Hard times (Dickens)

by Graham Handley

"My satire is against those who see figures and averages, and nothing else," proclaimed Charles Dickens in explaining the theme of this classic novel. Published in 1854, the story concerns one Thomas Gradgrind, a "fanatic of the demonstrable fact," who raises his children, Tom and Louisa, in a stifling and arid atmosphere of grim practicality.Without a moral compass to guide them, the children sink into lives of desperation and despair, played out against the grim background of Coketown, a wretched community shadowed by an industrial behemoth. Louisa falls into a loveless marriage with Josiah Bouderby, a vulgar banker, while the unscrupulous Tom, totally lacking in principle, becomes a thief who frames an innocent man for his crime. Witnessing the degradation and downfall of his children, Gradgrind realizes that his own misguided principles have ruined their lives.Considered Dickens' harshest indictment of mid-19th-century industrial practices and their dehumanizing effects, this novel offers a fascinating tapestry of Victorian life, filled with the richness of detail, brilliant characterization, and passionate social concern that typify the novelist's finest creations.Of Dickens' work, the eminent Victorian critic John Ruskin had this to "He is entirely right in his main drift and purpose in every book he has written; and all of them, but especially Hard Times, should be studied with close and earnest care by persons interested in social questions."

102 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Graham Handley is a retired lecturer and has published widely on nineteenth-century fiction, particularly on George Eliot, Trollope and Elizabeth Gaskell. He has edited Wuthering Heights for students.

Reviews

[Joy Cagil · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this book, Dickens has his characters symbolize the industrialization during the 19th century. The understanding of the importance of machinery has somehow converted human beings, especially the main characters, into suppressing their emotions and imagination. In the story fact and fancy consistently oppose each other, catching the characters unawares and messing up their perceptions about life. The setting of the story is in Coketown, and industrialized place, which was “neither town nor country.”

The story opens with, “‘Now, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life.” These words are from a speech given by Thomas Gradgrind in the school that he has founded, where he meets a child named Cecilia Jupe (Sissy), who is there temporarily as she is from the circus in town.

From the school, Gradgrind returns to his home called, the Stone Lodge, “a great square house” and “calculated, cast up, balanced” just like Gradgrind himself. In this house, Gradgrind has raised his own children, the oldest teens being Thomas and Louisa. There’s also a Mrs. Gradgrind but she is like a shadow and has no contribution to the plot.

Louisa and Tom have gone to the circus, but when their father finds out about it, he scolds the children for engaging in foolish things and not attending to their schoolwork.

Gradgrind’s best buddy is Mr. Josiah Bounderby, a rich banker and businessman. He is coarse, big, and loud, and always brags about his poverty-stricken background and how he rose from it. Dickens calls him, “the Bully of humility.”

Before the circus leaves town, even though Gradgrind didn’t want it much, he ends up taking in the smart, kind, and imaginative Sissy Jupe as a charity, after Sissy’s father, the circus entertainer, disappears. Sissy becomes a good friend to Louisa, eventually.

When the children grow up a bit, on her father’s urging, when she is nineteen, Louisa marries Bounderby decades older than her. She is miserable in her marriage and is disgusted with her husband. Eventually, in the story we learn that she married him to save Tom from getting in trouble with Bounderby’s bank.

Louisa is a confused person who feels she is missing on life, even though she is very well educated in the serious studies her father had designed. Tom has ended up worse. He is a selfish and lazy person and a gambler. Even though his older sister loves him and saves him from many possible disasters, he feels no closeness or appreciation for her.

The rest of the story circles around factory workers organizing into a union, Gradgrind being elected to Parliament, James Harthouse a smooth wannabe politician who tries to seduce Loiusa, Bounderby’s bank getting robbed, and many other characters such as Stephen, Rachel, and Sissy.

The story’s ending is satisfactory enough, given all the commotion and upheaval the plot grants the primary and secondary. characters.

As usual, I found Dickens’ characterization to be excellent, especially the descriptions of the main characters with wit and humor added to them. The plot is complicated, and although, I couldn’t quite warm up to Gradgrind’s and Bounderby’s ways, I enjoyed reading the book, if for nothing but for its social commentary.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best, most imaginative books on the consequences of the Industrial Revolution. Dickens is great.