Hard Times Character Analysis and Dickens’ use of literary devices Dickens & rhetoric Inflated rhetoric, hyperbole, and rhetorical questions: the use of formal syntax that seems out of place, or the presentation of questions where no answer is expected, to achieve a heightened effect and draw the reader's attention. Ex: "Is it possible, I wonder, tht there was any analogy between the case of the coketown population and the case of the little gradgrinds?" Tone: narrator's implied attitude, sometimes adopted for effect Ex: "Say, good M'Choakumchild. When from thy boiling store, thou shalt fill each jar brim full by and by…" Anaphora: deliberate repitition of the first part of the sentence Ex. "He was a rich men. A big, loud, man, with a stare. A man made out of a coarse material. A man with… A man with…" Allusion: reference to another work of literature Ex: "increase and multiply" "as you sow so shall you reap" Metonymy: using something associated with something larger to represent the whole, often for symbolic purposes. Ex: "Among the multitude of coketown, generally called the "hands"…" Extended metaphor: a drawn-out comparison that continues for a few sentences Ex: the beginning of the great manufacturer chapter, comparing time to a manufacturer Irony: using words that suggest the opposite of what is meant Ex: "he sat writing in the room with the deadly statistical clock…"
