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Introduction
The opening lines of Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities are among his most famous. He creates a sense of breathless and surging emotion; he encourages the reader to think of the past as a living, throbbing present; and he reminds us that the present too may stand on the brink of sudden and violent change. The chapter is quite long, but cleverly written and, especially with a few notes, very enlightening.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way — in short, the period was so far like the present period,* that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.*
There were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a plain face on the throne of England;* there were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a fair face on the throne of France.* In both countries it was clearer than crystal to the lords of the State preserves of loaves and fishes* that things in general were settled for ever.
* Dickens published his story in 1859. As he admits towards the end, he has included in 1775 events that happened ‘in and close upon’ the year 1775. Most of them may be confirmed with the help of The Annual Register for 1775, though Dickens allows himself some licence.
* That is, that loud-voiced activists demanded that every political opinion, and the state of each nation, was either utterly noble and good, or utterly bad and wrong, with no middle ground and no room for debate. A time like the present, indeed.
* King George III and Queen Charlotte, a German princess whom he married in 1761, the year after his accession. Unlike his grandfather and predecessor George II, who was born in Germany and came to England in 1714 when his own father became George I, George III was born and bred in England.
* King Louis XVI and his Queen Marie Antoinette, an Austrian princess whom Louis married in 1770. Louis acceded to the French throne in 1774, following the death of his grandfather Louis XV, and was crowned in Rheims Cathedral on June 11th, 1775.
* A reference to one of the miracles of Jesus Christ, who turned five loaves of bread and two fish into a meal sufficient for five thousand people, with leftovers: see Mark 6:30-44. Dickens, who was critical of Britain’s welfare policy in his own day, is implying that the Governments of both Britain and France regarded themselves as gods able to perform the miracle of meeting the needs of the public from utterly inadequate resources.
Word Games
Sevens Based on this passage
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Variations: 1.expand your answer to exactly fourteen words. 2.expand your answer further, to exactly twenty-one words. 3.include one of the following words in your answer: if, but, despite, because, (al)though, unless.
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