Charles John Huffam Dickens (pronounced /ˈtʃɑrlz ˈdɪkɪnz/; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was the most popular English novelist of the Victorian era The Victorian era of the United Kingdom was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from June 1837 until her death on the 22nd of January 1901. The reign was a long period of prosperity for the British people, as profits gained from the overseas British Empire, as well as from industrial improvements at home, allowed an educated middle class to, and he remains popular, responsible for some of English literature's most iconic characters.[1]
Many of his novels, with their recurrent concern for social reform A reform movement is a kind of social movement that aims to make gradual change, or change in certain aspects of society, rather than rapid or fundamental changes. A reform movement is distinguished from more radical social movements such as revolutionary movements, first appeared in magazines in serialised The term "serial" refers to the intrinsic property of a series – namely, its order. In literature, the term is used as a noun to refer to a format by which a story is told in contiguous (typically chronological) installments in sequential issues of a single periodical publication form, a popular format at the time. Unlike other authors who completed entire novels before serialisation, Dickens often created the episodes as they were being serialized. The practice lent his stories a particular rhythm, punctuated by cliffhangers to keep the public looking forward to the next instalment.[2] The continuing popularity of his novels and short stories is such that they have never gone out of print An out-of-print book is a book that is no longer being published. Out-of-print books are often rare, and may be difficult to acquire.[3]
His work has been praised for its mastery of prose and unique personalities by writers such as George Gissing George Robert Gissing was an English novelist who wrote twenty-three novels between 1880 and 1903. From his early naturalistic works, he developed into one of the most accomplished realists of the late-Victorian era and G. K. Chesterton Gilbert Keith Chesterton was an English writer. His prolific and diverse output included philosophy, ontology, poetry, play writing, journalism, public lecturing and debating, biography, Christian apologetics, fantasy and detective fiction, though others, such as Henry James Henry James, OM – February 28, 1916) was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James and Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English novelist, essayist, diarist, epistler, publisher, feminist, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century, criticised him for sentimentality and implausibility.[4]
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Life
Early years
2 Ordnance Terrace, Chatham Chatham is a large area within Medway, Kent, in South East England, Dickens's home 1817–1821Having spent the first three years of his life in Portsmouth Portsmouth (locally /ˈpɔːtsməθ/ ) is a city located in the ceremonial county of Hampshire on the south coast of England. Portsmouth is the United Kingdom's only island city, being mainly located on Portsea Island. The City of Portsmouth and Portsmouth Football Club are both nicknamed Pompey. As a significant naval port for centuries,, Hampshire Today, Hampshire is a popular holiday area. Its tourist attractions include many seaside resorts, the motor museum at Beaulieu, with national parks in both New Forest and the South Downs . Hampshire has a long maritime history and two of England's largest ports, Southampton and Portsmouth, lie on its coast. The county is famed as home of such, the family moved to London London is a leading global city, the world's largest financial centre alongside New York, and has the largest city GDP in Europe. Central London is home to the headquarters of most of the UK's top 100 listed companies and more than 100 of Europe's 500 largest. London's influence and strengths in the arts, education, entertainment, fashion, finance, in 1815. His early years seem to have been idyllic, although he thought himself a "very small and not-over-particularly-taken-care-of boy".[5] He spent time outdoors, but also read voraciously, especially the picaresque novels The picaresque novel is a popular sub-genre of prose fiction which is usually satirical and depicts, in realistic and often humorous detail, the adventures of a roguish hero of low social class who lives by his or her wits in a corrupt society. As indicated by its name, this style of novel originated in Spain, where it was possibly influenced by of Tobias Smollett Tobias George Smollett was a Scottish poet and author. He was best known for his picaresque novels, such as The Adventures of Roderick Random (1748) and The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751), which influenced later novelists such as Charles Dickens and Henry Fielding Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his rich earthy humour and satirical prowess, and as the author of the novel Tom Jones. He spoke, later in life, of his poignant memories of childhood, and of his near photographic memory of the people and events, which he used in his writing. His father's brief period as a clerk in the Navy Pay Office afforded Charles a few years' private education at William Giles's School, in Chatham.[6]
This period came to an abrupt end when John Dickens spent beyond his means and was imprisoned in the Marshalsea The Marshalsea was a prison on the south bank of the River Thames in Southwark, now part of London. From at least 1329 until it closed in 1842, it housed men under court martial for crimes at sea, including those who had committed "unnatural crimes"; political figures and intellectuals accused of sedition or other inappropriate behaviour; debtor's prison Prior to the mid 19th century debtors' prisons were a common way to deal with unpaid debt. Currently, the practice of giving prison sentences for unpaid debts has been mostly eliminated, with a few exceptions such as inability to pay child support and certain taxes, and some specific countries, such as the United Arab Emirates in Southwark, London. Shortly afterwards, the rest of his family joined him - except Charles, who boarded with family friend Elizabeth Roylance in Camden Town Camden Town is an inner city district in northwest London, England and the central neighbourhood of the London Borough of Camden. It is located 2.4 miles north-northwest of Charing Cross and is one of the 35 major centres identified in the London Plan. It was laid out as a residential district from 1791 and was anciently part of the manor of.[7] Mrs. Roylance was "a reduced Poverty is the lack of basic human needs, such as clean water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter, because of the inability to afford them. This is also referred to as absolute poverty or destitution. Relative poverty is the condition of having fewer resources or less income than others within a society or country, or compared old lady, long known to our family", whom Dickens later immortalised, "with a few alterations and embellishments", as "Mrs. Pipchin", in Dombey and Son Dombey and Son is a novel by the Victorian author Charles Dickens. It was first published in monthly parts between October 1846 and April 1848 with the full title Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son: Wholesale, Retail and for Exportation. Dickens started writing the book in Lausanne, Switzerland, but travelled extensively during the course of. Later, he lived in a "back-attic...at the house of an insolvent-court agent...in Lant Street in The Borough Southwark, or the Borough, is a district of south London, England, located in the London Borough of Southwark. It is situated 1.5 miles east of Charing Cross...he was a fat, good-natured, kind old gentleman, with a quiet old wife; and he had a very innocent grown-up son; these three were the inspiration for the Garland family in The Old Curiosity Shop The Old Curiosity Shop was one of two novels which Dickens published along with short stories in his weekly serial Master Humphrey's Clock, which lasted from 1840 to 1841. The Old Curiosity Shop was printed as a separate book in 1841.[8]
The Marshalsea The Marshalsea was a prison on the south bank of the River Thames in Southwark, now part of London. From at least 1329 until it closed in 1842, it housed men under court martial for crimes at sea, including those who had committed "unnatural crimes"; political figures and intellectuals accused of sedition or other inappropriate behaviour; around 1897, after it had closedOn Sundays, Dickens and his sister Fanny, allowed out from the Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music in London, England, is a conservatoire, Britain's oldest degree-granting music school and a constituent college of the University of London since 1999. The Academy was founded by Lord Burghersh in 1822 with the help and ideas of the French harpist and composer Nicolas Bochsa and in 1830 was granted a Royal Charter by, spent the day at the Marshalsea.[9] (Dickens later used the prison as a setting in Little Doritt Little Dorrit is a serial novel by Charles Dickens published originally between 1855 and 1857. It is a work of satire on the shortcomings of the government and society of the period.) To pay for his board and to help his family, Dickens began working ten-hour days at Warren's Blacking Shoe polish , usually a waxy paste or a cream, is a consumer product used to polish, shine, waterproof, and restore the appearance of leather shoes or boots, thereby extending the footwear's life. In some regions—including New Zealand—"Nugget" is used as a common term for solid waxy shoe polish, as opposed to liquid shoe polishes Warehouse, on Hungerford Stairs, near the present Charing Cross railway station Charing Cross station, also known as London Charing Cross, is a central London railway terminus. It is unusual among London's railway termini in that its services connect it to two of the others, Waterloo and London Bridge. It is one of 17 stations managed by Network Rail, and trains serving it are operated by Southeastern and Southern. It is the. He earned six shillings The shilling is a unit of currency used in some current and former British Commonwealth countries. The word shilling comes from schilling, an accounting term that dates back to Anglo-Saxon times where it was deemed to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere. The word is thought to derive from the base skell-, "to ring/resound" a week pasting labels on shoe polish. The strenuous - and often cruel - work conditions made a deep impression on Dickens, and later influenced his fiction and essays, forming foundation of his interest in the reform of socio-economic and labour conditions, the rigours of which he believed were unfairly borne by the poor. As told to John Forster (from The Life of Charles Dickens):
A 1904 artist's impression of Dickens in the shoe-polish factoryThe blacking-warehouse was the last house on the left-hand side of the way, at old Hungerford Stairs. It was a crazy, tumble-down old house, abutting of course on the river, and literally overrun with rats. Its wainscoted rooms, and its rotten floors and staircase, and the old grey rats swarming down in the cellars, and the sound of their squeaking and scuffling coming up the stairs at all times, and the dirt and decay of the place, rise up visibly before me, as if I were there again. The counting-house was on the first floor, looking over the coal-barges and the river. There was a recess in it, in which I was to sit and work. My work was to cover the pots of paste-blacking; first with a piece of oil-paper, and then with a piece of blue paper; to tie them round with a string; and then to clip the paper close and neat, all round, until it looked as smart as a pot of ointment from an apothecary's shop. When a certain number of grosses of pots had attained this pitch of perfection, I was to paste on each a printed label, and then go on again with more pots. Two or three other boys were kept at similar duty down-stairs on similar wages. One of them came up, in a ragged apron and a paper cap, on the first Monday morning, to show me the trick of using the string and tying the knot. His name was Bob Fagin; and I took the liberty of using his name, long afterwards, in Oliver Twist.[8]
After only a few months in Marshalsea, John Dickens' paternal grandmother, Elizabeth Dickens, died and bequeathed him the sum of £450. On the expectation of this legacy, Dickens was granted release from prison. Under the Insolvent Debtors Act An act of Parliament is a statute (commonly called a law) enacted as primary legislation by a national or sub-national parliament, Dickens arranged for payment of his creditors, and he and his family left Marshalsea for the home of Mrs. Roylance.
Although Dickens eventually attended the Wellington House Academy in North London North London is the northern part of London, England. It is an imprecise description and the area it covers is defined differently for a range of purposes. Common to these definitions is that it includes districts located north of the River Thames and is used in comparison with South London, his mother Elizabeth Dickens did not immediately remove him from the boot-blacking factory. 'The incident must have done much to confirm Dickens's determined view that a father should rule the family, a mother find her proper sphere inside the home. "I never afterwards forgot, I never shall forget, I never can forget, that my mother was warm for my being sent back." His mother's failure to request his return was no doubt a factor in his demanding and dissatisfied attitude towards women.'[10] Resentment stemming from his situation and the conditions under which working-class Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs (as measured by skill, education and lower incomes), often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes. Working classes are mainly found in industrialized economies and in urban areas people lived became major themes of his works, and it was this unhappy period in his youth to which he alluded in his favourite, and most autobiographical, novel An autobiographical novel is a novel based on the life of the author. The literary technique is distinguished from an autobiography or memoir by the stipulation of being fiction. Because an autobiographical novel is partially fiction, the author does not ask the reader to expect the text to fulfill the "autobiographical pact." Names and, David Copperfield David Copperfield or The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a novel in 1850. Like all except five of his works, it originally appeared in serial form (published in monthly installments) a year earlier. Many elements:[11] "I had no advice, no counsel, no encouragement, no consolation, no assistance, no support, of any kind, from anyone, that I can call to mind, as I hope to go to heaven!" The Wellington House Academy was not a good school. 'Much of the haphazard, desultory teaching, poor discipline punctuated by the headmaster's sadistic brutality, the seedy ushers and general run-down atmosphere, are embodied in Mr. Creakle's Establishment in David Copperfield.'[12]
Dickens worked at the law office of Ellis and Blackmore, attorneys, of Holborn Court, Gray's Inn The Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, commonly known as Gray's Inn, is one of the four Inns of Court in London. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wales, an individual must belong to one of these Inns. Located at the intersection of High Holborn and Gray's Inn Road, the Inn is both a professional body and a provider, as a junior clerk A law clerk or a judicial clerk is a person who provides assistance to a judge in researching issues before the court and in writing opinions. Law clerks are not court clerks or courtroom deputies, who are administrative staff for the court from May 1827 to November 1828. Then, having learned Gurneys system of shorthand in his spare time, he left to become a freelance reporter. A distant relative, Thomas Charlton, was a freelance reporter at Doctors' Commons, and Dickens was able to share his box there to report the legal proceedings for nearly four years.[13] This education informed works such as Nicholas Nickleby Nicholas Nickleby; or, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby is a comic novel by Charles Dickens. Originally published as a serial from 1838 to 1839, it was Dickens' third novel, Dombey and Son Dombey and Son is a novel by the Victorian author Charles Dickens. It was first published in monthly parts between October 1846 and April 1848 with the full title Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son: Wholesale, Retail and for Exportation. Dickens started writing the book in Lausanne, Switzerland, but travelled extensively during the course of, and especially Bleak House Bleak House is the ninth novel by Charles Dickens, published in twenty monthly installments between March 1852 and September 1853. It is held to be one of Dickens's finest novels, containing one of the most vast, complex and engaging arrays of minor characters and sub-plots in his entire canon. The story is told partly by the novel's heroine,—whose vivid portrayal of the machinations and bureaucracy of the legal system did much to enlighten the general public, and was a vehicle for dissemination of Dickens's own views regarding, particularly, the heavy burden on the poor who were forced by circumstances to "go to law".
In 1830, Dickens met his first love, Maria Beadnell, thought to have been the model for the character Dora in David Copperfield David Copperfield or The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a novel in 1850. Like all except five of his works, it originally appeared in serial form (published in monthly installments) a year earlier. Many elements. Maria's parents disapproved of the courtship and effectively ended the relationship by sending her to school in Paris.
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Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:33:06 GMT+00:00
SodaHead News Paladino took a page from Charles Dickens '/Ebenezer Scrooge's playbook. "Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?" The Tea Party fave thinks New York ... Tea Party Candidate Says Move The Poor To Prison Care2.com (blog)
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Wed, 21 Jul 2010 16:37:40 GM
Portsmouth's top attractions are its historic dockyards, old town, beaches of Southsea and it's also the birthplace of . Charles Dickens. and Sherlock Holmes! Link: Best Things to Do in Portsmouth from Dockyards to . Charles Dickens. .
