Dickens uses this technique with regards to Mrs Sparsit’s growing contempt for Louisa throughout the novel. Dickens informs the reader that Mrs Sparsit had always imagined that she would be Mr Bounderby’s wife and therefore his growing interest in Louisa leads to her growing obsession with Louisa. The reader first sees Mrs Sparsit’s underlying contempt for Louisa when she says to Bounderby that he is “quite another father” to the “little puss”. Soon enough Mrs Sparsit’s fears become a reality as Bounderby and Louisa get engaged and she is asked to move out. The fact Bounderby is concerned about how to break the news to her because he is unsure of whether she will be hysterical or refuse to leave adds to her comic dimension, but much to Bounderby’s surprise she takes the news in an “impressively compassionate manner” by saying,
“I fondly hope that Miss Gradgrind may be all you desire and deserve!”
From this point on in the novel she regards Bounderby as a victim, much to his annoyance, as she only senses a miserable future. She repeats several times how she wishes to see Bounderby cheerful as she used to, to remind him of her previous role in his life and reinforce how she believes marrying Louisa was a mistake as Louisa doesn’t play backgammon with him or make him his favourite drink. There is comedy in the way that Mrs Sparsit calls Bounderby a “noodle” to his portrait to emphasis the pity she has for him for entering into such a marriage. Whenever in the presence of Louisa she refuses to call her Mrs Bounderby, but prefers to call her Miss Gradgrind which is very insulting as Louisa is no longer a child but Bounderby’s wife. She takes on a role in front of Louisa as a humble woman for example by kissing Bounderby’s hand and calling him her “benefactor” but this is a technique by Dickens to exaggerate her character and make her more irritating.
Mrs Sparsit’s efforts to continually win back her role as a housekeeper draws Louisa to Harthouse, much to Mrs Sparsit’s delight as it causes the hostility between Bounderby and Louisa to grow. Dickens ironically, chooses for Mrs Sparsit to begin to imagine Louisa down a staircase which has a “dark pit of shame and ruin at the bottom”. There is irony in the fact that the Utilitarian philosophy that Bounderby is a great believer of wouldn’t approve of such fanciful images. It is another chance for Dickens to satirise the philosophy and to express the importance of fancy and how it can never be escaped. Through this idea Dickens is able to create suspense as he reinforces Louisa descending down the staircase because the reader is interested to see what will come of Louisa and Harthouse’s relationship especially as the following chapters are called “Lower and Lower”, and “Down”. Throughout these chapters Dickens makes clear the true extent of Mrs Sparsit’s obsession as:
“If she [Louisa] had once turned back, it might have been the death of Mrs Sparsit”.
Mrs Sparsit’s staircase is necessary for Dickens to compress the meetings between Harthouse and Louisa because by simply stating that Louisa is rapidly descending the staircase is enough information for the reader without having to include their conversations. One could argue that this is one of Mrs Sparsit’s functions in the novel.
Mrs Sparsit’s fascination with Louisa on the “brink of the abyss” reaches new heights in “Lower and Lower” as she tries to play detective in the Harthouse-Louisa mystery. This chapter is very comic as well as melodramatic. Again her caricature dimension is reinforced when she accepts Mr Bounderby’s invitation to his house with,
“your will is to me a law”,
and stating her pity for him and urging him to “be buoyant”. Dickens describes her as “pouncing”, “darting” and “diving” when chasing Louisa and he engages the reader in Mrs Sparsit’s thoughts of urgency as she asks herself,
“Where will she wait for him?”
“Where will they go together?”
Her swift moves, occasional outbursts and final breakdown,
“burst into tears of bitterness”,
could be described as melodramatic but I think it is necessary, for it Dickens to mimic and satirise the women who was “well born” and who is know running around in the rain acting like a “Robinson Crusoe”. It amplifies how far she has fallen down the social ladder and allows Dickens to show how he believes that placing such importance on people with wealthy backgrounds is misplaced.