The Sydney Carton Complex

We grow up, naturally, to look up to parents. When we are in any particular dilemma, we think that they can provide our solution. Alternately, they give us someone to emulate (or to oppose completely). Either way, we exist to please or live in spite of them. If we do not learn to sever the tie enough to become our own person, we will continue to need someone to cling to, long after we have grown up and moved into our own homes. Many times, we will cling to friends or lovers. They become our new "parents", so to speak. We will live for them, and their opinion on us becomes a be-all, end-all.

When I first read A Tale of Two Cities, I made the same conclusion that (most) analysts make. Sydney Carton stopped drinking, stopped pitying himself, and, ultimately, became, to quote Depeche Mode, a "martyr for love". To give your life for someone you love is considered the epitome of sacrifice, particularly for a culture that's afraid of death.

Apply what I said above, and you get a whole new perspective. If the desire to cling to someone else stems from an inability to separate from parents, then Carton's actions were not the heroic deed they've seemed. They're the product of living off of a parent "substitute". Much the way we, as a society, are raised to look for instant gratification, even if it's not the true solution to our problems, anyone who has not separated (to become his or her own person) will look for someone else to cling to. This trait is especially prevalent in addicts; it's largely the reason for twelve step programs. It's the reason that interventions are successful. If the addict lives by clinging to others, then he or she will only stop if he or she sees who the addiction is harming. An addict rarely ever quits purely for his or herself.

There is an alternate perspective on why Carton acted the way he did, and the ultimate symbolism of his action. One considers his social status; he's not a noble man who dies to protect Charles Darnay. In a Christian school of thought, Darnay's sin would be his social class; he's a noble (One of the seven deadly sins is gluttony). Manette's sin could have been getting involved with him in the first place. By sacrificing himself in place of Darnay, Sydney Carton died for someone else's sins. So Carton could have very well been Jesus. (And, alternately, Dickens could have been writing a Christian novel.)

Dickens may not have even known what he was thinking when he wrote A Tale of Two Cities. The novel works because it is embedded in human nature to have this desire to cling. We value self-sacrifice. It's the reason that Jesus is one of our heroes. And, because of this inability to separate (and learn that we need to take care of ourselves), we develop this idea that pain, for a higher cause, is good. When we starve ourselves in the name of human rights, our suffering is valued. We tend to suffer in the name of what is valued when we are growing up. An anorexic suffers for fashion (or, in some cases, attaining the perfect body, the only thing that an anorexic may not feel is perfect about him or herself). The alcoholic drinks for his or her family; the addict may feel inferior as a parent (possibly because the alcohol has made them that way), so the alcohol serves as a way of suffering for any shortcomings.

What I am proposing is not a better way to suffer. The anorexic does not need another reason to starve, and the alcoholic does not need to have his or her drinking justified. Rather, we begin to encourage separation earlier on, and more thoroughly. This does not mean throwing children out the minute they turn eighteen. It means teaching them how to take initiative, and how to figure out what they want and who they are. And, they will most likely be mature enough to be able to figure out those big problems on their own at one point or another. Then you have to let go.

These can all start in small steps. It's letting your child arrange their own guitar lesson at thirteen, or being aware of their own needs (i.e Going to the store for stringed cheese instead of asking you to buy it for them). I did not start taking initiative until I turned nineteen, after illness taught me that I am too pressed for time to waste it relying entirely on my parents. It shouldn't take an illness to start the process. And you will have to start it for them. But they will keep it going.

They'll move out and get a job. And maybe, if they'll find that person worth living for, they will also know how to walk away.