Dr. Alexandre Manette’s life in French prison is miserable and unjust. A casualty of class warfare, he is imprisoned in the infamous Bastille for daring to expose the truth about the wickedness of rich and powerful aristocrats. The irredeemably vile Evrémonde Brothers seize Dr. Manette’s letter to the Minister of State that would have revealed their sins, and they lock him away for eighteen painful years.
While under confinement, the doctor is restricted to dark, damp quarters where human waste and infectious diseases run amok. He often suffers from hunger and exhaustion and loneliness, constantly battling for his sanity and humanity. He refuses to become a zombie, one of the “living dead.”
Dr. Manette is a man of strong will and conviction, but even the toughest men can break down in the face of such physical, emotional, and psychological torture. The doctor’s saving graces during this arduous ordeal are the love and loyalty of his daughter Lucie, his adopting the craft of shoemaking, and his ability to forgive, not holding the sins of the father and uncle against Charles Darnay.
The difficulties experienced by Charles Dickens’s own father while incarcerated in debtor’s prison when Dickens was a child greatly influenced his depictions of Dr. Manette’s prison sentence.
https://dickensmuseum.com/blogs/charles-dickens-museum/what-inspired-a-tale-of-two-cities-by-professor-michael-slater
Dr. Alexandre Manette is sent to prison on a trumped-up charge. This is his punishment for daring to expose the wicked crimes of two members of the aristocratic Evrémonde family. Dr. Manette isn't just sent to any prison; he's sent to the notorious Bastille, hated symbol of repression under the ancien regime. The Bastille is a truly horrible place. Conditions are appalling, with filth everywhere and contagious diseases running rampant. The prisoners are constantly hungry, and without any adequate exercise, they're cooped-up in their dank, dismal cells practically the whole time.
Many prisoners go out of their minds in such conditions. Amazingly, Manette somehow manages to endure eighteen long years of this mental and physical torture. But he's never quite the same again. Although he managed to stop himself from going insane in the Bastille by becoming a shoemaker, Manette has been mentally destroyed by his lengthy incarceration.
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