Analysis of Presentation of Relationships in Hard Times

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‘Discuss some of the ways in which contrasts are created and used in the texts you have studied. In your response you must use integrated literary and linguistic techniques and consider the significance of contextual factors’ In Charles Dickens’ Hard Times, there are many contrasts between themes and characters that are used to show differences between classes, genders and relationship. For example, Dickens shows contrasts between the two main romantic relationships in the novel: Mr Bounderby and Louisa and Stephen Blackpool and Rachael. The marriage between Louisa and Bounderby is presented in a business-like manner, without any love or affection as Mr Gradgrind tells Louisa to consider it as a matter of ‘tangible fact’. The metaphor ‘tangible fact’ implies that the imminent marriage between the two characters is one that can be worked out like any other problem that Louisa would have to consider in her life of fact. This removes any impression of love or affection as it treats marriage as a logical, necessary step rather than one of love. The theme of love is even further hidden by the idea of Bounderby marrying Louisa because of her father’s status. During Bounderby’s wedding speech, he constantly refers to Louisa as ‘Tom Gradgrind’s daughter’ as oppose to her name. The repetition of this phrase highlights the importance of Mr Gradgrind to his relationship with Louisa, suggesting that the marriage is based on Bounderby’s need to be seen as somebody of a high social standing as oppose to him genuinely being in love with Louisa. The absence of a name typically makes a character seem to have no identity or to be weak or subservient in some way, such as Curley’s Wife in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. The reference to a woman as somebody’s wife shows them to be property of their husband and to have no independent from them, and the fact that Bounderby does this
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