This reader thought this theme to represent impulsiveness and therefore a negative but very fitting theme for the time. The themes were all developed throughout the book and almost always in multiple ways, whether it be a single person representing the theme, or an entire nation. The author was very successful in this multiple showing of themes throughout the book.
The author used a lot of foreshadowing in the book. Starting as early as the first chapter with the letter to Lucie. Another technique the author used was that of doubles. This was shown in the title A Tale of TWO Cities as well as being shown in the first line of the book, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times - Lucie was caring and a tender-loving type character while Madame Defarge was made out to be a blood thirsty vengeful person. Dickens used shadows and darkness multiple times throughout the book. The reader thought this to set a very oppressed, dark, gloomy setting for such a book was very appropriate. Imprisonment is one more technique used by the author. Whether it was used literally in the case of the Bastille or less literally like that of Doctor Manette. The reader again thought this a very fitting technique for this type of novel. The first book in the novel begins in the year of 1775 and the execution of Carton took place in 1789. This was only a very short period of history but it was a very busy, important part of France's history. The Industrial Revolution, swept through Europe in the late eighteenth century, originated in England. The rapid modernization of the English economy involved a shift from rural handicraft to large-scale factory labor. Technological innovations facilitated unprecedented heights of manufacture and trade, and England left behind its localized, cottage-industry economy to become a centralized, hyper-capitalist juggernaut of mass production. In tandem with this transformation came a significant shift in the nation's demographics.
