“A bare, monotonous, vault of a classroom”
This gives us the impression of a prison cell which sounds like no type of place to bring up children for seven hours a day and thirty-five hours a week. When we look back and compare this “prison cell” to our modern classrooms there is an obvious difference. The modern classrooms have interesting features such as colour, posters etc. This seems like a much better place to bring up children. Dickens then describes the children as being;
“Little vessels …. Ready to have imperial gallons of facts
poured into them until they were full to the brim.”
This gives us an impression of jugs; ready to be filled with drink, the exact same job they were made to do. But, shouldn’t children have an imagination and be able to think for themselves no to just learn facts. However he uses the word “Ready” so maybe the children wanted to be full of facts. Dickens then introduces us to two characters. Firstly we are introduced to “Sissy” Jupe. Mr Gradgrind speaks to “Sissy” because he doesn’t know who she is. He addresses her as “Girl Number 20” which makes us think that the children don’t even get to have their own names in the classroom. This is in contrast to today, where children are addressed by their first names by teacher. Mr Gradgrind then asks “Sissy” to describe a horse. “Sissy” is speechless as she is new to the classroom and wants to keep on the “right” side of Mr Gradgrind. So she says nothing and looks blank. Mr Gradgrind then asks another student who has been part of his system for a long time now. The young boy is called Bitzer and he says a horse is a;
“Quadruped. Graminivorous. Forty teeth, namely twenty-four grinders,
four eye teeth and twelve incisive. Sheds coat in spring;
in marshy countries, sheds hooves too. Hooves hard, but
requiring to be shod with iron. Age known by marks in mouth”
This gives the reader the impression of a robot which just gives out facts, or a boy who “ate a dictionary for breakfast”. As you can see Bitzer’s version is based purely on facts and this is how Dickens portrays the Education System. He makes out that it is all the children were taught. We know that they aren’t allowed to imagine anything or think of anything but facts because we see Mr Gradgrind say;
“Ay, ay, ay! But you mustn’t fancy.”
This is where he uses fancy to mean imagination. This shows that Mr Gradgrind fills the children with facts and cuts out all the imagination which children thrive upon. We see this backfire on Mr Gradgrind later on in the book. We are at the stage when Mr Thomas Gradgrind’s son is about to be arrested for robbing a bank and Mr Gradgrind says to Bitzer;
“Bitzer … have you a heart?”
This is replied to, when Bitzer says;
“The circulation, sir … couldn’t be carried on without one. No
man, sir, acquainted with the facts established by Harvey
relating to the circulation of the blood can doubt that
I have a heart.”
Mr Gradgrind realises that his system has a major flaw because he wants to help his son escape but he is stopped by the lack of compassion in Bitzer’s heart, which is only full of reason.
Charles Dickens’ had a poor upbringing and before he became an author he lived in a poor environment. He was born on February 7th 1812 into a family who were in financial trouble. This led to his father finding himself in prison for his debt problems. Charles Dickens went to school and at the age of twelve he went to “Warren’s Blacking Factory” to work. This must have affected his later life as his hard lifestyle will have made him a “harder” person with “harder” views. This means his views of the education system will be biased as he must’ve thought the system had failed him. I think his biased ness will come out in his writing.
During the main body of the book we find out how the plot develops. In the book young Tom Gradgrind becomes a dissipated, self interested hedonist. Louisa struggles with her life and feels that something is missing. Here we see that it is her “fancy”. She then marries Josiah Bounderby of Coketown who claims he is a self-made man who says he was left in the gutter by his mother. Bounderby is a middle class man as is Gradgrind and the two are friends. Josiah is twice Louisa’s age and he is a bank and factory owner. Tom is apprenticed at Bounderby’s bank whereas “Sissy” remains at the Gradgrind household.
We also meet Mrs Pegler, a strange old woman with an inexplicable devotion to Bounderby. James Harthouse also arrives in town; he has come to be a disciple of Gradgrind, who is a Member of Parliament. He takes an interest in Louisa and tries to seduce her.
Stephen Blackpool a local “hand”/worker leave his job at Bounderby’s factory when he is put under pressure to join the union. Young Thomas Gradgrind visits him and asks him to stand outside the bank each night for a week. Thomas Gradgrind says that if Blackpool does this he may get financial aid. Blackpool does so but the aid never comes. Stephen the leaves the town and the bank is robbed soon after. The lone suspect is Blackpool – the vanished hand who was seen outside the bank on several nights before he left.
Mrs Sparsit, Bounderby’s maid, sees James Harthouse declaring his love for Louisa. Harthouse asks her to come and meet him; she does not but returns to Gradgrinds house. Gradgrind realises how there is not only “reason of the head” but that there is “reason of the heart” the latter which Louisa lacks. He realises that the philosophy of rational self-interest that he taught her has made her a very “cold” and emotional less character. “Sissy” convinces Harthouse to leave the town as it is best for Louisa. Dickens’ then uses juxtaposition to place Bounderby (the middleclass) vs. Blackpool (working class). Bounderby is still after Blackpool whom he thinks committed the robbery. Blackpool hears of the robbery and comes back from his new town to clear his name. However, on his way back he falls down a disused mine shaft. Rachael and Louisa find him and he dies after an emotional farewell to Rachael, who he loved. Gradgrind then realises it must be his son Tom and so proceeds to try and get him out of the country. They get some help from “Sissy’s” old friends the circus people. They are nearly successful, but are stopped by Bitzer now a bank worker. The circus proprietor helps Tom slip out of Bitzers grasp and the young robber escapes. Mrs Sparsit, anxious to help Bounderby find the robber, drags in Mrs Pegler. Whom she thinks is an associate of Blackpools. We actually find out that Mrs Pegler is Mr Bounderby’s mother who loved him dearly but was forbidden to visit him. This means that Bounderby wasn’t such a self-made man after all. Angrily Bounderby fires Mrs Sparsit and sends her away. Five years later he will die alone in the streets of Coketown. “Sissy” however marries and has a large loving family. Louisa on the other hand doesn’t remarry and never had children but is loved by “Sissy’s” family. Gradgrind gives up his philosophy of fact and devotes his life to helping the poor by using his political power.
In the book, Dickens describes the Victorian Education System he explains about the classrooms which I touched upon before. He also explains the number system in which “Sissy” is girl number twenty. These factors contrast to a classroom now-a-days in which the teacher calls the pupil by his/her first name and the pupil calls the teacher by his/her title i.e. Sir, Miss etc. Students in classrooms are also allowed to express their opinions and are asked for their thoughts.
When we look at the way Dickens describes the characters and society we can see a contrast in his views and how we might explain it. He uses different techniques to show that the characters are all very different but are all alike. When he explains Thomas Gradgrind the first time he tells us of a square man who has;
“… Square coat … square legs … “
We can tell Dickens’ is exaggerating here as no-body could have completely square features and eyebrows which “help the emphasis”. From looking at Gradgrind we can see that Dickens’ doesn’t write realistically. However, when we examine “Sissy” we can see that his characters do vary and Dickens’ can write realistically, as “Sissy” has a heart and is compassionate. She doesn’t employ Gradgrind’s system of facts but uses common sense. She is asked for the proportion of starving people from 2 sets of figures. Instead of working out the proportion she says;
“I thought that it must be just as hard upon those who were
starved whether the others were a million or a million million.”
This shows that she cares for those concerned. This is alike real life where people we meet can be different, alien like or how might we say normal.
In “Hard Times” Dickens’ does write realistically in a sense. However, in the first two chapters he writes in a more exaggerated way to arouse interest in the book. As this was written in weekly instalments he would have wanted to excite his readers with interesting first chapters so that they continue to buy the magazine. I think that after the first couple of chapter when Dickens’ has an interested audience he starts to write in a more realistic fashion. In conclusion, life didn’t turn out the way that was expected by many characters in “Hard Times.” Those who strived to have perfect children didn’t. And those who were looked down on proved to be essential characters in finding that there was more to life than what they were taught.
