A tale of two cities

Introduction

Dickens chronology

Timeline

Further reading

Note on the text

Tale of two cities.

Book 1: Recalled to life: Period

Mail

Night shadows

Preparation

Wine-shop

Shoemaker

Book 2: Golden thread: Five years later

Sight

Disappointment

Congratulatory

Jackal

Hundreds of people

Monseigneur in town

Monseigneur in the country

Gorgon's head

Two promises

Companion picture

Fellow of delicacy

Fellow of no delicacy

Honest tradesman

Knitting

Still knitting

One night

Nine days

Opinion

Plea

Echoing footsteps

Sea still rises

Fire rises

Drawn to the loadstone rock

Book 3: Track of a storm: In secret

Grindstone

Shadow

Calm in storm

Wood-sawyer

Triumph

Knock at the door

Hand at cards

Game made

Substance of the shadow

Dusk

Darkness

Fifty-two

Knitting done

Footsteps die out for ever.

After eighteen years as a political prisoner in the Bastille, the aging Doctor Manette is finally released and reunited with his daughter in England. There the lives of two very different men, Charles Darnay, an exiled French aristocrat, and Sydney Carton, a disreputable but brilliant English lawyer, become enmeshed through their love for Lucie Manette. From the tranquil roads of London, they are drawn against their will to the vengeful, bloodstained streets of Paris at the height of the Reign of Terror, and they soon fall under the lethal shadow of La Guillotine. This edition uses the text as it appeared in its first serial publication in 1859 to convey the full scope of Dickens's vision, and includes the original illustrations by H.K. Browne ('Phiz'). Richard Maxwell's introduction discusses the intricate interweaving of epic drama with personal tragedy.