Hard Times

1. What does the speaker mean when he says to plant nothing but Facts and root out everything else, and why does he call the pupils' minds those of reasoning animals?

2. Why does Dickens spend so much of the chapter on the speaker's square forehead, hard mouth, bristling head, and neckcloth trained like a stubborn fact at his throat?

3. Why does Dickens introduce Thomas Gradgrind as a man who carries scales and a multiplication table to weigh any parcel of human nature, and what does it mean that he will not allow two and two to make anything over four?

4. Why does Sissy Jupe fail the horse question while Bitzer succeeds, and what does Dickens suggest by calling Bitzer pale and bloodless while Sissy grows richer in color under the same sunbeam?

5. What has been missing from the little Gradgrinds' childhood when they know constellations like professors but never learned 'Twinkle, twinkle, little star' or met a cow except as a graminivorous ruminating quadruped?

6. Why does Dickens describe Stone Lodge with counted windows, a garden ruled like a botanical account-book, and cabinets of labelled specimens before the circus scene begins?

7. What does Dickens mean by calling Bounderby the Bully of humility, and how does his story of the ditch, the egg-box, and the wicked grandmother function in the drawing room?

8. When Louisa and Tom are caught peeping at the circus, why do Gradgrind and Bounderby decide the cause must be idle imagination and contamination from Cecilia Jupe rather than a flaw in their own upbringing?

9. What does Dickens mean by calling Coketown a triumph of fact, and how do the identical streets, smoky chimneys, and interchangeable buildings show that philosophy made visible?

10. Why does the narrator ask whether there is an analogy between the restless Coketown workers and the little Gradgrinds, after listing drink, opium, and hidden singing rooms?

11. Why does Signor Jupe slip away with a bundle under his arm rather than face Sissy after being goosed once too often, and what does Childers mean when he says it cut Jupe deeper to know his daughter knew he was failing?

12. Why does Dickens pause to describe Sleary's troupe as untidy, unlettered, and bad at sharp practice, yet gentle, pitying, and quick to help one another?

13. Why does Bounderby decorate Mrs. Sparsit's past with opera boxes and satin while reminding her she now keeps the house of Josiah Bounderby of Coketown for a hundred a year?

14. When Sissy sobs that she read fairy tales to her father, why does Gradgrind call such stories destructive nonsense and say she will become a living proof of proper training?

15. What does Gradgrind mean when he tells young Louisa never to wonder, and why does Dickens call that command the spring of educating reason without cultivating the sentiments and affections?