How Is Madame Defarge A Foil Character

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Madame Defarge plays a significant role in Dickens’ novel A Tale of Two Cities as she symbolizes the French Revolution, and Dicken’s utilizes her as a foil character to lucie Manette through her reserved and cruel description. Despite representing a character of vengeance and ruthlessness, Madame Defarge’s traits relate to her troubled past. Madame Defarge had a troubled past due to traumatic events that took place in her childhood as the Evremonde brothers, French noblemen, destroyed her family. Late in the novel, she finally has her chance to take revenge on Charles Darnay, the living relative of the Evremonde’s and husband to lucie Manette, who tried to escape their reputation. Defarge will not let anything stop her as she believes “‘the Evremonde people are to be exterminated, and the wife and child must follow the husband and father’” (Book 3 ch 14). …show more content…

Madame also shows that she is ruthless in her efforts to get her revenge as, “It was nothing to her, that an innocent man was to die for the sins of his forefathers; she saw, not him, but them. It was nothing to her, that his wife was to be made a widow and his daughter and orphan;” (Book 3 ch 14). This exhibits Defarge’s ruthlessness as she never considers that obtaining her revenge could damage Darnay’s family similar to how significantly the tragic events of her past damaged her. Although, all of Defarge’s vengeful and ruthless moments stem from one thing, her damaged past. The Evremonde’s ruined her life as they raped her sister, her father died of grief, and her brother was killed trying to avenge their sister’s honor. This created a life of trauma for Defarge, forever damaging her heart, and creating her thirst for

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