| The opening social occasion in the novel Hard Times is the main catalyst of the story which develops the main characters, the society they live in, and the focus if the book. It all takes place during a day of school in the quaint little town with a visitor quizzing the pupils. In this brief scene the reader is introduced to a variety of characters and provided with insight into their lives as well as that of the town overall. The first to be met is Mr. Gradgrind. Immediately it becomes apparent that this man is one whose chief priority in the learning lives of the children is the memorization of facts. He values and esteems very highly the factual atmosphere by which he is surrounded and is determined to spread to all else. Another character to which we are introduced ia a small boy who prides himself in his extensive knowledge of memorized terms. Appearing to be a dictionary, spouting information, the boy added to the list of factual believers. As the social setting continues, it becomes very apparent that all members were of the same feeling, both teacher and students. From this analysis, it becomes apparent that the scene was explaining more than just the value of its immediate characters, but that of the whole town. It was not only the teachers and Mr. Gradgrind that found facts to be the seeds of knowledge but also the parents of the children that were sent there and everyone else in the town, yielding the general overall public opinion. This remained a constant in all cases of the scene but one. A student named Sissy was the oddball who was the daughter of an illiterate circus performer. Instead of bringing factual reference to class, she brought love, kindness, and feeling. Her values were very different from the rest of the towns, as were those of the circus she represented. All of this was revealed to the reader in the very first social scene of the novel. There was also another level to the scene referred to above. Charles Dickens also revealed the main theme, purpose, or moral to his whole book. He was criticizing society for its lack of feeling and emotion in its life. Dickens felt that, like Gradgring, the chlidren, and the town, that society was only looking at things on the outside but, unlike Sissy, were not grasping the full meaning of what things were on the inside. A horse may be a grazing mammal used to work on a farm, but it is also an animal that needs love and attention. The mere complextion of the children in the scene revealed this. That of the litte boy was pale and white for he did not know the meaning of love, Where as Sissy had bright pink cheeks, symbols of the childhood she lived in, the comforting love of the many performers in the circus. From what Dickens witnessed in his own society he wrote in his book, in an attempt to wake people to their own shortcomings by representing them in this and other social scenes. Through this social scene in the classroom, Dickens not only gave way to the values of all the major characters, but also foreshadowed the main theme of his entire book. |