Society and Suffering: City as Character in 19th Century Realism

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the relationship between the city and the individual in literature, thereby acknowledging the anthropomorphic qualities we endow with our cities and in turn, how these qualities consolidate into the trope of the city character. We build this understanding by discussing the social, moral, political, literary, etc. associations of the city, and how these lend themselves to expressions of human energy or reflections of human character. These understandings are then given form through close readings of Gustave Flaubert’s Sentimental Education and Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment