In the 1850 Dickens' criticism of the evils of Victorian England became increasingly violet. In yhe novel Hard Times, set in one of the industrial towns of the north, he emphasizes the dehumanising aspects of the Industrial Revolution and calls into question the influential philosophy of Utilitarianism, which relied heavily on statistics, rules and regulation, and did not at all highly value individualism and imagination.
In the Victorian Age the town became important because that was the favourite place for people to live in consequence of the industrial revolution, this is a new reality that is investigated in the novels of the time.
In Hard Times Dickens describes an industrial town: Coketown, expression of the capitalistic system. Dickens' description of Coketown is interesting and highly significant. He brings various images to put forward is ideas and themes effectively in the novel.
First of all the name of the town evokes fuel.
Dickens describes the smoke of the industrialized Coketown as "the smoke of serpents", a sinister image implying that something evil hovers around the catchments of Coketown.
Dickens also uses color symbolisms to describe Coketown. He associates colors to vitality and individualism and relates the colors of black and white with the loss of vitality and individuality. He therefore uses the color black or white not only to describe the environmental damage brought about by industrialism, but also the loss of people's individual freedom, joy and liveliness in their town.
In addition red of brick is unnatural, it is caused by the smoke and ashes; it is a town of unnatural red and black like the painted face of a savage, this two colours dominates the description of Coketown, in particular black paint even the channel and river's water. From this water then come a terrible stink that is caused by industrial refuses. This ideal town is full of machinery and chimneys noise, in the form of rattling and trembling dominates. The metaphor of the head of an elephant in a sort of madness reproduces the movement of the piston of a steam engine, mad is the machine, mad is the consequence of industrial revolution. Dickens introduces an idea of alienation: man is identified with the product and even with the machine that produces this; the machine causes a lack of identity. Dickens shows how the system determines the life of people and criticizes the alienation caused by mass production: persons go out and in at the same hours, they do the same work and for them every day is the same as the last and the next.
The sinister intricacies of industrialized towns and the lives that revolve around are brought into vivid images in Hard Times.