There are two sides to everything, and people constantly comment upon that through comparing and contrasting. In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens enunciates the duality in France and England around the time of the French revolution. Between his articulate diction and deep characterization, it is evident that Dickens is intentional with every part of his novel so he may convey his motif of duality.

The famous opening helps construct Dickens’ central motif throughout the book. After picking up the book and reading the title, the idea of the two cities is already planted, so Dickens is able to beautifully build off of his title. He constructs a sense of duality between the two cities with anaphora that he uses to construct poetic antithesis over how, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,” (Dickens 3). Dickens chooses several sets of two direct opposites and frames them to show the duality of the situations in both England and France. The words he uses are simple and delicate, making what he is saying seem matter-of-fact. Throughout the rest of the book, he demonstrates how either side of each comparison may be true in either city depending upon the person.

Dickens also uses various characters to make commentary on duality. One of the characters, Mr. Jarvis Lorry, is constantly traveling between the two cities for work, and he acts as a bridge of information. He introduces a woman named Lucie Manette to her father in France, where another character named Madame Defarge is introduced as an extravagant woman with “a large hand heavily ringed,”(Dickens 23). Dickens describes Lucie as a softer character with “earnest youth and beauty,”(Dickens 48). The two women are fairly different, each with their own challenges. Lucie must overcome her husband’s imprisonment while keeping her father from relapsing, and Madame Defarge is working to make the revolution happen in France. Both women have to deal with “wisdom… foolishness… belief… incredulity… Light… Darkness… hope… [and] despair,”(Dickens 3). Through showing the lives of these two vastly different women, Dickens demonstrates the dualities between two opposite people in two cities.

Throughout A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens works towards showing similarities and differences of life. His intentional words create a delicate tone to effortlessly prove how two feelings can radiate off of any one situation based upon a person and their circumstances.

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