F. R. Leavis, in The Great Tradition, described the book as essentially a moral fable, and said that 'of all Dickens' works (it is) the one that has all the strengths of his genius - that of a completely serious work of art' [REF].
Walter Allen, in an introduction to an alternative edition, characterised Hard Times as being an unsurpassed "critique of industrial society", which was later superseded by works of D. H. Lawrence.