This exerpt is from A tale of two cities, an historical novel by Charles Dickens, set in London and

Paris before and during the French Revolution. The story is set against the conditions that led up to
the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror.
This chapter, still knitting, is preceded by the chapter knitting, the name of the book (the second) is
the golden thread and the before-last chapter of the very last book is “knitting done”,
corresponding to the death of Mme Defarge... this is clearly an extended metaphor (and by the
way we say that in French, it would have been both literally and figuratively). Indeed, in this exerpt,
Mme Defarge is knitting while a spy, John Barsad, is entering in her wine-shop that she owns with
her husband. The conversation seems to be quite casual, but Mme Defarge scrutinizes him when
Barsad is supposed to be the spy, she knows it and he doesn't know that she knows : all the
interest of this excerpt lies in the unspoken, the resulting tension as well as the silent action that is
going on despite everything.

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How does Dickens make of a seemingly natter scene a tipping point?
First, we will study the peculiarities of this first meeting where each one tries to hide from the
other in some way, then the metaphor of the knitting and the second meaning that we can then
hear in the words of Madame Defarge who is one step ahead of Barsad and, finally, the revolution
theme.

I- First meeting

A/
First, Barsad and Defarge measure themselves, test the waters
Of course, the spy came in this purpose but Madame Defarge too pays great attention to his
complexion : she seems to see the details, parts of his body separately before the entire person,
which is a bit dehumanising. Indeed, she takes the innocent « good day » in panadiplose as if to
ridicule it, look like « yes, that's it, good day, I know who you are, you're not fooling me », and we
can think she addresses the « good day one and all » to every part of him, meaning that her
attention is alert to every detail. But maybe she thinks about the persons who sent Barsad (if there
are such people), or the plural personalities of Barsad, since he is a spy...
She doesn't make actual sentences : she notes things : « age about forty, height about five feet

nine, black hair, generally rather handsome visage »

And instead of « dark complexion, dark eyes » she says complexion dark eyes dark like

« complexion, two points, dark, eyes, two points, dark », she uses « having » a peculiar inclination

towards the left cheek which imparts a sinister expression! » and not « he has » or « he got » ; she

makes a description, a cold listing of the identity she perceives, maybe also to memorize it and

recognize him right away the next time she sees him.
Barsad may be the spy, but Madame Defarge has nothing to envy him in terms of analisis abilities –

we'll see later a few explanations to this. She observes really thin details.

B/ Small talk

Their conversation in a small talk, with just a few words, there seems to be no issue in what they

say, which is logical for a conversation between two people who are supposed not to know nothing

about the other. They greet each other, Barsad orders what he wants, he compliments the cognac

and the work of Madame Defarge...

The conversation is so devoid of interest that the repeat of "Madame" at the end of each Barsad

sentence seems to be resumed with irony by the omniscient narrator in the third person, tinged

here, precisely, of Madame Defarge's mind: "Madame complied with a polite air.

"YOU think so?" said madame, looking at him with a smile. "Decidedly. May one ask what it is for?"

"Pastime," said madame", because normally, she should be referred to as Madame Defarge, since

we know her name.

C/ tension, fake politeness. En reality, precautions

This is a sign of obsequiousness, and fake politeness ; indeed, Barsad is not really adressing to

Madame Defarge when he asks and compliments since he is a spy, that this is just a cover and that

in fact he doesn't care at all about the cognac : he's just trying to get information without being

caught.

The vocabulary is ridiculously cautious on the part of Barsad, "Have the goodness to give me a little

glass of old cognac, and a mouthful of fresh water, ma'am.", "May one ask what it is for", not even

I , it gives a much more sustained language

On the side of Madame Defarge, "she complied with a polite air", so if she had to take a polite AIR,

it means that it is only an appearance. She perfectly understood that the spy was showing well too

laudable for no reason "It was the first time it had been so complimented, and Madame Defarge

knew enough of its antecedents to know better." So she responds with irony using a
personification: "She said, however, that the cognac was flattered "": obviously, a cognac can not

be flattered. The remark is once again intended for an object: in this excerpt, no one is the real

recipient of the words of the other : everyone has an afterthought and Madame Defarge is on her

guard.

Every time that Madame is resumed ironically by the narrator, it is mentionned that Madame

smiles or shows a polite air, sign of this afterthought. But we don't really know what this

afterthought is.

II- métaphore knit

A/ Morbid

It's normal because in the previous chapter, someone points to the knitting work of Madame
Defarge, which, in its stitching, contains an elaborate registry of the names of those whom the
revolutionaries aim to kill. With this context, we understand that the last lines, "JOHN,"Stay long
enough, and I shall knit `BARSAD' before you go." She actually plans to kill him. Her knitting is a
predictive gravestone : after we know that, all the things she said sound morbid : "You knit with
great skill, madame." "I am accustomed to it." Since she knits gravestones, we can hear it
metaphorically as « I am used to kill ». "A pretty pattern too!" "YOU think so?" of course the
accent, here by capital letters, on the word YOU is mischievous since he is part of the "pattern"
without knowing it : so he compliments or himself or his own death sentence, which in both cases
is morbidly ironic, "May one ask what it is for?" "Pastime," , what a weird kind of pastime, and
finally "Not for use?" "That depends. I may find a use for it one day. If I do--Well, "I'll use it!" We
don't know what she imagines, but we can only imagine scary things.

B/ The metaphor

Even on a literal level, Madame Defarge’s knitting constitutes a whole network of symbols. Into her
needlework she stitches a registry, or list of names, of all those condemned to die in the name of a
new republic as we said. But on a metaphoric level, the knitting constitutes a symbol in itself,
representing the stealthy, cold-blooded vengefulness of the revolutionaries. As Madame Defarge
sits quietly knitting, she appears harmless and quaint. In fact, however, she sentences her victims
to death.

Dickens’s knitting imagery also emphasizes an association between vengefulness and fate, which,
in Greek mythology, is traditionally linked to knitting or weaving. The Fates, three sisters who
control human life, busy themselves with the tasks of weavers : one sister spins the web of life,
another measures it, and the last cuts it. Madame Defarge’s knitting thus becomes a symbol of her
victims’ fate—that is to say death. She's really like a voodoo.

She then knits the funeral destiny. She is so full of revenge that she can not stop the infernal spiral
of knitting until she dies. Like The Fates, this knitting can actually represent her own life made of
insatiable revenge. Except that she weaves not the thread of life, but that of death.

We can also think about the Penelope thread, not because everything is to begin again (although,
in general, any person who seeks revenge realizes that the revenge accomplished does not relieve
him or her, and in this sense everything is to start again because it will have been for nothing), but
because of the nature of Penelope's work : a shroud.

C/ Darkness

Madame Defarge is darkness. Besides, dark shadows follow her, whether it be her dead (Madame
Defarge has been plotting revenge for decades because wealth and status allowed people to
commit terrible crimes against her family and evade legal repercussions) or Barsad, at the
begenning we are told that « A figure entering at the door threw a shadow on Madame Defarge »
« which she felt to be a new one » : moreover, feel : she has intuitions, I could have said it in the
first part.
Plus Barsad has black hair, dark hair, and a dark complexion.
This thirst for revenge is reflected in the symbol of her job, wine : which may symbolize blood.
She is the diabolical image of the knitter, ie, by extension, that of revolution.

III- Revolution

A/ Influential revolutionary

Indeed, in the previous Chapter, we said it, a policeman friend warns Defarge that a spy by the
name of John Barsad has been sent to their neighborhood. Barsad planned an intrigue but she
knows, so plays also a game and he does not know it : she is one step ahead. And when he comes
to her shop, maybe Madame Defarge signals his presence to her clients by placing a rose in her
hair, and that's way they all suddenly flee.
The narrator says : « it was curious » : it is irony, again : it's clear at the end : « but, the taste of
Saint Antoine seemed to be decidedly opposed to a rose on the head-dress of Madame Defarge. »
she's such in influential revolutionary that everyone understand that something is happening when
she puts the symbol of Revolution in her hair.

An expolition is used to insist on this phenomenon : « Nor, of those who had been there when this

visitor entered, was there one left. They had all dropped off. The spy had kept his eyes open, but
had been able to detect no sign. They had lounged away in a poverty-stricken, purposeless,

accidental manner, quite natural and unimpeachable. " 4 sentences to say the same thing.

Madame Defarge has been quicker that Barsad to prevent him from spying and took up his rôle.

All that explains why she seems rather strong for a woman knitting alone in her corner, and why
she observes Barsad so well : she is herself, as a revolutionary, kind of a spy.
In the book, while Madame Defarge is helped by other French revolutionaries and her husband,
she often acts independently because her hatred and desire for revenge exceeds the hatred of
others. And the plannification, for decades, of the murders, shows a strong mind, as her irony.

Conclusion :

To conclude, this scene shows a conversation with apparently not any interest, but we still perceive
some tension behind it (Iceberg theory anachronistic consist in omitting things that he knows and
the reader will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. Of
course here, there are clues and we know what's happening, it's not exactly an illustration of the
iceberg theroy but yet, all the action takes place in the unspoken, quietly). This can be explained by
too much politeness which is ladle, the irony cleary distinguishable and the afterthought that seem
to cross the mind of Defarge, noticeable even if we don't know the context by her smiles, her
rhetorical question as well as the typography. Thus, in this scene where nothing seems to happen,
Defarge meets for the first time a character that she cares remembering and that she plans, at the
end of the extract, to kill.

Lead
reader
pastime
took up