion and gentleness). However, her sister Sissy does, representing the power of imagination in her character. This changes later on, but the use of the word fire as imagery near the beginning of the novel could signal that all of that emotion is just waiting to come out of her: ‘Yet when the night comes, Fire bursts out, father!’ This feeling of not being able to express emotion leads to her obviously feeling depressed, which is also clearly seen: ‘Removing her eyes from him, she sat so long looking silently towards the town’. However, later on there’s an obvious change in the character of Louisa, as she suddenly becomes much more emotional and is able to express her feelings. This could be because of the breakdown of her marriage to Mr Bounderby, or because of Sissy, whose character is quite the opposite of Louisa’s character at the beginning: ‘A dull anger that she should be seen in her distress, and at hat the involuntary look she had so resented should come to this fulfillment, smoldered within her like an unwholesome fire…………As she softened with the quiet, and the consciousness of being so watched, some tears made their way into her eyes.’ Louisa knows that she’s changed and knows that it’s been Sissy who’s made her change her character. As she’s talking to her, we see Louisa express all of these emotions that have been inside her just waiting to come out: ‘I an so proud and so hardened, so confused and troubled, so resentful and unjust to everyone and to myself’.
