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This study investigates in the perspective of modernity, Charles Dickens who wrote in the 19th century London, England which fully opened the era of modernity. The modernity of England which was historically the first to enter modern society can be characterized by capitalism and civil society. This study looks at how Dickens grasps the period’s transformation as it transfers from medieval feudal hierarchy society to modern capitalist civil society by observing his major novels. Dickens has a critical stance against capitalism which marked the epoch of modernity in history. Not overlooking the possibility of materialistic prosperity that capitalism may bring, he shows it to be a system that can not be morally justified due to its essential exploiting structure. Especially, his later works show the person at the top of national economy to be the financial capitalist, illustrating capitalism’s basic problems further degenerated. Writing with not the rural area or industrial city but the world’s center of finance, London as the setting to his novels, Dickens novels foresee the attributes of contemporary late capitalism. Capitalism which makes capital dominate labor or human life can on the other hand provide a breakthrough to human liberation. With industrialization and urbanization, the modern urbanites become much liberated from the hierarchy that had confined traditional society. However, what Dickens witnessed was the possibility for a free and equal civil society fall back due to materialism and the aspiration to be a gentleman. By grasping how the nation’s obsessive emulation for gentlemen is related to the imperialist economy parasitic on colonies, Dickens depicts both the possibility and problems of modernity in his time of modern capitalist civil society.

This paper explores how Charles Dickens’s Dombey and Son (1848) demonstrates the connection between the transformation of masculinity and the changes in the notions of vision and the observer in the early nineteenth century by focusing on its three male characters: Paul Dombey, James Carker, and Dombey’s son called little Paul. From his original status as a Cartesian subject, which is established in Dickens’s use of camera obscura images for him, Dombey degenerates into a being-as-object who is stupefied into passivity and lethargy after losing his controlling patriarchal power. I scrutinize how Dombey’s downfall is associated with the collapse of the camera obscura model of vision and subjectivity. I read Carker— e.g. his failed attempt to use his versatility and sharp eyes to subvert and steal Dombey’s social and economic power—through a changed meaning of the camera obscura in The German Ideology (1845-46) by Marx and Engels as a degenerative metaphor for procedures and forces that conceal, invert, and distort ideologies. Little Paul’s awareness of his subjectivity as being-as-object, which exists only in front of the other-as-subject, can be read as a precursor to the twentieth-century discourse on the reorganization of the visual relationship between subject and object and the decentralization of the subject-as-observer’s ruling position by Sartre. However, the early death of Paul Jr. implies that he fails to provide an alternative model of reciprocal male gazer/subject.

Examining the representation of Bucket, this paper aims to prove that Dickens’s Bleak House produces a different narrative of crime from that in Newgate novels and in detective fiction. Bucket, like the detective in detective novels, reassures the class hierarchy by containing the subversiveness of crime discourse in the Newgate fiction. Bucket’s representation is, however, different from that of aristocratic amateur detectives and of incompetent and shallow-minded police in detective fiction. Bucket is represented as a police who reveals competence in detection, class-neutrality, and family value. Through the representation of Bucket, Bleak House produces more progressive discourse of class than detective novels. Taking a broad view of the development of nineteenth-century British crime fiction, this paper argues that the detective narrative in Bleak House is a transitional type of crime narrative between Newgate novel and detective fiction.

This paper attempted to regard Pip Pirrip as an authoring hero and look at what his prominent characteristics are at first, and then, how these characteristics of his contributes to the securement of persuasiveness in Charles Dickens's discussion about a new gentlemanship in Great Expectations in the Bakhtinian perspective. In this novel, Dickens portrayed his hero Pip as an innocent orphan, isolated both domestically and socio-hierarchically, as well as a sensitive adolescent boy. Also, Dickens narrated Pip's self-authoring, where Pip was establishing his self-identity while responding so sensitively to his personal, social environment. Here Pip was pondering deeply almost all social, individual values disturbing a true gentleman, and his such profound meditation ended up exposing many social absurdities. Becoming a true gentlemen of Pip's can also be an ideological becoming in that it makes him establish his belief system newly as a true gentleman. Actually, Dickens's creativity was highlighted in this effort to make Pip's new autobiography highly persuasive regardless of maximizing his hero's interactive context. This narratology made Pip's becoming a true gentleman more persuasive as well. By using the hero-characteristics of Bildungsroman as variables and restructuring as many gentlemanship-related factors as possible as his hero's lived experiences, Dickens made all his discussions in Great Expectations so persuasive.

The purpose of this paper is to show Dickens's view on charity appeared in his famous fable-like short story, A Christmas Carol. Through the most famous character in Dickens's novels, Ebenezer Scrooge, Dickens argues that personal charity is more important than public charity. While public charity is cruel and impersonal like work house system, personal charity, Dickens argues, is more direct and effective for its psychological distance. Three Ghosts coming on Christmas eve implies the ways of Scrooge's past, present and future. The first Ghost is the representative of a Malthus's cruel rationality and the second one is the show case of the conflict between the middle class and the lower class in the mid Victorian Era. The last Ghost is a kind of a suggestion to heal the conflict through personal charity meaning the material contact between individuals. In A Christmas Carol Dickens shows that he prefers to personal charity for the immediate result of charity and the fact that public charity has not fully organized yet.

The purpose of this paper is to apply René Girard's model for the triangle of desire for Hard Times. Girard in his book argues that persons would possess the desire forced by mediators in society and that the desire can be shown through a triangle structure including subject, desire and mediators. If we apply the theory of Girard for Hard Time, Girard's relational geometry diagrams show the relations among Louisa, Mr. Gradgrind, Bounderby, Rachael and Blackpool. The application of Girard for Hard Times reveals another interesting aspect of the industrialized Coketown people's attitude toward marriage and divorce. The abortive struggle to get divorce of the characters, Louisa and Blackpool, shows why Bounderby as a mediator obstructs the achievement of desire of the characters wanting to divorce.

A Tale of Two Cities: Dickens’ Concept of Morality Sang-Wha Moon (Gwangju University) This paper shows what Dickens' concept of morality of the Victorian society in A Tale of Two Cities is. Throughout the Victorian period there were long-standing anxieties about female sexuality and working-class political revolt, both of which were seen as a threat to middle-class life and property. During the first half of the nineteenth century, there was a long struggle to reform the treatment of the mentally ill, and Victorian medical psychology sought to reclaim the insane as moral subjects, subjects lacking control and self-restraint, who for various and often unknown reason had failed to internalize the moral standards of the middle class. In A Tale of Two Cities, domestic space is no longer the opposite of the asylum, no longer the private home from which the insane individual is removed and to which he or she must return. In his novel Dickens shows madness of revolution can be treated with the ideology of Victorian middle class, represented by Lucie Mannette.

The ideal of middle class British masculinity and the representative of the new Victorian respectability, the ″gentleman″ was difficult to define amidst the class mobility and social change of the nineteenth century. Was the gentleman to be identified by class and by money\ulcorner By behavior and clothing\ulcorner By religion and morality\ulcorner This essay focuses on the problem of the ″gentleman″ as it was debated in the Victorian era and as it was reflected in the biography and work of the mid-nineteenth century's most important English writer, Charles Dickens. I examine the critical debate surrounding the Victorian idea of the ″gentleman″ by comparing the arguments of Shirley Robin Letwin's The Gentleman in Trollope(1982) and Robin Gilmour's The Idea of the Gentleman in the Victorian Novel(1981). Letwin views the ″gentleman″ as largely transcending class structure, while Gilmour's more historically-conscious view locates the gentleman as emerging out of, and even enabling, the class negotiations of this period. Against the backdrop of such debates, I discuss Charles Dickens's struggles with the idea of the gentleman in theory and in practice. In his novels, especially his semi-autobiographical bildungsromane about the growth and development of boys into adulthood, Dickens prominently engages with the identity and definition of the gentleman. As I demonstrate in this essay, this interest originated from Dickens's own childhood trauma and his subsequent drive to attain gentility, a necessity complicated by the vicissitudes of his personal and professional life

This essay studies some elements of children’s literature in Charles Dickens’s Hard Times, along with a possibility of regarding this novel as children’s literature though it is usually known as social novel or industrial novel. First, I consider the concept of child and childhood, the definition of children’s literature, and elements and characteristics of children’s literature. And then I also examine pleasure and enjoyment, usefulness for education and vicarious experience, imagination, and treatment of social issues as elements of children’s literature. Particularly among the elements of children’s literature, this essay considers the concept of fancy or imagination, what Dickens says about fancy, how his imagination is represented, and what effect the lack of fancy has on people and society in the novel. Based on the fact that Dickens had deep interest in fairy tales for his whole life and used fairy tales in his novels, this essay studies the aspects and effects of the fairy tale and how and why Dickens uses the fairy tale in the novel. This essay proves that the novel has various elements of children’s literature, that the fairy tale is used for Dickens’s literary and moral purpose, and that this novel can exert a similar effect on readers though it is not easy yet to regard Hard Times as children’s literature definitely.

In the global context, particularly in Christian nations, Christmas is considered a culturally and ethically significant time. In this study, we examine Charles Dickens' novel, “A Christmas Carol,” and the celebration of Christmas in Korea. We explore the values of Christmas in Korea derived from the significance and importance of this novel. These values include repentance, empathy, compassion, and the importance of humanity. Korean Christmas is regarded as a time for practicing these values, bearing a message akin to the transformation of characters like Scrooge. Furthermore, “A Christmas Carol” conveys a message of improvement and change over time, emphasizing change and growth in Korean Christmas. People reflect on their past, correct their mistakes, nurture hope for the future, and experience personal growth and transformation. Additionally, the novel raises awareness of social injustice and inequality, offering alternatives. In Korean society, Christmas encourages the willingness to care for and help others, facilitating discussions and understanding of societal issues. For these reasons, “A Christmas Carol” is considered a culturally and ethically significant time in Korean Christmas, and the two are intertwined in various aspects. This study explores the interaction between cultural change and ethical teachings by 'A Christmas Carol' and investigates the impact of this work on Christmas culture and social change. It serves as the basis for emphasizing moral principles and humanity during the Christmas season, and this research provides suggestions for future research directions, aiming to deepen the understanding of Dickens' work and the importance of “A Christmas Carol.” Through these efforts, it is expected that valuable insights into the connection between Christmas culture and moral messages will be gained. In this study, we will delve into the enduring appeal and cultural significance of “A Christmas Carol,” discussing how this novel has evolved into a beloved holiday tradition and a true symbol of Christmas. We will also examine the adaptation of this novel into various media and its influence on holiday season celebrations. Insights into the impact of this novel on Korean society and its continued significance in modern times will be provided, suggesting a direction for a healthier and more desirable path for Korean society.

History is a discourse that is contextualized by a historian's rhetorical purposes. So some historical data are chosen by a historian, and some are completely ignored or silenced. The master texts of history, in its traditional sense, are therefore discursive dialogs that silence the powerless voices. History-making certainly is a process of mystifying the violence toward the powerless. Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities is a novel in which those who have been silenced in history in its traditional sense raise their voices to the extent that they can overthrow the whole system of society. Their force seems to be powerful enough to disconnect the major historical stream that has silenced the powerless. However, the seemingly new start of history is achieved by extreme violence and sets up the same kind of power system as before, the oppressors and the oppressed, with the only difference of the subject of oppression. History is a dialogical process rather than a dialectic process. Dickens reveals the false justification of “historical truthfulness” by inflicting self-violence upon his own narrative. He continually tells us that history is a repetition of the past, and at first the narrative seems to support the statement. However, as the story proceeds, there are a lot of contradictions that deny the statement. And the mystic ending where Sydney Carton dies for Charles Darnay completely destroys the narrative coherence. This testifies that history always defies any attempt to find a coherence in it and (de-)mystifies the violence in the process of history-making.

The paper aims to analyze the microscopic narrative so called ‘herstory,’ female or feminist viewpoints on history of modernity in terms of melodrama in The Tale of Two Cities (1859) by Charles Dickens. The historical background of The Tale of Two Cities is the revolutionary period in France and England from 1775 to 1793 including the French Revolution and the American Revolutionary War. The novel not only represents the historical development of human rights in the birth of modern subjectivity based on reason and rationality, but also releases melodramatic explosive power of extravagant emotions, feelings, and affects. The main historical drive to move rational male modern subjects like Alexandre Manette, Charles Darnay, and Javis Lorry in the turbulent era, comes from emotional female subjects like Lucie Manette and Terese Defarge. And hidden narratives of her-story control the manifested history because the decisive motives of the French Revolution and final transformation of Sydney Carton from a meaningless machine to a sacrificial Christ are derived from the herstory about Teresa’s revenge and Lucie’s love. The significance of herstory with respect to melodramatic subjective feelings can shed new light on the buried affects in the narratives under the surface of objective modern history. (Kyung Hee University)

우리는 이 논문에서 인간의 성격이 자신의 내재적 특성과 환경과의 다양한 상호작용 즉, 환경에 순응할 것인가 환경 을 극복할 것인가를 통해 어떻게 조화를 이루면서 형성되는지 대한 연구를 제시한다. 인격과 성격은 타고나기도 하지만 후천 적 영향을 받는다. 우리는 해당 주제의 중요성을 강조하고, 이 핵심 문제를 살펴본다. 흥미롭게 몰입하여 읽을 수 있는 찰스 디킨스의 소설 "올리버 트위스트"를 연구 대상으로 선택한 의의를 살펴본다. 주인공에 중점을 두어 인간 내재적 특성과 주변 환경과의 상호작용을 하면서 성장하는 과정을 강조한다. 흔히 받아들여지는 가정과는 달리, 디킨스의 시각은 선천적 특성을 강조한다. 주인공 올리버를 통해 주변환경보다는 선천적 특성의 중요성을 강조하여 성격 형성에 큰 영향을 줌을 암시하고 있 다. 두 원인 요소의 결정적인 영향을 강조하면서, 내재적 특성에 더 큰 비중을 둔다. 우리는 그의 작품을 통해 그의 시각과 주장을 살피고 확인해 보기로 한다. 그의 시각으로 환경이 성격 형성에 미치는 영향을 탐구함으로써, 우리는 선천적 특성과 환경 간의 복잡한 상호작용을 이해하고자 한다. 현대 독자들에게 성격 특성이 어떻게 진화하고 환경적 요인에 의해 형성되는 지에 대한 주장을 제공하고, 전반적인 이해를 하는 것이 목표이다. 우리는 핵심적인 장면과 등장인물들을 검토함으로써 디킨 스의 주장을 지지하지 않기로 한다. 그러나 어느 것을 지지하는가 라는 질문에 대한 대답은 독자들의 몫으로 둔다.

In this papery, we study the diverse dynamics of human personality formation, examining the harmonious interplay between innate traits and the surrounding environment. Our focus is on Charles Dickens' renowned work, "Oliver Twist," where Dickens underscores the critical role of both the environment and innate traits in shaping personalities. We explore Dickens' unique perspective, emphasizing the deep insights gained through his work. The paper outlines the research background, stressing the topic's importance and explaining the necessity of addressing this crucial issue. The significance of choosing "Oliver Twist" as the research subject is highlighted, underscoring its special relevance. The main content thoroughly investigates how innate traits and the environment profoundly influence individual personality formation. Contrary to common assumptions, Dickens' perspective unequivocally highlights the greater importance of innate traits. Our analysis supports this claim, examining key scenes and characters in "Oliver Twist." By exploring his distinctive viewpoint on the environment's impact on personality formation, we enhance understanding of theinteraction between innate traits and the environment. Focused on "Oliver Twist," our goal is to provide contemporary readers with profound insights into how personal characteristics evolve and are shaped by environmental factors, utilizing Dickens' masterpiece as a central reference point.

In this paper Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities is analyzed in terms of its description of and dealing with its major characters’ traumatic experiences: Doctor Manette’s, Madame Defarge’s, and Sydney Carton’s. We argue that Dickens describes the individual traumatic experience not because he wants melodramatic effects, but because he attempts to delve into it in order to find the causes of French Revolution. Also, Dickens makes connection between individual experience of trauma and its social and political dimension. Through the analysis of Dickens’s attempt, we can acknowledge that the mega political event could be originated from severe individual traumas when they are not treated properly. We cannot find the effective way to prevent the revolutionary crash, but we can appreciate Sydney Carton’s vision of the community of “perennial mourning” as a possible treatment of individual and communal trauma.

The aim of this paper is to review why humans became devalued and why humanistic crisis occurred in Charles Dickens's Hard Times. The Victorian society prospered in terms of economy and industry. On the other hand, the Victorian people could not but lose their valuable customs and traditions such as conventional concepts of home and marriage, and their idealism of education to cultivate human dignity and culture in their life. The dark aspects of the Victorian age are well described in Hard Times. In particular, there are three reasons for such corruption and devaluation of humanity in the industrial society. Firstly, the utilitarian education emphasized the value of ‘reason,’ depreciating that of ‘emotions.’ Secondly, Coketown, portrayed as a typical industrial city in Victorian England, was a filthy residential area of poor urban workers, eventually causing bodily and mental corruption of the workers. Thirdly, a family home was not safe from the symptoms of materialism and selfishness as well as from the great evils of capitalism. As well portrayed in the novel, even a marriage was naturally taken to be one of the materialistic and social strategies to raise one’s status or improve one’s wealth. To sustain human dignity and value and avoid humanistic crisis in the capitalistic society, the roles of education, living environment, and family home should be much valued.

This paper analyzes clothing symbolism of mood and emotion described in master pieces of Charles dickens(2812∼1870), who is a well-known writer of England, and thus tries to clarify symbolic characteristics of clothing woven into all human lives.. The result show that clothing symbolizes in various ways such mood and emotion as bless, wrath, friendliness, respect, surprise, excitement, embarrassment, uneasiness, sadness, melancholy, anxiety, hostility, unpleasantness, deliveration, shyness, blessing, gratitude, despair, shame, sympathy, boasting, etc.

This paper aims to illuminate Charles Dickens’ hyperoptimistic view of life in Oliver Twist representing his earlier writing stage, which is entirely different from his critical view of life in his later works. With an in-depth exploration of Oliver’s different experiences in Coffin ship, workhouse, thieves’ den and gentleman’s world, the paper proves that Dickens just simply regards life as a struggle between good and evil and believes that evil will be conquered in the end. Dickens’ rosy optimistic inclination makes Oliver remain miraculously undisturbed by negative influences even under difficult adversities, and Oliver’s change from an abandoned baby to a favorite of fate is not achieved by himself but for the most part by the help of several kind-hearted people. The introductory part of this paper takes a brief look at some criticisms on Dickens and approaches the task of the paper. Section Two points out that Dickens devises a series of occurrences for Oliver to find his way back to the gentleman world. Section Three discusses how Dickens always keeps his optimism and presents how Oliver is able to defeat misfortune, evil and temptation by virtue of fate.

In Bleak House Dickens shows his faith in religion by satirizing his contemporary social institution which disregards human needs, and the upper class that is irresponsible and hypocritical. Here the institution is represented by the Court of the Chancery, characterized by a merciless lawyer, Vholes. As the defender of a lax system, the upper class is typed by false philanthropists, Mrs. Pardiggles and Mrs. Jellyby using religion for their own needs. The undesirable effect of the corrupted institution and the irresponsible upper class is not limited only to them, but also extends from an innocent individual to a whole society. It is explicitly proved through Jo, a symbolic victim of Victorian society, showing a social tie that society is an organism of interrelated parts. Though Dickens accuses the irresponsibilities of the paralyzed society, he hopes for a bright future in the society, and here as a counteraction of the foggy circumstances, he presents Esther’s unselfish love, supported by Allan’s active service. Dickens seems to believe that the helpless can not be relieved by any religion, without the resurrection of human nature which Esther and Allan show. In fact, Dickens’s view of religion today remains familiar to us.

The purpose of this paper is to illuminate how Charles Dickens’ childhood traumas are reflected in his autobiographical novels ? Oliver Twist, David Copperfield and Great Expectations. This research is mainly based upon Freudian psychoanalysis theory. With an in-depth exploration of Dickens’ responses towards his traumatic incident, the paper defines the core of the traumas and surveys how the defense mechanisms function to counterbalance Dickens’ childhood trauma only through the medium of art. Introductory part of this paper takes a brief look at the past criticisms on Dickens and clarifies the task of the paper. Section two deals with Dickens’ traumatic experiences, including his parents’ influence on his growth and his experiences in Warren’s Blacking factory which leaves him a permanent scar for humiliation, and reveals the origin of his trauma and its healing process. Section three discusses how Dickens manages to transfer his childhood trauma into his literary creativity, especially in his three autobiographical novels: Oliver Twist, David Copperfield and Great Expectations. The paper attempts to look into the fact that writing serves primarily as a mental therapy for Dickens to gain his salvation. In view of Freudian psychoanalytical approach, his creation of autobiographical novels apparently does much toward a self-treatment to overcome his traumas.