A Tale of Two Cities

66Worth an evening.

The crowd turns into a terror, and one wasted man spends himself for another.

The review

London and Paris, 1859, Charles Dickens. A man wastes his life and then spends it for another. A revolution eats its own. I can say that much from the couch without turning the ending into a speech. The guillotine is the bill of the rage. I won't describe the blade. The substitute at the end is the mercy, and that is the part worth staying up for.

I'd give it to a teen before a small child, and I'd go slowly. It is a crowd book, and a book about a crowd that becomes a terror. A teen who can hear that the rage has a bill will get more from it than from the fame of the title. The substitute is not a trick to spoil over dinner. It is the mercy.

Journal

Keep A Tale of Two Cities in the record.

No house has filed a sentence for this yet.

Live Historic number 66. Yours can differ.

The glance

Industry is the thin one.

Does anyone here do a real job, and does that job matter?

This phone is set for a grown person, just me. Change the ages.

The eight

5
Industry
A man wastes his life, then spends what is left of it for another.
7
Household
The substitute spends his life so another household can go on.
7
Piety
The mercy at the end is a man who stops keeping himself.
9
Courage
He spends a wasted life for another and cannot have it back.
8
Republic
A crowd in Paris becomes a terror, and the revolution eats its own.
6
Temperance
The rage runs up a bill; the book does not teach you to enjoy it.
5
Truth
The substitute is a mercy the crowd is not told in time.
6
Stewardship
After the terror, what the book leaves is that one spent life.

Where to read

Finding the page.

Live Historic · A Tale of Two Cities · 66IMDb

Live HistoricSee what matters.

Story · Switzerland · 1881

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Heidi

64Watch it awake.

A bitter grandfather thaws, and a city house makes the mountain child sick.

The review

Heidi is left with a bitter old man, and she thaws him. That is the first half I trust. Johanna Spyri, 1881. A girl, a grandfather, a mountain. Then a city house takes her as a companion. She sickens for the altitude and the air. The mountain is not magic. It is the place her body knows. I don't need to add a miracle to make it land.

A richer house using a child as company is the part I'd say out loud. Her body tells on the arrangement. I was tired and the book did not ask me to be clever about it. The old man was bitter and a child softened him, which is a household, not a trick. If we read it, we don't call the mountain a spell. We call it the air she needed and the house that took her off it.

Journal

Keep Heidi in the record.

No house has filed a sentence for this yet.

Live Historic number 64. Yours can differ.

The glance

Piety and Republic are the thin ones.

Can conscience actually stop someone, or is reverence only in the shot so it can be mocked?