The History Book Club discussion

Hello everyone,

For the week of March 12th - March 18th, we are reading Book the Second (XIV, XV, XVI, XVII) of A Tale of Two Cities.

The sixth week's reading assignment is:

Week Six: March 12th - March 18th (2012):

XIV (The Honest Tradesman) pg. 156
XV (Knitting) Pg 166
XVI (Still Knitting) pg. 177
XVII (One Night) pg 187


We will open up a thread for each week's reading. Please make sure to post in the particular thread dedicated to those specific chapters and page numbers to avoid spoilers. We will also open up supplemental threads as we did for other books.

This book was kicked off on February 6th. We look forward to your participation. Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Powell's and other noted on line booksellers do have copies of the book and shipment can be expedited. The book can also be obtained easily at your local library, or on your Kindle. And to make things even easier; this book is available "free" on line as either an ebook download or an audiobook. This weekly thread will be opened up either during the weekend before or on Monday of the first day.

There is no rush and we are thrilled to have you join us. It is never too late to get started and/or to post.

Becky will be leading this discussion. But since this is Becky's first time moderating a book in the History Book Club; Bentley will be co-moderating this selection.

Welcome,

~Bentley & Bryan

TO ALWAYS SEE ALL WEEKS' THREADS SELECT VIEW ALL

by Charles Dickens



REMEMBER NO SPOILERS ON THE WEEKLY NON SPOILER THREADS

Notes:

It is always a tremendous help when you quote specifically from the book itself and reference the chapter and page numbers when responding. The text itself helps folks know what you are referencing and makes things clear.

Citations

If an author or book is mentioned other than the book and author being discussed, citations must be included according to our guidelines. Also, when citing other sources, please provide credit where credit is due and/or the link. There is no need to re-cite the author and the book we are discussing however. For citations, add always the book cover, the author's photo when available and always the author's link. If mentioning simply other author's, please cite the author's photo and the author's link.

If you need help - here is a thread called the Mechanics of the Board which will show you how:

http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/2......

Glossary

Remember there is a glossary thread where ancillary information is placed by the moderator. This is also a thread where additional information can be placed by the group members regarding the subject matter being discussed.

http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/7......

Bibliography

There is a Bibliography where books cited in the text are posted with proper citations and reviews. We also post the books that the author may have used in his research or in his notes. Please also feel free to add to the Bibliography thread any related books, etc with proper citations or other books either non fiction or historical fiction that relate to the subject matter of the book itself. No self promotion, please.

by Charles Dickens

Chapter Overviews and Summaries

Book the Second: The Golden Thread
Chapter 14. The Honest Tradesman

Cruncher sits in front of Tellson's when a funeral procession approaches. He joins the mob which forms and takes over the hearse. He learns the spy is Roger Cly. The mob then loots the pubs but Cruncher talks to the undertakers.

He goes home, argues with his wife and gathers his night gear, and leaves. Young Jerry sneaks after him. Joined by two others, they go over an iron gate with Young Jerry following.. They are fishing for corpses and Young Jerry runs away scared.

The next day Cruncher and son leave for the Bank where Young Cruncher asks his father about being a "Resurrection Man."


Chapter 15. Knitting
Defarge enters the shop with a "mender of roads." They drink, eat a bit and Madame Defarge knits. The men go with Defarge and the "mender" to the upstairs room where the "mender" tells the story of the man, the father of the child killed, caught in the Marquis' chains. The others say there is a petition for the prisoner's release. The "mender" says the prisoner was hanged.

They tell the "mender" to wait and decide to add to the register which Madame keeps. Defarge, his wife and "the mender" go to see the King and Queen When they appear the "mender" cries but Defarge tells him he will be believed.

Chapter 16. Still Knitting
Monsieur Defarge tell his wife the "mender" knew of another spy, John Barsad. Madame will register his name.

A new-comer enters the shop. Madame knits, everyone else leaves. Madame silently identifies him as Basard He questions her but she avoids the answers. Monsieur Defarge enters so Basard questions both. The Defarges deny all. Barsad tells them the Doctor's daughter will marry the nephew of Monsieur the Marquis.

Chapter 17. One Night
In England the Doctor and his daughter sit under a tree talking about how happy they are.

Funerals had at all times a remarkable attraction for Mr. Cruncher; he always pricked up his senses, and became excited, when a funeral passed Tellson’s. Naturally, therefore, a funeral with this uncommon attendance excited him greatly, and he asked of the first man who ran against him:
“What is it, brother? What’s it about?”
“I don’t know,” said the man. “Spies! Yaha! Tst! Spies!”
He asked another man. “Who is it?”
“I don’t know,” returned the man, clapping his hands to his mouth nevertheless, and vociferating in a surprising heat and with the greatest ardour, “Spies! Yaha! Tst, tst! Spi—ies!”
At length, a person better informed on the merits of the case, tumbled against him, and from this person he learned that the funeral was the funeral of one Roger Cly.
“Was He a spy?” asked Mr. Cruncher.
“Old Bailey spy,” returned his informant. “Yaha! Tst! Yah! Old Bailey Spi—i—ies!”
“Why, to be sure!” exclaimed Jerry, recalling the Trial at which he had assisted. “I’ve seen him. Dead, is he?”
“Dead as mutton,” returned the other, “and can’t be too dead. Have ’em out, there! Spies! Pull ’em out, there! Spies!”

Does Dickens manage to convey the excitement of the crowds at this funeral - why are they so excited? Is one spy worth all this?

The transition to the sport of window-breaking, and thence to the plundering of public-houses, was easy and natural. At last, after several hours, when sundry summer-houses had been pulled down, and some area-railings had been torn up, to arm the more belligerent spirits, a rumour got about that the Guards were coming. Before this rumour, the crowd gradually melted away, and perhaps the Guards came, and perhaps they never came, and this was the usual progress of a mob.

How does this funeral procession in London differ from the one in Paris earlier in the book?

I love the way Dickens drops little bits of information pulling the reader on into the story and then dropping that thread of plot for another one which does the same thing.

And in Tale of Two Cities he alternates the scenes between sorrowful and funny and then fearful or ominous always with some sense of foreboding or impending doom or excitement of some sort. I don't remember him doing this in other novels - but he may have and I don't recall.

What is your reaction to these literary devices of structure?

"“Father,” said Young Jerry, as they walked along: taking care to keep at arm’s length and to have the stool well between them: “what’s a Resurrection-Man?”
Mr. Cruncher came to a stop on the pavement before he answered, “How should I know?”
“I thought you knowed everything, father,” said the artless boy.
“Hem! Well,” returned Mr. Cruncher, going on again, and lifting off his hat to give his spikes free play, “he’s a tradesman.”
“What’s his goods, father?” asked the brisk Young Jerry.
“His goods,” said Mr. Cruncher, after turning it over in his mind, “is a branch of Scientific goods.”
“Persons’ bodies, ain’t it, father?” asked the lively boy.
“I believe it is something of that sort,” said Mr. Cruncher.
“Oh, father, I should so like to be a Resurrection-Man when I’m quite growed up!"

So what is it that Cruncher is up to? Do we know yet? Would a Victorian reader know?

I think that a Victorian reader would know exactly what Cruncher was doing - he's stealing body parts from the dead to sell to science. This was not an honorable profession but it was common as the emerging science of medicine and its students needed the corpses and parts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_sna...

In 1789, when A Tale of Two Cities takes place, this body snatching was quite common. By the time Dickens wrote the book, however, it had been all but eliminated by law of 1832.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomy_Act

Chapter 15

Who is the mender of roads in this chapter and why is he so important? It is mentioned 5 times in this chapter that he's wearing a blue cap. What does that mean? Why is it so important?

It was high noontide, when two dusty men passed through his streets and under his swinging lamps: of whom, one was Monsieur Defarge: the other a mender of roads in a blue cap.

Madame Defarge set wine before the mender of roads called Jacques, who doffed his blue cap to the company, and drank.

The mender of roads, blue cap in hand, wiped his swarthy forehead with it, and said, “Where shall I commence, monsieur?"
They looked at one another, as he used his blue cap to wipe his face, on which the perspiration had started afresh while he recalled the

The man moved a little further away, as soon as he could, and the mender of roads fanned himself with his blue cap: feeling it mightily close and oppressive.

Do you appreciate Dickens' repetition or does it annoy you? What does it add - why did he do it?

Chapter 15

The title of this chapter is "Knitting," but there's not a whole lot about Madame Defarge's project there. Why do you think this title was used?

As I've been reading this time, I've been thinking about the original serial format of the book. I think the repetition lends itself very well to the serial format, as folks will go some time between reading chapters. I also like it because it gives life and richness to the characters.

We do finally figure out WHY Madame Defarge is knitting. Isn't it such an ingenious way to record information, especially during a time when women were not supposed to be all that smart or involved in revolutionary activities.

Karolyn wrote: "We do finally figure out WHY Madame Defarge is knitting. Isn't it such an ingenious way to record information, especially during a time when women were not supposed to be all that smart or involved in revolutionary activities. "

One of the things which surprised me is how much historically accurate detail is involved in Tale of Two Cities. Women really were involved and there really were knitters - of course "the register" was fabricated. (heh)

From Chapter 16 "More Knitting":
Madame Defarge with her work in her hand was accustomed to pass from place to place and from group to group: a Missionary – there were many like her – such as the world will do well never to breed again. All the women knitted. They knitted worthless things; but, the mechanical work was a mechanical substitute for eating and drinking…



The knitting women above are the famous citoyennes tricoteuses of revolutionary Paris, who would, during the Reign of Terror, take their knitting with them to watch the executions at the guillotine.
Tricoteuse

Also from the Chapter 16:
"... much was closing in about the women who sat knitting, knitting, that they their very selves were closing in around a structure yet unbuilt, where they were to sit knitting, knitting, counting dropping heads.”

Dickens connects the knitting of Madame Defarge and her compatriots with a chief motive of the French Revolution – hunger. And his imagery suggests that this knitting registers the gradual creation – the knitting-together, as it were – of a means to revenge that wrong.

Women participated in virtually every aspect of the French Revolution, but their participation almost always proved controversial.
Women and the Revolution
French Revolution - Role of Women

Thomas Carlyle, Dickens' primary historical source, notes the knitting women, too. :

"...for there are Citoyennes too, thick crowded in the galleries here. Citoyennes who bring their seam with them, or their knitting-needles; and shriek or knit as the case needs; famed Tricoteuses, Patriot Knitters;—Mere Duchesse, or the like Deborah and Mother of the Faubourgs, giving the keynote. It is a changed Jacobin Society; and a still changing. Where Mother Duchess now sits, authentic Duchesses have sat. High-rouged dames went once in jewels and spangles; now, instead of jewels, you may take the knitting-needles and leave the rouge:"

by Thomas Carlyle Volume 3 Book Chapter 3.2.V

Becky wrote: "I think that a Victorian reader would know exactly what Cruncher was doing - he's stealing body parts from the dead to sell to science. This was not an honorable profession but it was common as th..."

So they emptied the stomach because the body would be useless because it would be deemed not fresh? Did I read that right? Sorry.:(. Thank you :)

Yup - body snatching for science - Now when this was mentioned earlier in the book we only knew that Jerry didn't want them to quarter the bodies because it spoiled ("spiled") the corpse. And we know why his wife is upset and goes to "flopping." (heh)

Becky wrote: "Yup - body snatching for science - Now when this was mentioned earlier in the book we only knew that Jerry didn't want them to quarter the bodies because it spoiled ("spiled") the corpse. And we ..."

Thanks so much for the clarification, that is what I thought but wasn't sure. It is all coming together now :). I have to say I am learning a lot about myself reading this.....like how I need to work on dealing with suspense. Ha ha. I gave Jerry the benefit of the doubt too at the beginning. Now I just feel sorry and horror for his poor wife.