{"id":73,"date":"2017-02-07T18:44:18","date_gmt":"2017-02-07T18:44:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/?p=73"},"modified":"2020-08-31T20:39:13","modified_gmt":"2020-08-31T20:39:13","slug":"a-particularly-touching-novel-sexuality-in-a-tale-of-two-cities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/2017\/02\/07\/a-particularly-touching-novel-sexuality-in-a-tale-of-two-cities\/","title":{"rendered":"A Particularly Touching Novel – Sexuality in “A Tale of Two Cities”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Charles Dickens\u2019 A Tale of Two Cities<\/em> is a novel of sexual repression. \u00a0Written during the austere Victorian era when writing about such matters was strictly taboo, Dickens personifies inanimate objects and incorporates the sensation of touch to give his prose a subtle yet apparent sexual undercurrent.<\/p>\n

We first see this in the meeting between Mr. Lorry and Lucie Manette in Chapter IV of Book I.\u00a0 They have a dialogue until their conversation is punctuated by a passage of touch:<\/p>\n

“Mr. Lorry took the hesitating little hand that confidingly advanced to take his, and he put it with some ceremony to his lips.\u00a0 He then conducted the young lady straightaway to her chair again, and, holding the chair-back with his left hand, and using his right by turns to rub his chin, pull his wig at the ears, or point what he said, stood looking down into her face while she sat looking up into his.” (26)<\/p>\n

We see Dickens setting up a few things here.\u00a0 First, the physical contact between Mr. Lorry and Lucie comes as a dissonant surprise, especially since Mr. Lorry has just stated that he has \u201cno feelings\u201d and is a \u201cmere machine\u201d (Dickens 26).\u00a0 This passage appears particularly sexual because Mr. Lorry kisses Lucie\u2019s hand with his lips, framed with Lucie hesitating and confiding in him.\u00a0 Lucie\u2019s hesitation shows that what she is doing is a big deal for her, while her confiding in him hints secrecy and trust. \u00a0This portrays Lucie as a sort of virginal character about to engage in the sex act, further suggested by Mr. Lorry guiding her and holding the chair-back, which can be construed as Lucie\u2019s back. \u00a0Mr. Lorry taking Lucie\u2019s hand \u201cwith ceremony\u201d foreshadows her nuptials and eventual marriage, while the diminutive use of her \u201clittle\u201d hand and her \u201clooking up\u201d at him suggests that she is a helpless character that needs protection.\u00a0 It is important to remember is that nothing sexual actually occurs in this passage; Lucie is only seventeen, Mr. Lorry is old, and they are held back by the rules and norms of their social culture.\u00a0 Although nothing is consummated, we can glean that, contrary to his stoic speech, Mr. Lorry actually deeply desires Lucie sexually; however, he cannot fulfill these desires. \u00a0Lorry\u2019s kiss and seating of Lucie is his way of letting her go and presenting her as ripe for courtship.<\/p>\n

Lucie\u2019s body is evoked even more subtly during Charles Darnay\u2019s confession of his love for Lucie to Doctor Manette.\u00a0 Here we see a chair representing Lucie again: \u201cHis touch still lingered on her father\u2019s hand.\u00a0 Answering the touch for a moment, but not coldly, her father rested his hands upon the arms of his chair, and looked up for the first time since the beginning of the conference\u201d (128).\u00a0 First, notice how the paragraph begins with \u201cher father\u2019s hand,\u201d already indirectly referencing Lucie and framing her into what follows.\u00a0 Then Doctor Manette rests his hands on the arms of his chair, this time the chair\u2019s arms representing Lucie\u2019s arms.\u00a0 He even looks up just as Lucie looked up, suggesting that he is weak.\u00a0 Here we see Doctor Manette\u2019s desire to protect Lucie, and Lucie as a vulnerable character.\u00a0 Lucie’s vulnerability is starkly contrasted with Madame Defarge\u2019s dominance, seen when Monsieur Defarge puts his hand behind his wife\u2019s chair, using his wife to barricade himself from someone he hates.\u00a0 Given the lack of female characters in A Tale of Two Cities, the sensual contrast between Lucie and Madame Defarge is particularly striking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Charles Dickens\u2019 A Tale of Two Cities is a novel of sexual repression. \u00a0Written during the austere Victorian era when writing about such matters was strictly taboo, Dickens personifies inanimate objects and incorporates the sensation of touch to give his prose a subtle yet apparent sexual undercurrent. We first see this in the meeting between … Continue reading A Particularly Touching Novel – Sexuality in “A Tale of Two Cities”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3465,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[138876,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spring-2017","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3465"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}