I read several Dickens novels as a teen and loved them all. David Copperfiel, Oliver Twist, The Christmas Carol (as a yearly tradition), and Nicholas Nickleby. Oddly, I never read A Tale of Two Cities, Great Expectations or Bleak House, so thought I would remedy that this winter, starting with A Tale of Two Cities. It is a more difficult read than I remember the others being, but what is most striking is Dicken's use of sardonic wit and humor. I remember some of this in his other novels, but this one starts and seems never to sway from it. (I am only 20 pages in) Additionally, I am completely taken with his gift for creating dense, spare sentences that, in some cases, embrace an entire essay of thought. I have read several over, simply because they are delightfully spare, but oh so rich. He writes the type of sentences you can chew on for a very long time. I will say though, the number of commas makes one wonder if he had a great store of them with intent to sell, when they suddenly went out of fashion. Or perhaps the use of commas helps one translate a pageful of thought into one sentence? No matter, I am so glad I decided to revisit this author - he really is a master of the tale.
It is my favorite novel (and prose author) of all time, so have my upvote :)
Did the humor in this one surprise you?
Dickens’ humor is always great.
I was just reading that it is indeed a hallmark of his work. Perhaps as a teen I recognized the humor when he made fun of one of the despicable characters, but as an old woman, I see and appreciate the particular bite of a good portion of his words.
Most of Lorry’s scenes are wonderful as are Jerry’s. He can weave drama so well with humor - laughing at Jerry’s “Anna Dominoes” even though he is a horrid human being and Lorry’s insistence he is only a man of business while showing his intense love for both Lucie and Doctor Manette.
It is my favourite of his novels.
It is his best-selling novel.
It is his shortest novel.
I couldn't get into a Tale of Two Cities. I once read a review that called it "a tale of two cities, written by a man who had only been to one of them" lol. That felt about right. Depictions of Paris seemed off, while those of London rang true.
Absolutely loved Great Expectations though, so highly recommend that one.
So true, Tolkien is also rubbish, the guy has never been to Middle-earth
I also liked Great Expectations more than AToTC. I read them back to back in 2020. AToTC was pretty agonizing. GE less so.
I started to really love this book with the chapter where Mr. Cruncher goes “fishing.” It was a little hard to get into before that. After the chapter, I just plowed through. Great stuff
Do you have any of those sentences you mention at hand to share with us? (lots of commas?)
Dickens is one of the great writers I selected for the sentence structure exploration tool I made, and I picked some sentences from Bleak House (which I haven't read yet, but it made me willing to).
You're soo lucky if you can read Tale of two cities for the first time! Has anybody read a greater book about love than this one? I haven't.
I read this last month and loved it. My attention span isn't the best, so I took to underlining emphasized words in his line sentences in order to track to meaning of the long compound phases. It's so much better than Wishbone led to me expect!
Jarvis is basically Good Guy Greg before Good Guy Greg was a meme. A man of business, indeed!