Hard Times – Charles Dickens

Hard Times is Charles Dickenss powerful critique of industrial society and utilitarian thinking in 19th-century England. Set in the fictional town of Coketown, the novel follows the lives of factory workers, schoolchildren, and businessmen entangled in a world dominated by facts, rigid systems, and the devaluation of human emotion.

At the center is Thomas Gradgrind, an education reformer who prizes logic above imagination, and whose philosophy impacts his children and those around him in deeply troubling ways. Through richly drawn characters and vivid social commentary, Dickens exposes the harsh realities of industrializationpoverty, exploitation, and the loss of individuality.

A sharp, moving, and darkly satirical work, Hard Times remains a relevant and thought-provoking exploration of what it means to be truly human in a world driven by progress at any cost.