The pupils are addressed by number and not name, this shows they are stripped of their identity and personality. Gradgrind believes what children have to offer is not important; they do not need opinions, imagination thoughts and ideas he thinks all they need is facts.
“In this life we want nothing but facts.”
This clearly shows his attitude and emphasises the point that he will not only feed them facts but he will ‘strip’ them of everything else. A number or calculation may also be easier for Gradgrind to remember and comprehend as he is ‘a man of fact and calculations’. The relationship between the pupil and teacher isn’t personal. This shows they were taught in a military style.
Dickens introduces Bitzer and Sissy to show a contrast, and the effects of the education system. Sissy is from the circus and Bitzer has been in the school all his life. Bitzer is the model pupil.
“His skin was so unwholesomely deficient in the natural tinge…. He would bleed white.”
This shows he has no personality. He is a bland ‘unwholesome’ person. He has no colour; an effect of been in the ‘vault’ of a schoolroom all his life. Bitzer has had no childhood; he has never played outside in the sunshine. Whereas Sissy who has spent her life travelling ‘seemed to receive a deeper and more lustrous colour’. Sissy is a ‘deeper’ person; she has personality and opinion.
“I am very fond of flowers.”
Gradgrind’s school has not damaged her yet. Through Bitzer and Sissy, Dickens is making the reader aware that the education system is damaging. He is showing that children do need ‘fancy’, which Sissy had in the circus, to be able to grow up as a well rounded, happy person.
The atmosphere in the classroom is not one which encourages learning for children.
“The scene was a plain bare monotonous vault of a schoolroom.”
Dickens portrays the schoolroom as a prison or boot camp. He implies they are locked up by using the word ‘vault’. The children are restricted in what they can do; they have to sit in silence at all times. The ‘bare’ walls provide no stimulation, it is extremely boring. There is no encouragement and their imaginations are not exercised. The atmosphere is depressing and not suitable for children. The children are frightened.
“He seemed a kind of cannon loaded to the muzzle with facts, and prepared to blow them clean out of the region of child hood at one discharge.”
They are being taught by someone who is a hard figure and doesn’t care about them. The children are scared of the teacher and do not feel safe but they still respect him and want to please him. Dickens created images by using specific words. He uses the words ‘vault’, ‘bare’, ‘monotonous’ and ‘cannon’ so that reader builds a picture of a child imprisoned, upset and scared. This shocks the reader as they know it’s not a place where children should be.
The quality of learning and teaching is very poor. The children aren’t actually taught they just recite facts.
Bitzer: “Quadruped. Gaminivorous. Forty teeth…”
Gradgrind: “Now girl number 20 you know what a horse is.”
We see that the facts they learn are useless. Bitzer’s description is no help; someone who has never seen a horse would still not know what one looked like. Sissy, with her natural understanding of a horse contradicts the cold definition. Dickens uses irony as Gradgrind implies that Sissy, who has grown up with horses, didn’t know what a horse was until after Bitzer’s recited definition. Sissy and the other children are probably more confused about what a horse is after she has heard Biter’s definition. The children don’t actually understand what they are saying all they can do is recite facts that make no sense to them and won’t help them in life. They also don’t know how to think about things and work out the answer.
“Do you ever see horses walking up and down the sides of rooms in reality?”
“Yes sir!” from one half.
“No sir!” from the other.
When they are questioned by the government officer they do not know the answer to simple questions. The children just want to be right and simply guess the answer. They judge what answer he wants by his expression. This is also an ironic comment on the usefulness of reciting factual definitions as Bitzer did of the horse.
Dickens describes teachers as a factory product.
“He and some one hundred and forty schoolmasters had been lately turned at the same time, in the same factory…like so many pianoforte legs.”
They have no individuality, are robotic and boring. Dickens describes teacher training as reproduction of the same thing. The only things teachers know and can teach are ‘facts’.
“Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else.”
Dickens creates a gardening image by the use of ‘plant’ and ‘root’. However the process he describes is un-natural and doesn’t help. The education system and teachers are ‘annihilating the flowers of existence’. Dickens is suggesting to the reader that the teaching isn’t helping the children at all. He is trying the make the reader aware that this education system isn’t going to produce well rounded happy adults.
They will not know what feelings are and how to cope with them. The only jobs they are going to be able to do are ones which only involve facts and calculations or ones which do not require them to think. This makes the reader wonder if Gradgrind is just setting the children up to only be able to work in his factories.
Gradgrind’s own children are educated at home. However their education runs on the same principles as what is taught in Gradgrind’s school. Their education has never allowed them to ‘learn the silly jingle, twinkle twinkle little star’ they have never been allowed to have fun and play games.
“Almost as soon as they could run alone, they have been made to run to the lecture room.”
Gradgrind’s children are filled up with facts even more than the children in the school. They are not allowed story books or entertainment. But they still wonder what the circus is like and Louisa questions Sissy about her father; the clown. This shows the Gradgrind children want what they have been deprived of. This way of life for the Gradgrind children has ‘damaged’ them.
“I was tired I have been tired a long time…. Of everything I think.”
Louisa is obviously depressed. Dickens uses her to convey just how damaging having no childhood is. But as Gradgrind is no longer capable of making judgements about feelings he is not aware how unhappy his own children are.
“You are childish.”
Dickens uses irony and emphasises Gradgrind’s views as Louisa is a child so why shouldn’t she be childish. Dickens is suggesting that what Gradgrind believes children don’t need is exactly what they do need to lead a happy life.
Sissy has a good relationship with her father, they love each other and show that affection, they talk to each other, have fun together and support one another. The relationship between Louisa and her father is a contrast to that of Sissy and hers. Louisa cannot talk to her father about emotions or thoughts as he does not understand them or believe they are important. When he presents Mr Bounderby’s proposal to Louisa he presents it as facts.
“Now, where are the facts in this case...a large proportion of these marriages are contracted between parties of unequal ages.”
This emphasises his obsession with facts and calculating things as he does not even recognise marriage should be about love and feelings.
Louisa: “Do you ask me to love Mr Bounderby?”
Gradgrind: “No I ask nothing.”
Gradgrind sees marriage as a contract he wants statistically the best person for his child. Louisa knows she does not and cannot love Mr Bounderby but she does what she has been taught to and looks at the facts ignoring her feelings. She is ‘satisfied to accept his proposal’.
“What do I know…of tastes and fancies; of aspirations and affections…what escape have I had from problems that could be demonstrated and realities that could be grasped?”
Louisa does not know about ‘fancies’ she has never been able to ‘escape’ problems. She cannot work out that the marriage is the wrong thing to do and is going to cause her great upset and problems. Dickens is making it clear to the reader that facts are taken to the extreme and because they are all the children know, they set themselves up for an unhappy life.
“You have trained me so well, that I never dreamed a child’s dream”
The word ‘train’ emphasises the point that the children are not taught. Gradgrind does not know how to teach them. This also shows that Louisa herself knows she has never been a ‘child’ but Gradgrind sees this as ‘his success’.
The futures of the children are not good. Louisa finds someone she loves but because she does not know how to deal with feelings, she can’t work out what to do.
“Would you have doomed me, at any time, to the frost and blight that have hardened and spoil me?”
Louisa has realised that it’s because of her father’s theories that she is unhappy and her life is a mess.
“What a much better and happier creature I should have been this day.”
If she had experienced feelings before, she may not have made the same mistakes and would have known what to do. This makes Gradgrind listen and think about his theories.
“There is wisdom of the head and that there is wisdom of the heart…I have supposed the head to be all-sufficient. It may not be all sufficient. “
Gardgrind has seen the effect of his theories on his own child and has realised he was wrong. He has realised that if she was allowed to ‘fancy’ when she was younger she would not be in the mess she’s in. This makes the reader very clear that it is because of Gradgrind that the children’s futures are not happy and fulfilled. Dickens is also showing that Gradgrind was so set in his ways that it took his own children’s lives to be totally destroyed before he would listen and realise he was wrong.
Tom has also been damaged by Gradgrind he uses facts all through his life.
“So many people are employed in situations of trust; so many people, out of so many will be dishonest.”
Tom uses a fact to pardon himself for robbing the bank where he worked. Gradgrind sees that teaching his children to always look at the facts to decide on things has
turned against him. His own son has broken the law and it is essentially Gradgrinds fault. Dickens is showing that not only has not allowing the children to ‘fancy’ or have an imagination damaged them but filling them with facts and teaching the children to use facts has also had a negative effect on them.
Bitzer, the model pupil, works at the bank and wants Tom’s job. He surveys the facts and finds out Tom was responsible for the robbery and captures him. Gradgrind wants him to let Tom go and not tell any one what he has done.
“Bitzer…have you a heart?”
Gradgrind wants Bitzer to pity his family but Bitzer doesn’t know what these feelings are and doesn’t have them.
“No man, sir, acquainted with the facts established by Harvey relating to the circulation of the blood, can doubt that I have a heart.”
All Bitzer knows is facts. The reader realises that not only has Gradgrind damaged other people and destroyed their lives he has also caused problems for himself and his family.
The only child able to lead a happy and fulfilled life is Sissy. This demonstrates that the education system is damaging as although Sissy tried to fit in and adjust to it she couldn’t. She never turned into the type of child Gradgrind wanted. Although the education system did cause her upset. Her dad ran away as he felt that it was because of him and who he was, that she couldn’t fit in. However because of Sissy’s presence in the Gradgrind household she did save Jane Gradgrind from following in her sibling’s footsteps.
Louisa: “What a beaming face you have Jane.”
Jane: “I am sure it must be Sissy’s doing.”
Dickens is making sure the reader is aware that the only reason Jane is happy is because Sissy has had an influence on her. Sissy has let her have fun and ‘fancy’ behind Gradgrind’s back. Dickens ensures that we are aware that the futures of the children were damaged because of the education system.
Dickens uses many different techniques in the portrayal of the education system. The structure of the novel is significant. The separate book titles within the novel represent a gardening process. He is suggesting that a natural process is being distorted. He is saying if you sow the seeds wrong, look what they are like when you harvest them. Dickens is suggesting Gradgrind is teaching the children the wrong things and look at how their adult lives turn out; unhappy and destroyed. He also uses significant chapter titles. ‘One thing needful’ refers to Gradgrind’s obsession with facts. However because Dickens then presents him in a negative way within the chapter the reader understands that Dickens does not agree with him and the chapter title is ironic. ‘Another thing needful’ suggests Gradgrind has finally learnt facts aren’t everything. It also provides continuity throughout the novel as it is very similar to the first chapter title and clearly shows Gradgrind has progressed. Through the second chapter title; ‘murdering the innocents’, Dickens is getting his point across about how he feels early on in the novel. He is clearly suggesting that the education system is destroying the children who are vulnerable and haven’t done any thing wrong. In the second chapter Dickens uses word associated with war to imply there is a war waging against childhood. This suggests to the reader Gradgrind is totally against childhood altogether.
In the first chapter Dickens uses repetition of the words ‘facts’, ‘nothing else’ and ‘the emphasis was helped by’. This shows how important facts are to Mr Gradgrind and it makes the reader think, right from the start of the novel, that he is obsessed with facts. The repetition also becomes quite boring; this means the reader gets the impression that Mr Gradgrind is a boring person. Dickens also uses exaggeration and caricature, like the one of Gradgrind been ‘square’, to get his point across. Throughout ‘Hard Times’ Dickens creates imagery through language. This enables the reader to build up a better understanding about what Dickens wants them to think.
Irony is used throughout the novel. This provides some humour but at the same time allows Dickens to make his point through deliberate contradiction.
“They had been made to run to the lecture room…a large blackboard with a dry ogre chalking ghastly white figures on it.”
The word ‘ogre’ provides irony as ogres are mythical creatures not facts.
“Not that they knew, by name or nature, anything about an ogre. Fact forbid! I use the word to express a monster in a lecturing castle…taking childhood captive.”
Here Dickens voice appears directly in the narrative in an attempt to make sure the reader understands what point he was making when he used the word ‘ogre’. Throughout ‘Hard Times’ Dickens’ voice intrudes into the novel.
“Rather overdone, M’Choakumchild. If he had only learnt a little less, how infinitely better he might have taught.”
This shows Dickens’ frustration with the quality of teaching. He feels that if teachers knew a few less facts then they might actually teach the children about the facts they do know, or allow them to imagine things and explore fiction, rather than just getting them to recite lots of facts which they don’t understand and mean nothing to them. Through the authors intervention the reader becomes aware that ‘Hard Times’ is not just a novel. Dickens feels strongly about the education system and is frustrated at those who feel it is healthy and of value to children. ‘Hard Times’ could be said to be a satirical portrayal of education as Dickens scrutinises the system and picks out every bad aspect of it and uses irony to help him do this. He makes the reader see the bad things about the education system, and makes them look at the effects of it has on the children.
The education system in ‘Hard Times’ is presented in a very negative way. It is shown to ‘damage’ the children and not actually teach them anything of any importance. Dickens uses many different techniques to make the reader aware of how bad the system is and also makes his own thoughts clear. I think Dickens would like to have seen education exercising the children’s imaginations, allowing them to experience feelings and learn what they mean and how to deal with them. He would have liked to have seen the children actually been taught and allowed a greater freedom to do other things like play and imagine, rather than just reciting facts. Dickens makes it very clear throughout the novel that he feels fun should be on the curriculum and children should enjoy going to school and learning; they should be allowed to be children and enjoy childish things. From the futures Dickens created for the characters in ‘Hard Times’ we see that he felt if the curriculum was changed people would lead better, happier, fulfilled lives.
