Hard Times (1854) first appeared in Dickens’ weekly periodical,
Household Words, serialized in twenty instalments. The shortest of his
novels, it is set in Coketown, a fictitious Victorian industrial town
inspired by Preston in the North of England. It tells the story of the
family of Thomas Gradgrind, a man obsessed with misguided ‘Utilitarian’
values that make him trust facts, statistics and practicality over emotion.
Based on James Mill (the Utilitarian leader), Gradgrind raises his own
children, Louisa and Tom, in line with these same views. The novel has
been frequently adapted for film, stage and television.