A Tale of Two Cities

and memoranda, are all comprehended in the one line, 'Recalled to Life;' which may mean anything. But what is the matter! She doesn't notice a word! Miss Manette!

Two interlocking causal chains—Manette's Bastille imprisonment, Lucie's resurrection thread, Darnay's return to France, the Carmagnole conspiracy, and Carton's substitution—drive a tight symmetrical plot whose wine-cask handwriting, echoed footsteps, and knitting are load-bearing, so plot scores 90.

She was the golden thread that united him to a Past beyond his misery, and to a Present beyond his misery: and the sound of her voice, the light of her face, the touch of her hand, had a strong beneficial influence with him almost always.

Vivid iconic types—Carton the wasted cynic redeemed, Darnay the stainless nephew, Madame Defarge the tricoteuse of vengeance, Jarvis Lorry the bachelor banker—parade through revolution-torn Paris with operatic clarity, so cast scores 88.

both knew too well what it meant. One. Two. Three. Three tumbrils faring away with their dread loads over the hushing snow.

Book the First's slow accretion of ominous symbols gives way to Book the Third's relentless acceleration toward the tumbrils, with the final chapters compressing time and climax tightly, so pace scores 84.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the

The opening anaphora and set-pieces—the wine-cask scene, the storming of the Bastille, the final walk to the guillotine—are vividly melodramatic at full power, so prose scores 90.

The wine was red wine, and had stained the ground of the narrow street in the suburb of Saint Antoine, in Paris, where it was spilled. It had stained many hands, too, and many faces, and many naked feet, and many wooden shoes.

Paris and London circa 1775–1793—the Marquis's estates, Tellson's Temple, the wine-shop of Saint Antoine, the Conciergerie, La Force—knit revolutionary Paris into a stage set of mob-pavements and grindstone-knives, so world scores 90.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity

The opening paragraph immediately doubles the title and primes the audience for the collision of London and Paris; "The Period" is a sustained thesis-statement hook, so hook scores 94.

I carry about me, not a scrap of writing openly referring to it. This is a secret service altogether. My credentials, entries, and memoranda, are all comprehended in the one line, 'Recalled to Life;'

The doubled-city structural conceit, the past-resurrection spine, and the substitution climax formalized the historical-novel template of moral mechanics that runs forward through Hugo and Tolstoy, so innov scores 84.

"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."

Carton's walk to the guillotine, his vision of Lucie's future generations, and the closing line are one of the canonical English-novel endings—both formally lyrical and structurally inevitable, so ending scores 95.