Krishna
Charles Dickens, whose father went to Debtor’s prison for his financial ineptitude, provided sad events that reflected in many of his stories when he had become an author.
We have reviewed his Great Expectations here, previously.
Thomas Gradgrind believed that everything can be measured and weighed and otherwise determined by facts. There is no place for squishy sentimentality in the school he ran. When he finds his own son and daughter engaged in a frivolous pursuit of not only going to the perimeter of a circus about to open in town but actually lifting up the tent to peer inside, he totally gets stunned and even more annoyed when the daughter declares that she is not a bit regretful for what she did.
We learn when she confesses to Lousia that her father was very loving but regretful that he was a failure at everything. He seems to have run away only to give his daughter a chance to be ‘adopted’ and educated by the men who took her in.
Meanwhile Stephen Blackpool works for Gradgrind’s friend Bounderby,, who is equally ‘logical’ and comes to him for advice. His, Stephen’s, wife keeps running away after taking all the money and comes back a hag to repeat the cycle again. He asks how to get rid of her and the employer says that there is no way absolutely. Once married, they are in it ‘for better or worse’.
Now Gradgrind is asked by his friend, the fifty year old Bounderby, if he can marry his daughter Louisa, who is only twenty. He is thrilled and has a conversation with his daughter who gives a ‘yes’ totally unemotionally.
He marries her and moves Sparsit to the bank’s building in a dingy area.
Stephen is evicted from a public office by a demagog and he goes to see Gradgrind and Louisa whan they call him to ask what happened.
Meanwhile a man called James Harthouse is trying to seduce Louisa and has found that the way is through Tom. Louisa even agreed to marry Bounderby because his being rich will give her means to give money whenever her brother Tom, a layabout, needed money due to gambling and reckless spending. He does not even appreciate it and is like a whiny baby, complaining that she is not doing more.
Mrs Sparsit spies Harthouse professing his love to Louisa when Gradgrind was away on business and plans to expose her and take her ‘rightful’ place beside Gradgrind.
Now she realizes that she is falling for James and confesses to her father everything – How she hates Gradgrind and why she cannot control ‘facts’ because emotions are overpowering, how she is deeply unhappy – everything. He is shocked to find that all he believed in comes crashing down and that his philosophy of ‘deep facts’ ruined his daughter’s life.
Hampton in the meanwhile is convinced that she will Louisa will come for him ready to elope and is puzzled when he cannot reach her and found no messages waiting for him. He probes Tom to see what the matter is but gets nowhere as Tom is clueless.
Sissy informs Hampton that it is over between him and Louisa and commands him to leave town and never comes back. Crestfallen, he agrees. When Gradgrind confronts Bounderby, a furious Bounderby gives him an ultimatum. Either Louisa comes by next morning or he will send her stuff over to Gradgrind, as a sign of the fact that he will not ‘accept her’ any more.
Meanwhile Steven Blackpool, who has left the city, gets the blame for the missing money even though it is obvious to us that Tom is the one who stole it to pay the gambling debts. Rachel goes to Louisa in tears for help in clearing Steven’s name.
Rebecca comes to defend Stephen Blackpool’s name who was defamed for the theft of the dollars from the bank. (It was Tom who did the thievery). But when he does not arrive to clear his name, he is judged guilty in the eyes of the townspeople.
Mrs Sparsit unintentionally humiliates Bounderby by bringing an old woman as the ‘thief’. When it is exposed that she was the loving mother of Bounderby whom he had banished with an allowance, Bounderby, the ‘righteous man who rose with no one to support him’ as he is fond of saying daily, gets exposed before the whole town as a fraud and a humbutg.
Meanwhile Sissy and Rachel team up to find Stephen and go exploring where he went to. They find his hat, abandoned. They find him fallen in and when they rescue him, he convinces Gradgrind of his innocence but dies shortly thereafter.
Now all eyes are on Tom, who has run away after realizing that now he is in trouble. Sissy is instrumental in hiding him with the circus company where she came from and the owner is indebted to Gradgrind for the kindness shown to Sissy herself. While they are planning to get Tom away from the country (‘North America or South America’ according to their plan), Blitzen, Bounderby’s assistant gets there and arrests Tom.
Through the cunning of the circus owner, they manage to extricate Tom. The story ends with a lot of moral lessons like Charles Dickens like to place in the story but they do not come across as preachy.
Has some flagging in the story but however, all the classic Charles Dickens ingredients are there.
6/10
– – Krishna (September 2019)