『 두 도시 이야기 』의 감상성 (Sentimentality in A Tale of Two Cities)

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초록

A Tale of Two Cities is one of the most popular novels of Charles Dickens’s, while it is one of the least appreciated ones. This paper proposes that sentimentality is the source of the neglect and the popularity, raising questions on the concept of appropriateness of emotions prescribed by the critics of Victorian sentimentality.
Analyses of different emotional scenes in A Tale of Two Cities shows that Dickens uses sentimentality as a main feature of his major characters like Sydney Carton, Charles Darnay who sublimate their own desires and self-interests by avoiding mimetic rivalries. Lucie Manette, an epitome of sentimental idealization, is characterized by her ‘sweet compassion,’ which moves and changes all the other characters around her. In contrast, minor characters of English society and of French Revolution are characterized by their lack of sympathy and compassion which make the mode of their portrayal rather hard-boiled.
This dichotomy of pitiless world and helpless individuals makes Dickens’s sentimental view of the world and of the history, which makes A Tale of Two Cities a ‘sentimental’ historical novel, which shows weaknesses and crisis of bourgeois realism of the 19th century. On the other hand, Dickens’s sentimentality functions as an analgesic against, and an alternative to the individualized, fragmented society after modernization, as shown in the case of Javis Lorry, a successful businessman who became a warm-hearted mentor and helper for all.

영어초록

A Tale of Two Cities is one of the most popular novels of Charles Dickens’s, while it is one of the least appreciated ones. This paper proposes that sentimentality is the source of the neglect and the popularity, raising questions on the concept of appropriateness of emotions prescribed by the critics of Victorian sentimentality.
Analyses of different emotional scenes in A Tale of Two Cities shows that Dickens uses sentimentality as a main feature of his major characters like Sydney Carton, Charles Darnay who sublimate their own desires and self-interests by avoiding mimetic rivalries. Lucie Manette, an epitome of sentimental idealization, is characterized by her ‘sweet compassion,’ which moves and changes all the other characters around her. In contrast, minor characters of English society and of French Revolution are characterized by their lack of sympathy and compassion which make the mode of their portrayal rather hard-boiled.
This dichotomy of pitiless world and helpless individuals makes Dickens’s sentimental view of the world and of the history, which makes A Tale of Two Cities a ‘sentimental’ historical novel, which shows weaknesses and crisis of bourgeois realism of the 19th century. On the other hand, Dickens’s sentimentality functions as an analgesic against, and an alternative to the individualized, fragmented society after modernization, as shown in the case of Javis Lorry, a successful businessman who became a warm-hearted mentor and helper for all.

참고자료

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