Madame Defarge's Revenge

Charles Dickens was not only an astute businessman, but also one of the most inventive and brilliant writers of his time, the Victorian Era. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is regarded by the author as the best story he has written. In A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens refers to revenge as a negative force that drives humans’ morals. There are many examples of vicious acts driven by revenge in this novel. Dickens shows revenge is not justified and does not heal through Gaspard’s revenge on the Marquis, Madame Defarge’s revenge on Darnay, and the Revolutionaries’ revenge on the aristocrats.
Gaspard’s revenge on the Marquis eventually brings about his death and does not heal Gaspard or change what the Marquis did to cause him so much pain.

When recalling her past life to Monsieur Defarge, Madame Defarge says,“ ‘that peasant family so injured by the two Evrémonde brothers, as the Bastille paper describes, is my family Defarge, that sister of the mortally wounded boy upon the ground was my sister, that husband was my sister’s husband, that unborn father, those dead are my dead, and that summons to answer for those things descends to me!’” (264). This connects Madame Defarge to Charles Darnay. Charles Darnay’s family, the Evremondes, is the family that destroys Madame Defarge’s family. This explains Madame Defarge’s hatred of not only the aristocracy as a whole, but also Charles Darnay specifically. Madame Defarge feels responsible to avenge her family. Madame Defarge also says, “‘Tell the Wind and the Fire where to stop; not me!’”(265). Madame Defarge says this to Monsieur Defarge when she is trying to make a point that she will not be stopped from avenging her family. She is comparing herself to the elements saying she is even more unstoppable than wind and fire. This shows her revenge is the force that drives her life and what she will dedicate her life to. Her attempt to find and kill Lucie and her family is also foreshadowed. This hunger for revenge from an early age is recalled when Dickens says, “But imbued from her childhood with a brooding sense of wrong, and an invertebrate hatred of a

One innocent seamstress who was killed at the Guillotine said, “I am not afraid to die, Citizen Evremonde, but I have done nothing. I am not unwilling to die, if the Republic which is to do so much good to us poor, will profit by my death; but I do not know how that can be, Citizen Evremonde. Such a poor weak little creature!” (275-276). The innocent seamstress represents many innocent people killed in the Revolution by vengeful Revolutionaries. The seamstress’ innocence contrasts drastically with the cruelty of the Revolutionaries. The paradox of the Revolutionaries is that their goal is to help the poor and weak but ended up killing many poor innocents instead. Dickens is showing how the revenge in the hearts of the Revolutionaries destroyed more than it built up and their efforts were not worth the innocent lives lost. Furthermore, the Revolutionaries are described as, “The grindstone had a double handle, and, turning at it madly were two men, whose faces, as their long hair flapped back when the whirlings of the grindstone brought their faces up were more horrible and cruel than the visages of the wildest savages in their most barbarous disguise”(203). The gruesome, inhumane description of the Revolutionaries shows how Dickens thinks the revenge of the Revolutionaries takes away their humanity and their actions are not