Analyse the images of Dombey and Son in literary work “Dombey and Son” by Charles Dickens.



Dombey and Son (1848) is a lesser-known work by Charles Dickens. The novel tells the tale of a dysfunctional family led by a heartless businessman. The businessman hopes his son, Paul, will take over his business empire. He ignores his daughter, Florence. The work was a serial novel published each month from October 1846 until April 1848.

Paul Dombey is the owner of Dombey and Son, a shipping company. The wealthy business owner dreams of having a son to take over the family business one day. He neglects his first child, a girl,because she is not the boy for whom he had hoped. Dombey’s first wife dies shortly after giving birth to his namesake son. This leaves both his newborn son and his six-year-old daughter, Florence, motherless. Mrs. Richards, whose nickname is Toodle, serves as a wet nurse to Little Dombey.

Little Paul Dombey grows into a frail child who is often sick. He loves his older sister, Florence. For his health, his father sends him to the seaside city of Brighton, which does him good. Little Dombey receives an intense education in Brighton at Dr. and Mrs. Blimber’s school. At school, he becomes friends with his schoolmate Mr. Toots. Alas, Little Dombey’s health gets worse, and he dies at the mere age of six years old.

Mr Dombey is one of Dickens's emotionally cauterised men of wealth and power, rich in worldly appurtenances and poor in any concession to humanity. He thinks that he sits on top of society, but in fact he understands little about the commercial forces that have made him and will destroy him. Mr. Dombey is the head of the shipping and export firm Dombey & Son. He is married twice, first to Fanny, who dies at the beginning of the novel, and then later to Edith. He is the father of two children, Paul Junior and Florence, but his feelings for them are very unequal. He loves Paul almost obsessively, but is disinterested in, and even cruel towards, Florence. Mr. Dombey is extremely proud of his position and family name, and the novel traces the story of him coming to be humbled and finally understand the true nature of love.

Paul Dombey Junior (Little Paul)

Paul is the son of Mr. Dombey, and the pride and joy of Dombey's life. He is expected to inherit the firm of Dombey & Son and continue the family lineage. Paul is a very frail and sickly child. He is also very precocious and wise beyond his years. He dies at age 6, causing great grief to his father and sister.

How many lines are there in a sonnet? Write a brief information about form and structure of the sonnet as a type of poetry. Illustrate with example.

Sonnet Structure

There are fourteen lines in a Shakespearean sonnet. The first twelve lines are divided into three quatrains with four lines each. In the three quatrains the poet establishes a theme or problem and then resolves it in the final two lines, called the couplet. The rhyme scheme of the quatrains is abab cdcd efef. The couplet has the rhyme scheme gg. This sonnet structure is commonly called the English sonnet or the Shakespearean sonnet, to distinguish it from the Italian Petrarchan sonnet form which has two parts: a rhyming octave (abbaabba) and a rhyming sestet (cdcdcd).

Only three of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets do not conform to this structure: Sonnet 99, which has 15 lines; Sonnet 126, which has 12 lines; and Sonnet 145, which is written in iambic tetrameter. .

Shakespearean Sonnet Basics: Iambic Pentameter and the English Sonnet Style

Shakespeare's sonnets are written predominantly in a meter called iambic pentameter, a rhyme scheme in which each sonnet line consists of ten syllables. The syllables are divided into five pairs called iambs or iambic feet. An iamb is a metrical unit made up of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable. An example of an iamb would be good BYE. A line of iambic pentameter flows like this:

baBOOM / baBOOM / baBOOM / baBOOM / baBOOM.

Here are some examples from the sonnets:

When I / do COUNT / the CLOCK / that TELLS / the TIME (Sonnet 12)

When IN / dis GRACE / with FOR / tune AND / men's EYES
I ALL / a LONE / be WEEP / my OUT/ cast STATE (Sonnet 29)

Shall I / com PARE/ thee TO / a SUM / mer's DAY?
Thou ART / more LOVE / ly AND / more TEM / per ATE (Sonnet 18)


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