Gresham College Lectures

Tale of Two Cities
-Manchester-third city involved
-1857 Dickens assisted in writing The Frozen Deep; Dickens played Richard in this play; was to be played in Manchester
-Dickens fell in love with Ellen Turner, who played Lucy in The Frozen Deep, which is referenced in The Tale of Two Cities with the character Lucie
-Parallelism between The Frozen Deep and A Tale of Two Cities
-1858 Dickens started public readings of A Tale of Two Cities; became "The greatest reader, of the greatest writer, of this age."
-Dickens lived in London as a young child, "an extensive and peculiar knowledge of the city"
-This inspired his writing in A Tale of Two Cities
-Dickens first visited Paris in 1844
-London and Paris are the Two Cities
-Dickens visited Paris at least 15 times; span a time of political change
-"Wherever I turn a see some astonishing new works, doing or being done."
-Written around the time of the French Revolution
-was not a fan of Revolution, yet confronts it in this novel
-Novel was sent out in parts, like a series; episodes
-Wrote as he went along
-The events of the Revolution constitute one layer of the novel




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