One
of the greatest displays of emotion in the book comes when Louisa has her
breakdown, explaining the ineffectiveness of her upbringing to her father. In a fiery display of emotion she states “if
you had known that there lingered in my breast, sensibilities, affections,
weaknesses, capable of being cherished into strength, defying all the
calculations made by man, and no more known to his arithmetic than his creator
is”(209). Dickens really establishes the
emotion of Louisa within this passage through the specific diction he
uses. Words such as “sensibilities”,
“affections” and “weaknesses” show the anger and angst that Louisa has compiled
within in her and the amount of emotion that she has really comes through
because of the use of these very specific words. The overall effect of this is that it cements
a real split between Louisa and the ideologies of her father, this is the
climax of the book in which Louisa finally will become her own woman.
I agree, Louisa's words depict very clearly the turn from going along with everything that her father has taught her to the point in which she breaks out and becomes an individual. I also think that this quote is significant in the way that it is the turning point for Gradgrind from being a mostly emotionless person to realizing what his methods have done to his daughter and other children, and the point in which he starts making positive changes and working against what he originally believed.
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