It depicts Coktown,a typical red-brick industrial city of the morth.In its schools and factories children and adults are caged and endlaved,with no personal freedom until their spirit is broken.Against this social backdrop where harsh regimes are enforced by the likes of Josiah Bounderby,the pompous self0amde man,and Gradgrind,the censorious disciplinarian,the personal tragedies of Louisa Gradgrind and Stephen Blackpool are played out. Despite its vivid portrait of the horrors of the newly nechanized society,Hard Times is shot through with a wit,good humour and a conviction that entertainment is shot through with a wit,good humour and a conviction that entertainment is essntial for human hapiness,making it one of the most uplifting of Dickens's novels. 作者简介： Charles Dickens(1812-70).Best known for his host of distinctively cruel,comic and repugnant characters,Charles Dickens remains the most widely read of the Victorian novelists. Set in the fictional Coketown,which is partly based
ENDURING LITERATURE ILLUMINATED BY PRACTICAL SCHOLARSHIP "Send Us a Boy -- We'll Send You a Cowboy!" is the slogan of the Box Canyon Boys Camp. But for the nail biters, thumb suckers, and teeth grinders -- the cast-away offspring of parents who are busy travelling, being divorced, remarrying, and garnering fortunes -- it's just another place to face rejection. Until Cotton. Cotton pulls them together. In a hot-wired pickup, he leads "the Bedwetters" on a fantastic mission to save a heard of buffalo -- and in the process, to save themselves. But as the raw red Arizona sun rises, they will discover the cost of their one grand moment of glory… EACH ENRICHED CLASSIC EDITION INCLUDES: A concise introduction that gives readers important background information A chronology of the author's life and work A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context An outline of key themes and plot points to help readers form their own interpretat
