The definition of a horse

The text “The definition of a horse” is an extract from the second

chapter of Hard Times by Charles Dickens. 

It is set in the city of Coketown, an imaginary place invented by
Dickens as the emblem of the Industrial Revolution during the
Victorian Age. Indeed it is dominated by grim factories and oppressed
by coils of black smoke. In Coketown Mr. Gradgrind established a
school, where poor children go.

The scene is set in a classroom, Mr. Gradgrind is holding a lesson. It is
interesting to notice how Mr. Gradgrind is characterised: he is “a
man of realities. A man of fact and calculations”. He is the symbol
of the capitalist set on duties and work. Indeed he thinks and
behaves as a matematician, where feelings and other's ideas have no
importance. It goes without saying that he reflects the puritan
mentality, indeed his aim is to reach a better social level as the
recognition of God's grace. 

Mr. Gradgrind's characterisation is an exaggeration, the intelligent
reader easily realises thet Dickens is using the narrative strategy
of the grotesque. The capitalist middle class reader is able to have
an alibi  not to recognise himself in the character. In addition Mr.
Gradgrind in Dickens's words “always mentally introduced himself”:
he does not use his heart, but his mind. This underlines the
materialism which dominates his daily life. Mr. Gradgrind does not
want to have any relationship with his students, this is the reason
why he all calls them “sir”.

The narrator to describe Mr. Gradgrind's eyes says “cellarage”: it
conveys the idea of something dark and as a consequence his
expression is creepy and sever. He is also called as a “galvanizing
apparatus” which underlines how he looks more like a machine than a
human being. 

“Girl numer twenty” is an example of how students were called: he tries
to make her feel almost like an object with no identity or
personality. The girl is called “Sissy” but Mr. Gradgrind is not
able to accept even a nickname wich gives an idea of affection. 

He asks her what her father's job is, indeed he judges the person by the
social level, as said before according to the Puritan mentality. Mr.
Gradgrind ignores the girl, he critices what her father does. 

The little girl creates a sense of patetic vision and sympathy in the
reader. Indeed Dickens is using the narrative strategy of pathos.
Dickens seems to ironices the situation, because a sunray illuminates
the little girl as if God was trying to help her. 

The other boy, Bitzer, looks pale, indeed Dickens says “what little
colour he ever possessed”. This detail makes the reader undestand
another important aspect of the Victorian age and the Industrial
Revolution: child labour. Indeed maybe he is pale because he has no
time to spend time in the sun, because when he is not at school he
has to work in a factory. This was very common in big cities and new
industrialized cities, like Coketown imagined by Dickens. His weak
body is a symbol of his poor diet and very bad living conditions. 

In the end the definition of a horse Mr. Gradgrind wanted a scientific
and rational description corrisponding to how he is defined by the
author.