Insights into Chapter 21 Echoing Footsteps. 4/14/11 Vickie C. Ball, Harlan High School

Transcription

1 Insights into Chapter 21 Echoing Footsteps 1

2 Of course, we ve prepared for the title of this chapter (and its contents) by paying attention to page 93 to the last sentence of the first full paragraph. (That s why the narrator can say it has been remarked because it WAS remarked on page 93.) 2

3 The Golden Thread, as you will remember, is the title of Book the Second. Make sure you understand the symbolism here. 3

4 On page 212, be careful to understand the foreshadowing of the first full sentence ( [T]here was something coming in the echoes, something light, afar off, and scarcely audible yet, that stirred her heart too much. ) This foreshadowing is portentous. 4

5 Also on page 212, the first full paragraph sees the birth of Lucie and Charles first child. Make sure you know what sex the child is and what her name is. 5

6 In that same paragraph, the last sentence talks about the Divine friend of children seem[ing] to take her child in His arms, as He took the child of old, and made it a sacred joy to her. The capital letters should help you make an inference to Whom is being referred here. (You might want to see the gospel of Mark, chapter 10, verse 14 if you re not sure.) 6

7 At the bottom of page 212, Lucie and Charles face tragedy with their second child. Be sure you know what sex he was, and what happens to him. (Note also the unrealistic, idealized response that Lucie has on page 213. Remember that Lucie is a flat character always good, always perfect and this is even true as her child dies.) 7

8 The second and third paragraphs of page 213 are about Sydney. Pay attention to his relationship with the family of the Darnays, especially the children. 8

9 At the top of page 215, we see Dickens use the setting to echo the conflict. 9

10 Page 215 is set in mid-july, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine in Soho (London), England. However, keep in mind what Dickens narrator is NOT telling you information that you already know: the middle of July would be July 14, and the year is Now you should be able to understand the gloomy and threatening sky and the storm that is raging because you KNOW what is happening across the English Channel in France at that exact same time! 10

11 On page 216, the white space break is important because the setting jumps from Soho to Saint Antoine (but the date stays the same): Bastille Day. In the first paragraph after the white space break, be sure you remember the broken wine cask of Chapter 5, Book the First. 11

12 On page 217, Dickens creates verisimilitude by making the Defarge wine shop (a fictitious place) the center of the whirlpool of boiling waters of the activity of the very real Bastille Day. 12

13 Now that the Revolution is no longer growing silently, there is no longer a need for the name Jacques. Be sure you do look for imagery of the out-ofcontrol third estate revolutionaries as a flood and a raging sea. Mark any time you see that in pink. 13

14 On page 219, in the storming of the Bastille, Monsieur Defarge requests that he be taken to One Hundred and Five, North Tower. If this means nothing to you, be sure to go back to page 42 and reread the second half of the page. While in this cell, Defarge looks carefully for something, but the narrator chooses NOT to tell us if he finds anything. Keep that in mind. It s part of the suspense Dickens is creating to push toward the climactic chapter of his book. 14

15 On page 222 at the bottom of page, make sure you note that there have been several discoveries in the Bastille, including discovered letters and other memorials of prisoners. 15

16 On page 223, we see the reality of the foreshadowing of page

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