Charles Dickens was very successful during his lifetime; many of his works inspires movie makers and the producers of television programmers since his death (Brook, 1970). The amusing names of many people in his works have become very well-known moreover his characters often seem funnier, stranger, better or worse than men, women and children in real life. This adds humour to stories that are often very serious and sad. Through these characters we can learn a lot about the society of 19th century of England. We can also enjoy a very good, exciting story. Dickens' characters are some of the most memorable ones in fiction; his genius is shown in the choice of names, the details he offered in each scene. Hard Times’ characters …show more content…
Gradgrind is a “man who proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four, and nothing over, and who is not to be talked into allowing for anything over” (HT: 2). He describes himself as an ‘eminently practical’ man far from imaginations and emotions (Shaw, 2001). • Louisa Gradgrind: The character around whom the novel stands on, Gradgrind’s eldest children and later Bounderby’s wife. Louisa suffered from her father’s system of education. Thus she could not enjoy her childhood and when she grows up, she has married a man who she does not love, just to please her father. The first chapters of the novel show that Louisa has the gift of imagination especially in her love to her brother Tom. • Thom Gradgrind: Gradgrind’s son one of the characters that effected with Gradgrind’s philosophy he was selfish and unhuman, an apprentice at Bounderby’s bank, He loves money even more than he loves his sister …show more content…
He is a self-made man because he was abandoned by his mother Mrs. Pegler who sacrificed her life to give him a place in society. His true upbringing, by caring and devoted parents, indicates that his social mobility is a boas and calls into question the whole notion of social mobility in nineteenth- century England. • Cecelia (Sissy) Jupe: The daughter of a clown in Sleary’s circus, she represents the world of imagination in the novel (Davis, 1999). Sissy is taken in by Mr. Gradgrind when her father disappears. • Mrs sparsit: Bounderby’s housekeeper, a widow and once a member of the aristocratic elite. She dismissed from Bounderby’s service because of his origins after she was looking for him for herself to get married. • Stephen Blackpool: a worker in Bounderby’s factory, he was in love with Racheal and married to a horibele alcholic woman; a very honest man of great