How does Dickens describe Coketown?

How does Dickens describe Coketown?

Coketown is described as being “inhabited by people equally like one another, who all went in and out at the same hours, with the same sound upon the same pavements, to do the same work and to whom every day was the same as yesterday and tomorrow, and every year the counterpart of the last and the next” (27-28).

What does Dickens think about Coketown?

The connotations are that Coketown is not a safe place to be and that it is full of danger. Dickens goes on to emphasise the devastation caused by the industrial age, saying 'It was a town of red brick, or of brick what would have been red if the smoke and ashes had allowed it'.

What Coketown means?

Coketown – an Industrial Mill Town The fictional city of Coketown is a stand-in for real life industrial mill towns. Coketown was inspired by places like Preston, a town Dickens visited right before writing the novel. Coketown is a hellish place where every brick building looks like every other brick building.

Is Coketown a real place?

Coketown, the fictional city in Hard Times, the Charles Dickens novel based on Preston, Lancashire during the industrial revolution. ...

What is Coketown based on?

Charles Dickens (1812–1870) published this 'Condition of England' novel in 1854. His setting was a mythical place called Coketown, partly inspired by a visit to the Northern industrial town of Preston where he had observed a strike.

What is the significance of Coketown in the novel hard time?

The significance of Coketown in the novel Hard Times is that it provides an appropriate backdrop to Dickens's withering critique of industrial society. It's notable that the town is named after what it produces, coke, a hard grey fuel.

Why is Coketown referred to as a town of unnatural red and black like the painted face of a savage?

The factories of the town belch out pollution discolouring the bland red bricks that many are built of. There is no regard to the health of the people that live in Coketown, the poorer people having to live in filthy slum-like areas beside the dirty factories, whilst the wealthy owners can afford to live further away.

Is serpents of smoke metaphor?

To evoke the feelings of fear in his readers, Dickens uses similes to compare the colours of the city to 'the painted face of a savage,' and the movement of the machines to a great 'elephant in a state of melancholy madness,' and smoke turns into 'interminable serpents' through metaphor.

What is the main principle of Mr Gradgrind's philosophy?

Gradgrind expounds his philosophy of calculating, rational self-interest. He believes that human nature can be governed by completely rational rules, and he is “ready to weigh and measure any parcel of human nature, and tell you what it comes to.” This philosophy has brought Mr.

What technique is serpents of smoke?

Literary Technique. In this example, Dickens uses the alliterative words serpents of smoke as a metaphor for the imagery of the polluting smoke spiralling continuously from the chimneys of Coketown factories.

What is the meaning of Coketown by Charles Dickens?

• Coketown. Coketown Coketown is a novel written by Charles Dickens in 1854. Coketown is a description of a typical town in the Victorian age after the industrial revolution which occurred during the 18th century. Charles Dickens describes the other side of the coin during the Victorian age by using figure of speech in his description...

What is the theme of Coketown in hard times?

• Quotations on the theme of Coketown in Hard Times by Charles Dickens. Quotations on the theme of the fictional town of Coketown, from the Charles Dickens novel Hard Times. No temperature made the melancholy mad elephants more mad or more sane.

What happened to Coketown?

• The production of coke generates considerable air pollution, and in the absence of any clean-air legislation at that time in Victorian Britain, one can only imagine just how polluted the air must have been for the people of Coketown. The fact that the town is named after its main industry suggests that this is all the town has going for it.

Why does Dickens give the town such a generic name?

• Although Dickens evokes qualities of actual factory towns of the time, such as Manchester, by giving the town a generic name he emphasizes its unnatural aspect, as it is incompatible with its environment.