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No! Nooooooooooooo!!!!!
That little dramatic reenactment comes to you courtesy Book Three, Chapter Three—a
chapter conveniently titled, The Shadow. The shadow in question, of course, belongs to
the evil Madame Defarge, and it's Charles Darnay's wife and daughter—Lucie and little
Lucie—on whom the shadow falls.
OK, so all the Victorian melodrama may be a bit much, but the motif of shadows in A
Tale of Two Cities is actually important. From the book's first, creepy, fog-filled
scenes, to the end of the story when Charles Darnay's life is threatened by the dark deeds
of the revolutionaries, shadows, well, overshadow many of the events in this novel.
So what does it all mean? For one thing, all the shadows in this story are a sort of physical
manifestation of the dark depths of the human heart. Like Madame Defarge's shadow. It's
threatening because she carries a dark, dreadful secret within her.
But shadows are also important because they reinforce Dickens' mixed feelings toward the
French revolutionaries. Their bloody deeds cast a dark shadow over all of Paris, and
though Dickens understands their plight, he finds a repellent darkness in their methods.