ornamental line

A Fool and Madman

"'They may cough, and jeer, and groan in Parliament, and call me fool
and madman, but which of them can raise this human sea and make it
swell and roar at pleasure? Not one'" (297).
Charles Dickens' Barnaby Rudge (1841)


Points for Reflection

C. Dickens' Barnaby Rudge (1841), chps 34-50

  1. have you ever before read a book that takes a five-year hiatus between chapters, a space of time Dickens inserts between chapters thirty-two and thirty three?  What kind of freedom does this narrative decision grant Dickens?
  2. does Dickens betray intellectist prejudices throughout his tale, or instead extend sympathy and understanding towards those with limited cognitive capacity and/or education?
  3. the narrator joins John Willet in constructing Hugh as bestial by what means (283)?
  4. is John Grueby as servile and duplicitous as Mr. Gashford?
  5. does the young Lord George Gordon exhibit strong, well-defined character and determination?  Is he a powerful and charismatic speaker?
  6. what power does mystery have over the curious, unthinking masses, according to Dickens (304)?
  7. does Dickens’ narrator question anti-Semitism in the same breath that he interrogates anti-Catholicism?
  8. is Dickens’ characterization of Dennis, the hangman, more terrifying than it is comical (310-13, 328-30)?  Recall that I asked the same about Mr. Chester, when discussing an earlier section of the novel. Does Dickens appear determined to fuse the scary and the entertaining?
  9. why does the tall and strong Hugh deign to defer to the uppity, but much shorter and slighter, journeyman Sim Tappertit (323-326)?
  10. in what ways has Mr. Chester changed in the last five years?  In what ways does he remain unaltered (332-33)?
  11. what did Haredale do that has generated such antipathy in Hugh (336)?
  12. does Mr. Chester betray any moral qualms as he considers the serious trouble into which he is leading Hugh (337)?
  13. why does Mrs. Varden consider the military, of which her husband is a part as a sergeant in the Royal East-London Volunteers, to be unchristian (338-40)?
  14. why does Miss Miggs give so much of her earnings to the Protestant Association headed up by Gordan (343-44)?
  15. what is the “momentary suspicion” that Gabriel Varden is able to quell once he can see Mr. Haredale’s eyes in the light of a candle (351)?
  16. why do you think Dickens is willing to altogether remove his eponymous hero from the narrative for such an extended period of time (chapters 26-44)?
  17. according to the narrator, has Barnaby’s mind expanded in the last five years (371)? Has Grip's (373)?
  18. how robust is Barnaby Rudge’s memory, when compared with that of other characters like Gabriel Varden, Mr. Haredale, and Gashford (352, 370, 371)?
  19. does Barnaby’s cognitive disability allow him to lead an idyllic life?  Do those things which delight him far outnumber those that discomfit him?
  20. does Barnaby’s new preoccupation with money (373-75, 382-83) seem consistent with his cognitive disability? The narrator refuses to say with certainty what catalyzes Barnaby’s interest in gold, and later cites four possibilities (394-95). Are any of these an adequate explanation?
  21. which of the types of blindness listed by Stagg (377) have we already encountered in Dicken’s novel?
  22. does Dickens perpetuate or interrogate the romantic notion that the blind are necessarily more virtuous than the seeing?
  23. what does Mrs. Rudge imagine Barnaby would have become, if it were not for his cognitive disability (387-88)?
  24. what fringe benefit does Grip provide Barnaby and his mother, besides companionship (388)?
  25. the country gentleman who brings Barnaby and Mrs. Rudge to his “great house” believes that Barnaby’s mother does not institutionalize him for what reason (389-90)?
  26. what tone predominates during Dickens' description of the country gentleman (390)?
  27. why doesn’t Mrs. Rudge warn Barnaby about Stagg’s true motives (395)?
  28. to what factors does the narrator point in explaining the large numbers of “scum and refuse” swelling the anti-Popery crowds (407)?
  29. what prompts Barnaby to behave violently (412-13, 417-19)?
  30. to what end does Gashford repeat the refrain “do nothing” (416-17)?


    illustration of riot in progress outside Parliament
    illustration from chp. 49 (1841)
    George Cattermole


Dr. Paul Marchbanks
pmarchba@calpoly.edu