لخّصلي

Coketown is an industrial city filled with large, smoking factories.Mr Bounderby is not happy that a circus girl will share Mr Gradgrind's home with his daughter, Louisa and his One day, Mr Bounderby receives a visit from a poor factory worker called Stephen Blackpool.Mr Gradgrind's ideas are shared by a rich man called Mr Bounderby, who owns many of Coketown's factories as well as the local bank.Hearing that the performer's young daughter Sissy is all alone, Mr Gradgrind decides to adopt the girl.

Coketown is an industrial city filled with large, smoking factories. In this grey place, Thomas Gradgrind has opened a school for the children of the factory workers. «They need facts, facts and more facts,» he tells the teacher on a school visit. Mr Gradgrind believes that you can pour facts into a child's mind in the same way that you can pour oil into a machine: to both will work better that way.
Mr Gradgrind's ideas are shared by a rich man called Mr Bounderby, who owns many of Coketown's factories as well as the local bank. Mr Bounderby is sproud of his successful life because, he tells everyone, «I grew up with nothing, without even a mother to help me».
One day, Mr Gradgrind is told that a performer from a circus belonging to a man called Mr Sleary has disappeared. Hearing that the performer's young daughter Sissy is all alone, Mr Gradgrind decides to adopt the girl. Mr Bounderby is not happy that a circus girl will share Mr Gradgrind's home with his daughter, Louisa and his One day, Mr Bounderby receives a visit from a poor factory worker called Stephen Blackpool. Stephen explains that he is so poor that he cannot afford a wedding for Rachael, the woman he wants to marry. Mr Bounderby sends Stephen away, saying that he cannot help someone who is so 45 poor. As Stephen sadly walks home, he meets an old woman called Mrs Pegler. She tells him that she waits near the bank every few weeks to see Mr Bounderby, She does not say why she does not want Mr Bounderby to see her. 30
Some years pass before Mr Bounderby asks Louisa to marry him. Mr Gradgrind tells his daughter that it is logical that she should marry Mr Bounderby because he is rich. Louisa reluctantly agrees.
Life is increasingly difficult for the people working in Coketown's factories. The workers decide to call a strike to protest about their terrible conditions. Stephen Blackpool refuses to join the strike, believing it will make their conditions worse. Because of this, the other strikers refuse to