A Tale of Two Cities

Character Guide

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Lucie Manette (the golden thread)

A gentle, devoted young Englishwoman who is reunited with her long-imprisoned father in Paris. Her compassion and steady presence draw together nearly every other character in the story.

Doctor Alexandre Manette (the shoemaker of the garret)

A French physician who was secretly imprisoned in the Bastille for eighteen years and emerges from captivity broken but slowly recovering, largely through his daughter's care.

Charles Darnay (Charles Evrémonde, called Darnay)

A French émigré living in England who is tried for treason early in the novel and acquitted with Sydney Carton's help; he loves Lucie Manette.

Sydney Carton (the jackal)

A brilliant but dissolute English barrister who resembles Darnay closely enough to have played a role in his acquittal; he is quietly, hopelessly devoted to Lucie.

Mr. Jarvis Lorry

A precise, kindly elderly banker at Tellson's Bank who has long managed the Manette family's affairs and treats them almost as his own.

Monsieur Defarge

A Paris wine-shop owner and former servant of Doctor Manette, deeply involved in the growing revolutionary movement of Saint Antoine.

Madame Defarge

Monsieur Defarge's wife, a formidable, watchful woman who knits constantly in her wine-shop while quietly recording grievances against the aristocracy.

Miss Pross

Lucie's fiercely loyal, plainspoken English governess and companion, utterly devoted to 'her Ladybird.'

Mr. Stryver

A loud, ambitious barrister who employs Carton as his 'jackal' to prepare his cases and briefly considers Lucie as a potential wife.

Jerry Cruncher

Mr. Lorry's odd-job man and messenger at Tellson's Bank, known for his rusty appearance and mysteriously irregular nighttime absences.

The Marquis St. Evrémonde (Monseigneur)

A haughty, callous French aristocrat, Darnay's uncle, whose contempt for the peasantry is displayed when his carriage runs down a child in the street.

Gabelle

The Evrémonde family's rent-collector and steward in France, whose imprisonment eventually draws Darnay back to Paris.

Glossary

Tumbril

A crude open cart used to haul condemned prisoners to the guillotine during the Revolution.

La Guillotine

The execution device that became the era's dominant symbol of revolutionary justice and terror.

Monseigneur

A French honorific used for a lord or nobleman; also used ironically to describe the aristocratic class collectively.

The Bastille

The Paris fortress-prison used to hold political prisoners without trial, stormed by revolutionaries in 1789.

Emigrant/émigré

A French aristocrat or citizen who fled France (often to England) to escape revolutionary violence.

Jackal

Stryver's dismissive nickname for Sydney Carton, referring to his behind-the-scenes work preparing Stryver's legal cases.

Saint Antoine

A poor, revolutionary-hotbed district of Paris where the Defarges' wine-shop is located.

Citizen/Citizeness

Revolutionary-era forms of address replacing 'Monsieur' and 'Madame' to signify equality under the new Republic.

Resurrection Man

Period slang for someone who illegally dug up and sold corpses to medical schools, Jerry Cruncher's secret trade.

Old Bailey

London's central criminal court, where Darnay is tried for treason early in the novel.

Recalled to life

A recurring phrase in the novel referring to Doctor Manette's release from long imprisonment and symbolic rebirth.

Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death

The revolutionary motto of the new French Republic, invoked to justify both idealism and violence.

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