This is my second reading of this story after so many years and it was even more enjoyable the second time around. I am going to mention what is in the plot in the following paragraphs, but even though the main points will be there, the story is much more complicated and much more profound than I can ever tell it.

As is usual with Dickens, the book is full of characters all drawn perfectly, fitting to the story and standing alone in their own right. The storytelling is exquisite and the twists and turns spectacular.

Lucie Manette has been told she is an orphan, but she isn’t as her father Dr. Manette has been prisoned in Bastille for many years. The year is 1775 and Jarvis Lorry, an English banker and a loyal friend to the Manette family, meets Lucie Manette in Dover to tell her about her father, who is now released from the prison but is kept in a wine shop belonging to the Defarges.

Lucie and Jarvis Lorry travel to France and find Dr. Manette, who has lost his reason. They manage to take him out of Paris to London. The scenes with Madame and Monsieur Defarge here at the wine shop hint at what will happen later on in the story. Also, the author’s use of atmosphere in this story is spectacular. ‘Intensely cold wind covering the land like an evil spirit,’ for example.

This is a much-complicated story, addressing the conflicts during the French revolution and their echoes in London. On the personal scales, the relationships include the father and daughter, woman and three suitors, and subjects versus the state.

Within those relationships, the most attention getting one is a central huge human story of three men in love with the same girl, Lucie. These men are an English lawyer Carton and a French aristocrat Darnay.

Continuing with the plot, Doctor Manette, now in London has regained his wits and memory and is living with her daughter quite happily. Several years pass as three men have fallen in love with Lucie, Mr. Sydney Carton, Mr. Stryver, and Charles Darnay. Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay are look-alikes. Lucie chooses Darnay and marries him. Carton tells Lucie he will do anything for her and for anyone she loves even if it may not be him.

When Darnay’s uncle in France is killed, Darnay goes to France to inherit his aristocratic title, but he is arrested and thrown into jail. At this time, Lucie has a small child. Doctor Manette, Miss Pross, Lucie, and her small child follow Darnay to Paris, trying to get him released.

Based on Madame Defarge’s revelations, Darnay is sentenced to death. The lawyer Sydney Carton travels to Paris to help Lucie, the love of his life. He convinces the Manettes to leave Paris and manages to get into Darnay’s cell, drugging him and exchanging places with him, having someone named Barsad, who also helped him get into the cell, carry Darnay out. Another character Miss Pross, who was with the Manettes, shoots Mme. Defarge as Darnay returns with Lucie, their child, and Dr. Manette back to London.

In Paris, Sydney Carton sacrifices himself for Lucie’s sake by going to the guillotine instead of Darnay; however, he dies feeling much satisfied with his choice.

the supreme sacrifice of Darnay.

is Charles Dickens (1812 - 1870), who was an author, journalist, editor, illustrator and social commentator. His most famous books include Great Expectations, Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol, Nicholas Nickleby, David Copperfield, A Tale of Two Cities.

it is a literary classic and its plot construction, among other things, will teach any writer a thing or two.

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Created Oct 24, 2020 at 11:19am • Submit your own review...