‘It was the best of times, while it was the worst of times.’ The famous quotation from ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ echoed through the lecture hall of Anqing Foreign Language School’s Junior High Department of the west campus. Teacher Chen Congtao told the story in his own voice.
‘A Tale of Two Cities’, written in 1859, is the most influential masterpiece of Charles Dickens. The novel takes the vigorous French Revolution as the background, revolves around the two cities of London and Paris, and condenses many important historical events at that time into the changes of a family, which presents us with a world of ugliness and beauty, of light and darkness at odds.
Furthermore, in ‘A Tale of Two Cities’, Dickens created various characters and we were impressed by their vividness and dimensionality. On the other hand, with its dramatic plot and vivid characters, it is a classic that deserves to be read again and again.
Meanwhile, the pursuit of rational spirit conveyed by ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ transcends the long river of times and will linger in people's minds for a long time.