num_pages: 299
description: Set in Coketown, which is based on the author's observations of Preston, Hard Times is Dickens's classic work about industrial England. G.K. Chesterton wrote of this novel, 'Twenty times we have taken Dickens's hand and it has been sometimes hot with revelry and sometimes weak with weariness; but this time we start a little for...we realise that we have touched his gauntlet of steel.' Others have seen a more complete vision of humanity in the novel's portrayal of the generous hearts of Sleary, the circus-owner, and Cissy Jupe, contrasted with the selfishness and hardness of Thomas Gradgrind and other characters who suppress love and imagination.
language: English
title: Hard Times: For These Times
titlecomplete: Hard Times: For These Times
characters: Mrs. Sparsit, Mr. M'Choakumchild, Sissy Jupe, Josiah Bounderby, James Harthouse, Louisa Gradgrind, Stephen Blackpool, Thomas Gradgrind
genres: Classics, British Literature, Novels, Classic Literature, School, Historical Fiction, Literature, 19th Century, Fiction, Victorian
ratings_count: 66517
places: Coketown
publisher: Oxford University Press