15 h 23 minAudiobook9 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 15 h 23 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
Between London and Paris, a family seeks peace while old cruelties feed a revolution.
In Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities, Lucie Manette finds her father broken by eighteen years in the Bastille. Her patient care helps Doctor Manette begin again. In England, Charles Darnay seeks a life beyond his noble French family, while Sydney Carton, a gifted lawyer who resembles him, believes his own life has no worth.
Across the Channel, anger gathers in the streets of Paris. Ernest Defarge’s wine shop becomes a center of unrest, and Madame Defarge knits a secret register of enemies. As the French Revolution draws closer, private lives face public violence. Love offers shelter, but family history threatens to pull these people into the growing storm.
What you’ll discover
- Two cities, shared fears Explore London and Paris as Dickens sets their differences and likenesses side by side.
- A fragile return to life Follow Doctor Manette as he struggles to rebuild his mind under Lucie’s patient care.
- A lawyer without hope Meet Sydney Carton, whose gifts and love stand against his sense of a wasted life.
- The roots of vengeance See how cruelty and neglect turn private suffering into a hunger for public revenge.
- Mystery with gathering force Follow a swift plot of doubles, secrets, and sacrifice, carried by short scenes and cliffhangers.
Who will love it
You will love this book if you enjoy stories of love and courage set against great events, and vivid characters you remember for years.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A banker rides to raise a buried man
- The prisoner in the attic is Lucie's father
- Charles Darnay stands trial for treason in London
- Two men love Lucie and one hides it
- A marquis drives over a child and keeps his pride
- In Saint Antoine the knitting becomes a register
- Darnay goes to Paris and the net closes
- Injustice and revenge feed each other
- Being recalled to life takes love and a double
- Echoes, threads and knitting tell the tale
Who’s who
- Lucie ManetteA gentle young Frenchwoman raised in England believing her father dead, she devotes herself to restoring him and holding her family together.
- Doctor Alexandre ManetteA physician freed after eighteen years in the Bastille, he clings to his shoemaking in times of stress and wants to protect his daughter.
- Charles DarnayA French exile living in England who gave up his family name and wealth, he wants to live honestly and hold his family safe.
- Sydney CartonA brilliant but careless lawyer who drinks away his talent, he looks like Darnay and secretly loves Lucie.
- Jarvis LorryA loyal, orderly banker at Tellson's who carries the secret mission and becomes a devoted friend to the Manettes.
- Madame DefargeA calm wine shop keeper who knits a register of enemies, she is driven by an old family grievance and wants vengeance.
- Ernest DefargeA wine seller in Saint Antoine and former servant of the Doctor, he leads the revolt but feels some loyalty to his old master.
- Miss ProssLucie's fierce, red-haired companion, sure that no foreigner can outdo an Englishwoman, she will do anything to guard her Ladybird.
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- Read by Lucas Linden, complete. It opens once the recording is online.
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- Paperback
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A Tale of Two Cities
by Charles Dickens · 1859
A banker rides through fog to dig a man out of a living grave, while Paris hungers and waits.
Medium level10–20 hours to readEnglish
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In short
What would you do if you were sent to dig a man out of a grave, and the grave turned out to be a Paris attic? In 1775 a banker named Jarvis Lorry sits in the Dover mail coach on a foggy night, and a rider gallops out of the mist with a message.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A banker rides to raise a buried man
The story opens with a wide look at an age of certainty. England and France each have a king and a queen, and both nations feel sure that things are settled forever. Yet highwaymen rob travelers in London, and in France a young man is sentenced to torture for failing to kneel to a procession of monks.
Then the view narrows to one coach. On a Friday night in November 1775, the Dover mail labors up Shooter's Hill in mud and mist. A rider named Jerry Cruncher gallops up with a note for Mr. Jarvis Lorry of Tellson's Bank. Lorry sends back three words, Recalled to life, and only he knows they mean a man long thought dead has been found alive.
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- 15-minute summary
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Details
- First published
- 1859
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 10 h 0 min
- Level
- Medium level
Cite this edition
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/a-tale-of-two-cities.
Dickens, C. (2026). A tale of two cities. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/a-tale-of-two-cities (Original work published 1859)
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/a-tale-of-two-cities.
@book{dickens2026tale,
author = {Dickens, Charles},
title = {A Tale of Two Cities},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/a-tale-of-two-cities},
note = {First published 1859}
}
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What is A Tale of Two Cities about?
It follows people in London and Paris from 1775 into the French Revolution. A doctor freed from prison, his daughter, a French exile and a careless lawyer are drawn into a conflict between cruel nobles and angry crowds.
Who are the two cities in the title?
They are London and Paris. The story moves between them, comparing their courts, their streets and their people. Dickens uses the pairing to show how similar injustice and fear can be in two very different countries.
What does Recalled to Life mean?
It is the message that Mr. Lorry sends back when told a man long thought dead has been found alive. It points to Doctor Manette's return from prison and echoes through the book as a theme of second chances.
The author
Charles Dickens
1812–1870 · English novelist
Charles Dickens was an English novelist born in Portsmouth in 1812. He lived in London and later at Gad’s Hill Place in Kent, where he died in 1870. His books include The Pickwick Papers (1836–1837), A Christmas Carol (1843), David Copperfield (1849–1850), and Great Expectations (1860–1861).
More by Charles Dickens
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