character (KARE-ec-ter): a person who is responsible for the thoughts and actions within a story, poem, or other literature. Characters are extremely important because they are the medium through which a reader interacts with a piece of literature. Every character has his or her own personality, which a creative author uses to assist in forming the plot of a story or creating a mood. The different attitudes, mannerisms, and even appearances of characters can greatly influence the other major elements in a literatry work, such as theme, setting, and tone. With this understanding of the character, a reader can become more aware of other aspects of literature, such as symbolism, giving the reader a more complete understanding of the work. The character is one of hte most important tools available to the author.
Using the definition above, characterize Louisa Gradgrind.
6 comments:
DEANNA LAGASSE
Louisa Gradgrind represents the typical Vicotrian female character. This can be greatly seen through her sumbmissive attitude in her decisions to marry Mr. Bounderby. To other characters, Luiosa is merely the product of her carefully monitered environment, and is obeying the wishes of her father and famliy and marrying a man they prefer. In relaity, Louisa feels exactly the opposite. She is sumbmissive, and and feels angered inside, but does not show it to other characters. Only the readers acknowledge her true feelings, and not the charcters in her life. This can be seen at the end of Chapter Fifteen, when Mr. Gradgrind announces her engagment to the older Mr. Bounderby, "From that moment, she was impassive, proud and cold--held Sissy at a distance--changed her all together" (100). Louisa sets the stage for the theme, setting, and tone of the novel, and especially the time. Louisa is not able to express her emotions, as she was condiitoned to not be imaginitive or sensitive. Furhtermore, there is nio one Louisa can really talk to, for she is confined to her family and studies. Louisa seems to be testing her father's training and showing him how his teaching has caused her to be. This can best be seen when Mr. Gradgrind tells her that she is engaged, an amazing and emotional moment in most females' life. She states, "'There seems to be nothing there but languid and monotonous smoke" (96). Louisa is clearly detachted and resigned to her fate, as she has really no way out. Her father is even taken naback, and at first suprised by her nonchalantness, but soon he regains his composure and praises her. Also, with knowing the character, readers can be more understanding of literary elements such as symbols. For example, Louisa seems facsinated with the fire in her room, and while she is looking at it, she dreams of fantasical ideas, what her father does not want her to dream of. On the other hand, fire and soot are in the Coketown factories, and the fuel to people's livelihoods and lives. Overall, Lousia represents a kind of Victoriaan femininity, as she sucummbs to her marriage, yet she has opposing feelings inside which she is not able to let out due to her upbringing. Symbols such as the fire create an outlet for her fantasies. The dreary, sumbmissive tone of the novel is also shown by these depressing thoughts, and she shows how the setting of the novel, Coketown, is influenced by society's ideals of womanhood, etc.
KATHY MENG
Louisa Gradgrind is the daughter of Tom Gradgrind, a man who emphasizes Fact and dissapproves of Fancy.
In Chapter3 A Loophole Mr. Gradgrind caught Louisa and his son peeking at a circus. Mr. Gradgrind, being a man of Facts, brought up Louisa to focus only on facts yet she goes to see the circus through a loophole.
The circus represents the Fancy that Mr. Gradgrind dispises, Louisa is mildly rebelling his father. I think Louisa is a smart girl with her individual thoughts. She is able to have own thoughts because she seeks the fancy despite her father's restrictions.
Not all kids are able to think for themselves. For example Sissy is taught the same importance of Fact by Mr.Gradgrind but she is trained to believe that only Fact matters. Louisa has the drive in her to seek beyond what her father taught her.
Although Louisa has the curious drive, this is suppressed by her family duties which she shows she is docile. When Mr.Gradgrind asks her to marry Mr. Bounderby she agrees though we all know she despises him (when Mr.Bounderby kissed her, she scrubs it off).
"I often sit wondering here, and think how unfortunate it is for me that Ican't reconcile you to home better than I am able to." (50) Shows her bound to her family.
Because she values her family, which incldes her pop, Mr. Gradgrind, who values Fact, her interest in Fancy is suppressed.
Nicole Barr
I agree with all that Deanna and Kathy said about Louisa's character, and her drive to look beyond what he father has taught her. She appears to know that there is more to life, and though he thinks he has the highest of intelligence, Mr. Gradgrind is really just protecting himself from feeling any emotion. However I don't agree with Kathy when she says that Sissy doesn't have a drive to also feel that emotion. I think that she is just covering up this drive with her excessive politeness.
KATHY MENG
After writing about Sissy, I take back what I said about Sissy. She does have Fancy but she seems very eager to be Factual and conform to Mr.Gradgrinds standards.
Colin Sweeney
When comparing the books main female characters, Sissy and Louisa, a distinct difference can be noted. Although Louisa strives to be like Sissy, as both deanna and kathy have noted(comment about sneaking out to the circus to have a bit of "fancy" in her life), she is unable to do so because her education and restrictions enforced by her father have prevented her from having this "fancy over fact" trait. Louisa, as Deanna noted, is seemingly unfeeling. She becomes engaged and she shows nearly no emotion at the situation. In fact, her statement afterwards (which deanna noted) about the smoke and fire is of great importance i think. unable to describe her feelings within her, she uses this metaphor to express how she feels. Inside her, hidden by all the smoke are her feelings, or the fire. Ultimately I agree with Kathy that Fact dominates her life and makes her the way she is but I think Deanna did a better job of describing her role in the book and how/why she is important to the story.
Luke S. Morrell
Louisa Gradgrind is one of the only characters that is seen to go through a distinct change in the first book of Hard Times. While others, like Stephen Blackpool and Sissy especially, are affected by others' actions or new environments, Louisa's very nature changes markedly. This change comes about as part of the central conflict of the book - the battling mindsets of Fact and Fancy. When we first encounter Louisa, she is rebelling against her father's revered Fact, and although she is successful in school and an imagination-less upbringing, there is something in her nature that hungers after fancy too, making her willful and independent when faced with authority. When we first meet her, in fact, she is disobeying her parents and trying to catch a glimpse of the carnival, and later she lives vicariously through Sissy, who recollects her time with her father, two characters that lie in the camp of Fancy. The change, however, comes as she grows into an adult, and she gives up hope. This is manifested in her total acquiescence to her marriage with Bounderby, a patriarch of Fact, even though she knows they will not love each other and finally, when her marriage is announced, her avoidance of Sissy's eyes,a rejection of her search for fancy. Through Louisa, Dickens depicts how harmful a lifestyle placed rigidly in Fact can be, even to someone with a strong, independent spirit.
Post a Comment