Hard Times

Charles Dickens - Hard Times (1854)

Thomas Gradgrind, a wealthy, retired merchant in the industrial city of Coketown, England, devotes his life to a philosophy of rationalism, self-interest, and fact. He raises his oldest children, Louisa and Tom, according to this philosophy and never allows them to engage in fanciful or imaginative pursuits. He founds a school and charitably takes in one of the students, the kindly and imaginative Sissy Jupe, after the disappearance of her father, a circus entertainer.

Themes;
- Mechanization of human beings,
- The opposition between fact and fancy,
- The importance of feminity       

Motifs;  
- Bounderby's Childhood,
- Clocks and time.

Symbols;
- Staircases,
- Pegasus,
- Smoke serpents,
- Fire.

Symbolism, Imagery and Allegory;

- Fairy palaces and elephants (a.k.a the factories and the machinery inside of them) 
- Fire, Sparks and Ashes.
- Turtle Soup, Venison and Gold Spoon. 
- Mrs Sparsit's Staircase,
- Old Hell Shaft.

Setting;
- Coketown, England in the mid-19th century, Victorian England.

The Narrator;

The narration is omnicsent (in third person.)

Question posed; Who is the narrator, can she or he read minds, and, more importantly, can we trust her or him?

The novel is full of characters who are only completely unable to communicate with one another. What's more, most of them don't really even have a way of internally processing the events happening around them. Some, like Bounderby, are in total denial, while others, like Louisa, are too deeply detached from their emotions to react appropriately to anything.

Genre;

Family Drama, Literary Fiction, Philosophical Literature

Tone;

- Sarcastic, Rueful, Mocking, Authoritative, Detached.

Dickens often uses the trick of distancing readers from the characters and the plot. For instance, let's look at this description of Bounderby talking to Mrs. Gradgrind, in Book 1, Chapter 4:

"[Bounderby] stood before the fire, partly because it was a cool spring afternoon…partly because he thus took up a commanding position, from which to subdue Mrs. Gradgrind[…]

Mrs. Gradgrind, a little, thin, white, pink-eyed bundle of shawls, of surpassing feebleness, mental and bodily; who was always taking physic without any effect, and who, whenever she showed a symptom of coming to life, was invariably stunned by some weighty piece of fact tumbling on her[…]

'For years, ma'am, I was one of the most miserable little wretches ever seen. I was so sickly, that I was always moaning and groaning. I was so ragged and dirty, that you wouldn't have touched me with a pair of tongs.'

Mrs. Gradgrind faintly looked at the tongs, as the most appropriate thing her imbecility could think of doing. (1.4.5-11)"

Here, it's the narrator's voice that tells us with unquestioned authority what to make of these two people.

Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit

Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit - Jeanette Winterson (1983)

Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit is a definite struggle for modern identity. The entirety of the book is woven with black humour, opposing and antagonistic themes of religion and sexuality and twisted tales of folklore. There is an ambiguous setting for the novel; it is somewhere between the contemporary and the traditional which mirrors the themes involved. Jeanette’s struggle for identity was inevitable. It was always going to be a struggle because she had an identity forced upon her by her God-driven Mother who pre-determined her path in life. Perhaps all would have gone to plan if Jeanette had not gone to school and been exposed to “normal” life. Or perhaps if she’d led a life less sheltered from men and sex her choices would have been different “I would cross seas and suffer sunstroke and give away all I have, but not for a man, because they want to be the destroyer and never be destroyed.”

'Tis Pity She's a Whore.

John Ford - 'Tis Pity She's a Whore (1633)

"Annabella, the beauty of Parma, does not lack admirers, but one of them society will surely view with disgust – her own brother, Giovanni. When he confesses to her his infatuation, Giovanni begs her to kill him, but so far from doing so, she embraces him as a lover. What chance has their incestuous love in a hostile world? What tragic chaos will follow? Compassionate and disturbing, John Ford’s great story of doomed love – told in scenes that combine intense reflection with explosive violence – enters the most challenging moral territory of all."
'Tis Pity She's A Whore is a tragedy written by John Ford during the Renaissance Era. It is a tale of morality, religion, relationships and incest. All of these themes were underpinned by the strict moral and social codes of the time, often evaded in the play in the name of love and lust.
Male dominance is a key feature of the play - there are no female characters left by the end and male superiority is embodied heavily in the final symbol (one of the most famous in dramatic history) of Giovanni walking with his lover and sister, Annabella's heart pierced on the end of his sword.  It is quite an ironic symbol of macho chauvinism - the woman's heart (both physically and metaphorically) being the prize.

The play is set in Parma, Italy, in the early 1600s, contemporary with Ford's writing of the play.

Basic Outline: The Canterbury Tales

Geoffrey Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales (1475)

The Canterbury Tales are written accounts of different stories told during a mass pilgrimage to visit the grave of Thomas Becket in Canterbury - a cardinal who was later made a saint. Tales were told as part of a competition started at Tabard Inn in Southwark, London where the pilgrimage began. The author of the best tale told during the journey would receive a free meal at the Inn on return to London. Pilgrims from all walks of life tell tales as part of Chaucer's story: including a knight, cook, lawyer, friar, clerk, squire, physician, monk and a parson to name a few. 
Chaucer was writing during the medieval period. The texts written at this time were largely of moral cause; closely linked with the religious devotion that was so deeply rooted in society at the time, tales created to be told to the illiterate masses. That is one of the reasons why Chaucer's work is so celebrated and rare; most of the population did not know how to read or write at the time it was written. This is a clear reason as to why Chaucer portrays his work as spoken out loud stories. Most of Chaucer's tales are written in rhyming couplets and therefore, the rhythmic device is made apparent through the spoken word.

The Handmaid's Tale

Margaret Atwood - The Handmaid's Tale (1985)

Offred is a handmaid in the republic of Gilead, a totalitarian and theocratic state that has replaced the USA. Reproduction rates are low and Handmaids are assigned to bear children for elite couples that struggle in conceiving a child. Offred herself serves the commander and his wife, Serena Joy. Serena is an advocate for 'traditional values.' Offred in fact, is not the narrator's real name -- handmaid names consist of the word 'of' followed by the name of the Handmaid's Commander. Impersonal, wordless sex must occur with the Commander whilst Serena sits behind her, holding her hands. Offred's freedom, like the freedom of all women is entirely restricted.

THEMES;
  - Women's bodies as political instruments,
  - Language as a tool of power, 
  - The causes of complacency.

MOTIFS;
- Rape and Sexual Violence,      
- Religious terms used for political purposes,  
- Similarities between Reactionary and Feminist ideologies.

SYMBOLISM, IMAGERY & ALLEGORY;
- The Bible and Religion; The novel is peppered with frequent allusions to different parts of the Bible.  "Give me children or else I die." - Genesis. Strange, small pieces of Biblical text show up frequently throughout the book. This is particularly evident in place names and propaganda.
- Eyes and Seeing; "Eyes" are spies who work for the government of Gilead, and they are situated throughout. There is the assumption that characters are constantly being watched. As reproductive objects, the handmaids must not be sexualised and one of the 'freedoms' that Gilead supposedly provides them with is the freedom from the lascivious male gaze.
- Fertility and Sex; Society had shifted all the blame for infertility onto women; "there is no such thing as a sterile man any more, not officially. There are only women who are fruitful and women who are barren. That's the law."

Genre; the genre of The Handmaid's Tale is a mixture between Dystopian literature and Science or 'Speculative' fiction.
Tone; Dispassionate and Factual

Life in the Medieval Era.

Food
- Game, bread, cheese, eggs, butter, milk, herbs, vegetables, grain. 
- Honey used for sweetness.
- Ale consumed among all classes - amount depended on the class.
- Wine - mainly drunk by the upper class, usually watered down.
- Fish was available - Church took it upon them selves to make rtules as to when it was suitable to eat. 

Life
- Feudal system was the control of the land.
- Quality of jobs usually dictated the quality of life.
- Medicines etc were controlled and used more frequently for higher class.
- Games, bear and ball bating - entertainment system. 

Medieval Church.

- Far greater role than today,
- Dominated life - all believed in god and heaven/hell.
- Taught that the only way they could get to heaven was the church at the time would let them.
- Weekly services.
- Peasants worked on church land. - Paid 10% of what they earned.Tithes. 
-  Buried in holy land if your soul was to get to heaven.
- BIG money element to the church.
- King Henry got hold of the money when he became king - wealthy church which monarchs wanted to control.

Society

- Domesday book - SENSUS; more than 90 percent of the English Nation (2m) 
- Many lived off the land, althjough the paesants had to combine this with being a labourer.
- Free/unfree; free - church, kings, queens.
- Church owning 75% of the land.
- Knighthood was rewarded for service for bought in by the wealthy.