Foreshadowing In A Tale Of Two Cities

One theme that came alive in this book and specifically in the passage is the people’s hunger. The setting of the passage is in Saint Antoine, which was a poor suburb of Paris. It talks about how when a wine cast breaks open, literal swarms of people crawl on the ground in hopes to fill there stomachs. Men crawl, women scoop, babies sip and others drink the spilled wine. I think that Dickens' used “The Wine Shop” scene to show how desperate the people were for not only food but for help during these troubling times. They were overwhelmed by the high taxes and lack of support they were given. Another foreshadowing that I believe Dickens’ tries to create in this scene is the future violence and bloodshed that will unfold throughout the novel.
Many scenes have darkness overcoming them. For example, in the opening scene the mail coach’s journey begins in the dark. Dickens’ wrote this novel with shadows that overwhelmed many passages throughout the book. One might associate darkness and shadows with secrets. It’s very obvious that many secrets and mysteries in this book will never see the light the of day. I think that one can tell through these three passages that a major theme in the book is Revolution. Through people’s obvious hunger, disregard for the poor, high taxes, and eeriness throughout the land, it is no wonder that Revolution finally broke out. The Wine Cast passages shows the desperate times that the country dwellers were going though. Marquis Evrémonde portrays the corrupt lifestyle that the selfish nobles lived in that day and provided an illustration of the cruelty that the French Revolution tried to overcome. Lastly, the passage about Darkness showed the hardships and the shadows that some lived in. It also represented the deep dark secrets that some may never know about. Dickens was able to clearly show the reign of terror in London, Paris (hence a tale of two cities) and in the French country side leading up to the outbreak of the French