Following on from chapter 46 of Nancy’s meeting Noah claypole informed Fagin of all the information is soon manipulated by Fagin and passed on to Sikes, whose vicious anger is set off like a flare. The readers are already led feel that Sikes is quite possibly the most brutal character in the whole novel, and at the scene of Nancy’s death, the readers are exposed quickly and bluntly to the shocking reality of Sikes’ barbaric characteristics. Sikes’ anger drives him to the conclusion that he has to kill Nancy; he’s prepared to do anything.
In the event of Nancy’s death Dickens uses descriptive language to help the reader visualise almost perfectly what’s happening. He provides a metaphor for Nancy’s life telling us that Sikes “double locked the door” as he enters Nancy’s room, again, possibly insinuating the fact that Nancy has been trapped in her own life, unable to escape no-matter what. Even as she pleads “stop before you spill my blood! I have been true to you, upon my guilty son I have” Sikes still kills her “he beat it twice with all the force he could summon, upon the upturned face that almost touched his own”.
The language Dickens uses is horrific and gruesomely literal. It leaves shocking images in the readers head. “She staggered and fell: nearly blinded by the blood that rained down from a deep gash in her forehead” this makes you wonder, as a reader, how a character such as Sikes, could even live with himself after committing such a brutal act of violence. This is exactly what dickens wants us to think; soon after, Dickens proves that Sikes cannot live with what he has done, implying that he is haunted by her eyes.
He surprises the readers, again, a strategy to keep them enthralled sunshine after Nancy’s death “the sun-the bright sun”, showing that she’s been released from her life of fear, and is now tormenting Sikes, showing him that she is most probably better off dead than, living in a life in the slums, in fear of her controlling acquaintances such as himself and Fagin. Readers of the Victorian ere would have been thrilled at the fact, Nancy finally re-paid Sikes for the unbearable way in which he treated her, an example of which, in chapter 50 Sikes is tortured mentally by the vision of Nancy’s eyes “the eyes again!
Staggering… the noose was at his neck” Justice was finally served “he fell” “there was a sudden jerk, a terrific convulsion of the limbs; and there he hung! “, haunted by the mob and tortured by Nancy’s eyes, he is repaid as he was driven to the death he was destined to receive. “the chimney quivered with shock, but stood bravely” Another way Dickens could be showing that at last something showed at least an ounce of bravery against Sikes as the chimney withstood the power of Sikes’ fall which finally killed him.
