The Chimes
'The Chimes' Summary
On New Year's Eve, Trotty, a poor elderly "ticket-porter" or casual messenger, is filled with gloom at the reports of crime and immorality in the newspapers, and wonders whether the working classes are simply wicked by nature. His daughter Meg and her long-time fiancé Richard arrive and announce their decision to marry next day. Trotty hides his misgivings, but their happiness is dispelled by an encounter with the pompous Alderman Cute, plus a political economist and a young gentleman with a nostalgia, all of whom make Trotty, Meg and Richard feel they hardly have a right to exist, let alone marry.
Trotty carries a note for Cute to Sir Joseph Bowley MP, who dispenses charity to the poor in the manner of a paternal dictator. Bowley is ostentatiously settling his debts to ensure a clean start to the new year, and berates Trotty because he owes a little rent and ten or twelve shillings to his local shop which he cannot pay off. Returning home, convinced that he and his fellow poor are naturally ungrateful and have no place in society, Trotty encounters Will Fern, a poor countryman, and his orphaned niece, Lilian. Fern has been accused of vagrancy and wants to visit Cute to set matters straight, but from a conversation overheard at Bowley's house, Trotty is able to warn him that Cute plans to have him arrested and imprisoned. He takes the pair home with him and he and Meg share their meagre food and poor lodging with the visitors. Meg tries to hide her distress, but it seems she has been dissuaded from marrying Richard by her encounter with Cute and the others.
In the night, the bells seem to call Trotty. Going to the church, he finds the tower door unlocked and climbs to the bellchamber, where he discovers the spirits of the bells and their goblin attendants who reprimand him for losing faith in man's destiny to improve. He is told that he fell from the tower during his climb and is now dead, and Meg's subsequent life must now be an object lesson for him. There follows a series of visions which he is forced to watch, helpless to interfere with the troubled lives of Meg, Richard, Will and Lilian over the subsequent years. Richard descends into alcoholism; Meg eventually marries him in an effort to save him, but he dies ruined, leaving her with a baby. Will is driven in and out of prison by petty laws and restrictions; Lilian turns to prostitution. In the end, destitute, Meg is driven to contemplate drowning herself and her child, thus committing the mortal sins of murder and suicide. The chimes' intention is to teach Trotty that, far from being naturally wicked, mankind is formed to strive for nobler things, and will fall only when crushed and repressed beyond bearing. Trotty breaks down when he sees Meg poised to jump into the river, cries that he has learned his lesson and begs the Chimes to save her, whereupon he finds himself able to touch her and prevent her from jumping.
At the end of the book, Trotty finds himself awakening at home as if from a dream as the bells ring in the New Year of the day Trotty originally climbed the tower. Meg and Richard have chosen to wed, and all of her friends have spontaneously chosen to provide a wedding feast and celebration. The author explicitly invites the reader to decide if this "awakening" is a dream-within-a-dream. The reader must choose between the harsh consequences of the behaviour of the upper classes in Trotty's vision, or the happiness of the wedding.
Book Details
Language
EnglishOriginal Language
EnglishPublished In
1844Author
Charles Dickens
England
Charles Dickens created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. Charles John Huffam Dickens was born on 7 February 18...
More on Charles DickensDownload eBooks
Listen/Download Audiobook
- Select Speed
Related books
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
The Woman in White is Wilkie Collins's fifth published novel, written in 1859. It is considered to be among the first mystery novels and is widely reg...
The Man On The Other Side by Ada Barnett
Ruth never expected to have a house of her own. Raised in an orphanage, she is forced to work for her living. She chooses to work in a book store, unt...
The Diary of a Superfluous Man by Ivan Turgenev
The Diary of a Superfluous Man is an 1850 novella by the Russian author Ivan Turgenev. It is written in the first person in the form of a diary by a m...
The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless, Vol. 3 by Eliza Haywood
Betsy Thoughtless is about marriage, rather than dealing with courtship and thus differs from the type of domestic writing that would develop in the 1...
Rainbow Valley by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Rainbow Valley (1919) is the seventh book in the chronology of the Anne of Green Gables series by Lucy Maud Montgomery, although it was the fifth book...
Veronica by Johanna Spyri
Published in 1886, this novel encompasses a small community wherein Veronica, having lost her own mother, is “adopted” by a neighbour, Gertrude, who h...
The Efficiency Expert by Edgar Rice Burroughs
The Efficiency Expert is a 1921 novella by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs. One of a small number of Burroughs' novels set in contemporary Americ...
Shawl-Straps: A Second Series of Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag by Louisa May Alcott
Unlike the other volumes in this series, which are books of childrens' stories, Shawl-Straps is a novel. It is the story of Amanda, Matilda, and Lavin...
Fairy Prince and Other Stories by Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
What if you could step into a world of fairy princes, enchanted forests, and magical creatures? Eleanor Hallowell Abbott's enchanting collection of s...
Hester: A Story of Contemporary Life, Volume 2 by Margaret O. Oliphant
Hester is an 1883 novel written by Margaret Oliphant. It examines the cycle of history through the lives of the Vernon family. The book was published...
Reviews for The Chimes
No reviews posted or approved, yet...