Comprehension Questions for A Tale of Two Cities
Book the First: Recalled to Life
ENGLAND
Chapter 1 The Period
1. Re-read the famous opening paragraph and list all the opposites (paradoxes) Dickens uses to create a mood. What kind of mood? Note: the “present period” is 1859 but the time period of Book I is 1775. What comment does Dickens make about the present? (The theme of revolution is introduced here.)
2. What details does Dickens give about life in England?
3. What details does he give about life in France?
4. What significance does Dickens give to the allegorical figures of the Woodman and the Farmer?
(Allegory: a story in which the characters and various elements symbolize ideas or concepts with whichthe author implies the real meaning of his work. The story is thus an extended metaphor, usuallydesigned to teach an abstract truth.)
Chapter 2 The Mail
1. Describe the atmosphere of this chapter. What mood is created? Point out specific details that contributeto it. How does nature reflect the mood of the characters?
2. Who is Jerry? Who is Jarvis Lorry? What is their relationship? Why does Jerry need to speak to Lorry?
3. Why are the other passengers and the driver apprehensive about Jerry’s arrival?
4. How does Jerry react to the cryptic message he must take back to Tellson’s? Why do the characters seemto speak in code? What effect does this have on the reader? This chapter introduces one of the mainthemes of the book: resurrection.
Chapter 3 The Night Shadows
1. At the beginning of the chapter, Dickens as narrator intrudes on the story in order to expound upon thesecretive and mysterious creature one human being is to another. Why do you think he does this? Howdoes it relate to the rest of the chapter?
2. What is Jerry’s state of mind as he rides back to Tellson’s? How is Dickens drawing his character?
3. How is Tellson’s Bank described? How are the themes of “buried alive” and “resurrection” developed inthis chapter through the dream of the bank passenger, Mr. Lorry? What foreshadowing is createdthrough this dream? Characterization of Lorry?
Chapter 4 The Preparation
1. What further details do we learn about Tellson’s bank and Mr. Lorry as he waits for the young lady toarrive?
2. Focus on the description of the sea at Dover. What details does Dickens use to characterize it?
3. When Miss Manette (Lucie) arrives, Lorry goes to see her. Describe her apartments. How does theatmosphere contribute to the mood that has been established so far? How does it reinforce the idea ofdeath and burial?
4. What story does Lorry tell Miss Manette about her past? How is he related to her? How does Dickensdevelop Lorry’s character in the way he tries to deal with her personal history? Why is it essential forLucie to accompany Lorry to France?
5. An important character is introduced after Lucie faints, Miss Pross. Who is she? Describe her. Lucie andMiss Pross are often criticized as stereotypes. Agree or disagree.
Chapter 5 The Wine-shop
1. Thoroughly describe the action surrounding the broken wine cask in the street. How do the peoplebehave? What foreshadowing might this scene illustrate, especially when Gaspard writes “blood” on thewall? What theme introduced in chapter 1 is continued here?
2. Dickens is a master of physical detail. What effect is created by his description of Saint Antoine after thewine is gone? How should the reader feel toward the French people who live in this neighborhood?Explain.
3. Why does Dickens capitalize Hunger and Want?
4. Describe DeFarge. What is his attitude toward Gaspard? Why isn’t DeFarge moved by the wine spill?
5. Describe Madame DeFarge. Why does she play with a toothpick and cough at certain times? What doyou think is the point of her knitting?
6. Who are present in the wine shop at the time of the wine casket incident? Why do certain charactersrefer to each other as Jacques?
7. Why does DeFarge kneel to Lucie? Why does he allow the three men to peep through the keyhole at Dr.Manette? Why is Dr. Manette “locked in”? (Note that spying is another theme introduced in Book theFirst.) Do you feel any sympathy for DeFarge here? What relationship is Dr. Manette to him?
8. Describe the room in which Dr. Manette is staying. Note the references to light and dark. Why is theroom kept so dark?
Chapter 6 The Shoemaker
1. Describe Dr. Manette. How is he depicted as a man “buried alive”? Why can’t Dr. Manette bear thelight? Why does he make shoes? (Note that imprisonment is another major theme introduced in Book theFirst.)
2. Note that “Lucie” means “light.” How does Lucie recall her father to life? (Note: the theme of rescue isintroduced here.)
3. Find and comment upon all the references to light and dark in this chapter.
Book the Second: The Golden Thread
ENGLAND chps. 1-6
Chapter 1 Five Years Later (1780)
1. Characterize Tellson’s Bank and the Temple Bar. In what sense is Tellson’s like a prison? What isDickens’ comment on the justice system of the late 18th century?
2. Jerry Cruncher is Tellson’s “odd job man.” What does that mean?
3. Discuss the attitude with which Dickens characterizes Jerry’s home life. Given the details the authoruses, what kind of work does the “honest tradesman” do for Tellson’s? Comment on the references to themud on Jerry’s shoes and the rust on his fingers. What might these suggest?
Chapter 2 A Sight
1. What is Jerry’s assignment?
2. Point out details of the courtroom, the gaol (jail) and especially the crowd of spectators in the OldBailey. Why is a trial referred to as a “play”?
3. Who is on trial and for what reason? What is the punishment?
4. Look carefully at the passages describing the entrance of the prisoner. How does Dickens characterizethe crowd as they watch him?
5. Comment on the mirror image. How does this mirror prepare you for later developments?
6. What is Lucie’s effect on Darnay and the crowd? How does the crowd remind you of the mob in Paris?
Chapter 3 A Disappointment
1. How does Dickens satirize the British justice system in the trial of Charles Darnay? Consider witnessescalled (Barsad, Cly, the Manettes) cross-examination (in this case, by Stryver) and quality of evidence.
2. Who is Sidney Carton? How does he turn the case in favor of Darnay? In what ways are Sidney andCharles foils?
3. What is the message Jerry is to take back to Tellson’s? How does the end of this chapter parallel that ofchapter 2? What theme does it suggest?
Chapter 4 Congratulatory
1. How is Stryver characterized? How is he a foil to Jarvis Lorry? Note the comments on “business.”
2. Why do you think Dr. Manette studies Charles Darnay with a look of dislike, distrust and fear? Whatcould Dickens be suggesting here? What else might Dickens be suggesting about Lucie, Charles, Sidneyand Stryver?
3. Charles and Sidney dine together. How does Dickens further develop them as foils? Why does Sidneylook at himself in the mirror?
Chapter 5 The Jackal
1. What is the relationship between Sidney and Stryver? Is the animal imagery appropriate? What is ironicabout it? Why does Stryver refer to Sidney as Memory?
2. How does Lucie enter the conversation? How does Sidney refer to her?
3. Note the imagery of light and dark. What other images does Dickens use to characterize Sidney? How doyou feel about Sidney Carton so far?
Chapter 6 Hundreds of People (4 months after the trial)
1. Mr. Lorry has become a good friend of the Manette family. Discuss the imagery Dickens uses to showthe effect of this relationship on Lorry. What is the effect of the imagery he uses to describe the Manettehome?
2. What “little shrewd doubts” does Lorry wish to solve about Dr. Manette? What do he and Miss Prosstalk about while waiting for Lucie and the doctor to return home? How are Lorry and Pross foils?
3. Who are the “hundreds of people” who visit the Manette home? What other meaning might “hundreds ofpeople” have? Why does Dr. Manette become agitated when the subject of the Tower comes up? (seefootnote) What is the substance of Charles’ story about the prisoner? (This is a piece of foreshadowing.)
4. What is the effect of the storm on the gathering at the Manette home? The echoing steps? (Note Lorry’swords about the night at the end of the chapter —“to bring the dead out of their graves”—it becomesimportant later.)
FRANCE (chps. 7-9)
Chapter 7 Monseigneur in Town
1. Explain the effect of Dickens’ use of religious imagery in describing how Monseigneur takes his hotchocolate. How is the French aristocracy characterized in the scene at the opera?
2. The Monseigneur ignores a Marquis who is so angry as he leaves in his carriage that he hits and kills achild in Saint Antoine. Describe the scene and comment on the Marquis’ reaction to the death of thepoor child. How is the aristocracy further characterized?
3. Comment on the effect of the last paragraph in chapter 7. What are the dominant images?
Chapter 8 Monseigneur in the Country
1. The Marquis is on his way back to his country estate. How does Dickens characterize the poor who livein the countryside? Why does the Marquis stop twice?
2. What is significant about the sunset image? How are the Monseigneur and the Marquis foils?
3. Whose arrival is the Marquis awaiting? How does the plot thicken with this revelation?
Chapter 9 The Gorgon’s Head
1. How are Charles and his uncle foils or mirrors of each other? With what important differences? What issinister about the Marquis’ knowledge of a Doctor and a daughter? Charles mentions his mother. In whatconnection?
2. Comment on the pace, imagery, and use of repetition in the last part of the chapter (after Charles goes tobed, beginning with “The valet come and gone, Monsieur the Marquis walked to and fro. . .”).
3. Explain the Gorgon image. What is significant about the fountain? Fountains in general in this novel?
ENGLAND (Chps. 10-14)
Chapter 10 Two Promises (one year later)
1. What has Charles been doing since he left France?
2. Why doesn’t Charles ask Lucie to marry him first, before speaking to Dr. Manette? What request doesCharles make of him?
3. Point out evidence that shows that Dr. Manette is not happy at first that Charles wants to marry Lucie.How might Charles interpret this constraint?
4. In what terms does Dr. Manette promise to support Charles if Lucie should indicate her preference forhim? Note all the references to hands.
5. Why does Lucie come home to find her father working at his cobbler’s bench?
Chapter 11 A Companion Picture
1. How is this chapter a “mirror” or “companion picture” to the previous one? How does Dickens handleStryver’s intentions to marry Lucie and his attitude about her reception of these intentions?
2. What is Stryver’s advice to Sidney? What remains unspoken between them? What kind of man isStryver shown to be?
Chapter 12 A Fellow of Delicacy
1. In what terms does Stryver view his proposal to Lucie?
2. Stryver stops at Tellson’s to tell Lorry of his intentions. Why does Lorry offer to speak to Lucie forStryver? How does Stryver prepare himself for being “put in the wrong”? By the end of the chapter, howare we to view Stryver?
ENGLAND (chps. 13-14)
Chapter 13 The Fellow of No Delicacy
1. How is the title of this chapter ironic? What images does Sydney use to describe himself?
2. Why does he open himself up to Lucie at this point in the story? How is Lucie characterized in herreaction to him?
3. What foreshadowing does Dickens plant at the end of the chapter?
Chapter 14 The Honest Tradesman
1. What is ironic about the title of this chapter? Why is Jerry Cruncher so interested in the funeralprocession of Roger Cly? (who was Roger?)
2. How does Dickens characterize the crowd as they run the sole mourner off and accompany the hearse tothe graveyard?
3. Why does young Jerry secretly follow his father that night? With what effect does Dickens use the“fishing” image?
4. Jerry is clearly angry after his “fishing expedition” and takes it out on his wife. We are not told why. Canyou figure it out?
5. Note young Jerry’s desire to become a “Resurrection Man” like his father. With what major theme doesthis phrase contrast in the main plot?
FRANCE (chps. 15-16)
Chapter 15 Knitting
1. The Crunchers and the Defarges are foils to each other. How does the juxtaposition of chps. 15 and 16highlight similarities and differences?
2. What is the substance of the meeting of the five Jacques? Describe the manner of execution of Damiens,who made an attempt on the life of Louis XV some years before (the same fate possibly awaitsGaspard—why?). What is Gaspard’s fate? Why is it carried out over the fountain?
3. What does it mean “to be registered”? After hearing the report of the mender of roads, what sentence theDefarges the other Jacques pronounce?
4. Why do the Defarges take the mender of roads to see the King and Queen at Versailles? How has hedemonstrated that “you are the man we want” to the Defarges?
Chapter 16 Still Knitting
1. Examine the first two paragraphs closely. Why does Dickens come back to the stone faces on thechâteau of Monsieur the Marquis?
2. Jarvis Lorry is a “man of business”, Jerry Cruncher refers to his “honest trade” as a “business” (see chp.14) and Mrs. Defarge, in speaking of registering the spy, Barsad, does so with “a cool business air.”Comment.
3. Madame Defarge and her husband have a discussion about how long the revolution is in coming. Howdoes Madame Defarge show herself to be the stronger of the two? (Refer to specific images she uses.)
4. How does John Barsad (the other “witness” in Charles Darnay’s trial) try to elicit information from theDefarges about Gaspard? To what degree is he successful? Why is the last paragraph full of references to“darkness”?
5. Note the thread image. In London, Lucy is associated with the golden thread. In Paris, Madame Defargeknits the threads of the revolutionary registry. What is the effect of Dickens’ use of this image?
ENGLAND (chps, 17-20)
Chapter 17 One Night
1. The night before Lucie’s wedding, Dr. Manette tells his daughter of his time in prison. He speaks ofimagining the different ways his then unborn child might have turned out. What were these ways? Howdoes the real Lucie compare?
2. Dickens plants some foreshadowing in this chapter. What is it?
Chapter 18 Nine Days
1. The morning of the wedding, why does Dr. Manette emerge from his room “deadly pale” after havingspoken privately with Charles?
2. What is the significance of the title of this chapter? How do Lorry and Pross deal with the situation andhow do they feel about their actions?
Chapter 19 An Opinion
1. On the tenth day, Dr. Manette recovers. What method does Lorry use to discuss the doctor’s relapse?Why is this effective?
2. By the end of the chapter, Lorry and Pross carry out an “execution” of sorts. Why was this necessary?How do they feel about destroying the shoemaker’s bench?
Chapter 20 A Plea
1. Sydney comes to visit the newly arrived married pair. Why?
2. What is Charles’ attitude about Sydney and how does Lucie try to temper this opinion? How are Charlesand Sydney further developed as foils in this chapter?
ENGLAND AND FRANCE (chp. 21)
Chapter 21 Echoing Footsteps
1. Some years have passed. During this time,what has occurred in the lives of the Darnays, Sydney, andStryver? How is business at Tellson’s Bank?
2. It is 1789. What is important about this date in French history? Comment on the images of “footsteps”(in the middle of the chapter and in the last paragraph). What is the effect?
3. Comment on the effect of Dickens’ extended metaphor of the sea throughout his description of thestorming of the Bastille. Is Dickens’ depiction of this event consistent with history?
4. Why does Defarge ransack Dr. Manette’s former cell?
FRANCE (Chps. 22-23)
Chapter 22 The Sea Still Rises
1. Who is “old Foulon”? (see the footnote!) Of what major theme should you be reminded? Irony?
2. How do the Defarges, the Vengeance, the Jacquery and the crowd deal with Foulon and his son-in-law?How is Dickens developing the nature of the revolutionaries?
Chapter 23 Fire Rises
1. Comment on the effect of Dickens’ use of fire imagery as he describes the destruction of the Marquis’château.
2. Who is Gabelle? Why does he fear for his life?
3. What is the aftermath of this event? How is Dickens further characterizing the mob? Are therevolutionaries a force for positive change in France? Explain.
ENGLAND AND FRANCE (chp. 24)
Chapter 24 Drawn to the Loadstone Rock
1. It is now three years later (1792). Note that Dickens refers to the French nobility collectively as“Monseigneur.” Why is Tellson’s Bank important to “Monseigneur”? Why does Lorry go to Paris?
2. How does Charles, in his relationship with Gabelle, resemble Dr. Manette, in his relationship with theDefarges? With what important differences?