Saturday, September 19, 2009

"The signal man" Charles Dickens


Does a person who live isolated be remembered when he dies??
The signal man is one of those people who live by himself, doing his job. His responsibility was over the top; not only to give way to the trains, moreover to prevent accidents from happening. After the visit of this misterious person/ghost, the signalman clearly focusses his purpose of life to avoid certain situations that can cause harm to others; worrying about his job obsessively.

Do these ideas seem real??

Nowadays we are living in a world which promotes and permits individuality. We can communicate with each other but not by talking; a phone call, an email or a SMS. For instance, this person was living something we experience day after day: people doing their job, being more worried about the task than the people who they relate with.

The story is very descriptive and makes you think. However, I am not thinking in how Dickens portrait his reality into this story (neither Modernity). I am more interested in the way this story can be applied into situations we live everyday.

To improve our way of living, we need to start by caring about others. This caring must be based on respect but also truth. I am sure we can make a better world. The problem is: we have not created a "we", yet.

2 comments:

Clau said...

Unfortunately is going to take years to develop a sense of “we” in our society...
Now, Dickens in his short story wanted to protest against the consequences modernity brought, right? what was the role of the ghost? and can these protests be applied n our society? how or why?


Take care,

Claudia

Yori said...

I have been thinking about this. Modernity as such had advantages and disadvanteges. However, the critique that you can make as an observer of that reality will depend on the area or status you live in. Dickens had an special view point that I do not understand yet; but his questioning is obvious.
In terms of the ghost, I am not sure I can state what it meant becuase after listening to what Claudia suggested: "the signalman maybe never lived, maybe he was already dead" made me reflect about which way the story went.