If we want to know how the characters in novels are created and how they are made looking lively, the reading of novel ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ written by Charles Dickens would be a good guide.
Dickens’ characterization of men and women in ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ is near to realistic. Some of them act a little bit dramatically, as and when the plot of the novel demands so. Jarvis Lorry, an simple minded banker and Madame Defarge, a diehard revolutionary, never depart from the strict necessities attached with their professions. But Dr. Manette turns himself into an advocate and takes the tools of a saviour in his hands for saving his son-in-law from a certain death penalty.
Charles Dickens was the technician who used symbols as effective implements for helping the larger picture of his novel to be understood deeply. Unlike a well-sculptured use of powerful symbols in his other novels, in ‘A Tale Of Two Cities’ he depended upon the sharp adjectives and salient humour. While caricaturing the host of characters, he displayed his masterly art of telling about the aspects of contemporary society. In the same manner he narrated the pros and cones of the ongoing revolution in France. The vivid description of all the characters is such that if by chance any one of them passes by us, we would immediately tell that ‘this is Jerry Cruncher (from his unique style of walking) or this is Lucy (by seeing her serene beauty), or this is Madame Defarge (from the frozen lava of her anger)’.
The dialogues go with the characters. Mr. Lorry and Dr. Manette are professionals. They depict the cultured face of the time. Madame Defarge is the firebrand lady representing the wrath of the revolutionaries of contemporary France. As the novel was to be published as serial in a newspaper, the beginning and the end of each chapter tend to be loaded with gunshot sentences. And when a writer like Dickens fires a shot, it is heard up to far pavilions. He did not give us characters; he gave us the types of people. In real life, you would find replica of every man and woman Dickens depicted in his novels. Becoming the mother of children having convincing looks, Dickens had animated a crowd of characters. They are proud; they are feeble. They are generous; they are greedy. They are coward; they are bold. Dickens read the life before his eyes and used it for his creations, hoping that the readers would love them and honour the same.