"Dickens, Charles - A Tale of Two Cities" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickens Charles)

NOTE: A SHIFT IN VOICE The lead paragraph of Chapter 3 is one of a
very few times in the novel that Dickens changes his narrative voice.
What does he gain from using "I," the first-person singular?

"I" commands attention. We note there's a break in the action, and
concentrate on the meditative interjection that follows.

"I" is also a suitable persona for stepping back and commenting in
general on what's been happening. Dickens as "I" philosophizes over
the "wonderful fact" that human beings are basically mysteries to
each other. "My friend is dead," he says, meaning, imagine I've lost
a friend. Whether she's living or dead, her innermost personality
remains secret; we can't break down the barriers of our
individuality.

How does this insight relate to the story? Dickens applies it
specifically to the passengers in the mail coach, all equally
mysterious to each other. Yet characters throughout the novel hide
secrets and memories, which even their loved ones can't decipher:
Dr. Manette is one such character, Charles Darnay is another. Even
Jarvis Lorry has something to reveal, as we learn in the next
chapter.

A TALE OF TWO CITIES: CHAPTER 4

At a Dover inn, having shed his heavy overcoat, Jarvis Lorry proves
to be about 60 years old. He's carefully dressed (if a little vain)
and self-controlled, though his eyes hint that a lively spirit
remains unquenched by long service to Tellson's.

Jarvis Lorry passes the day walking on Dover beach. It is evidently
a smuggler's haunt, which adds to the air of secrecy. Lorry awaits
the arrival from London of Lucie Manette, a 17-year-old orphan and
ward of Tellson's. When Lucie appears, Lorry is struck by her beauty
and resemblance to the child whom, 15 years earlier, he carried
across the Channel on a similar errand for Tellson's. Suddenly
uncomfortable, he drops a formal bow, gazing into a depressingly
ornate mirror behind Lucie.

In a roundabout fashion, over protests that he is only a man of
business, the bank clerk reveals Lucie's past. After her mother
died, Lorry did indeed fetch little Lucie across the Channel. Now
word has come that Lucie's father, Dr. Manette of Beauvais, is not
dead as everyone had believed. The doctor has just been released
from 18 years of secret imprisonment in the Bastille, and now remains
in the care of an old servant in Paris. Lorry has been dispatched by
Tellson's to identify his former client, and to escort Lucie to her
father.

"I am going to see his ghost!" exclaims Lucie. Like Jarvis Lorry she