Charles Dickens

Dickens’ Biography Born February 7, 1812 1824 -- Dickens worked at Warren’s Blacking

Warehouse 1824 -- Mr. Dickens (Charles’ father) taken to

debtors’ prison; family joins him Imprisoned from February – May Dickens’ Belief:

“To be thoroughly earnest is everything, and to be anything short of it is nothing.”

• 1827 - Dickens family evicted from home for not paying rent

• Charles is pulled out of private school• Charles, now 15, becomes law clerk and free-lance

writer• 1834 - Charles takes Boz as pen name• 1834 - Charles’ Dad re-arrested for debts

•Dickens starts Publishing!1836 -- Sketches by Boz1837 -- The Pickwick Papers

1837-- Oliver Twist is serially published

*“Here Comes the Bride…”

• 1836 (Dickens is 24) he and Catherine Hogarth get married

• and..one year later, the first “little Dickens” is born

• and one year after that, baby # 2 is born...

Dickens• 1843 -- A Christmas Carol• 1844 -- Martin Chuzzlewit• 1844 -- The Chimes• 1845 -- The Cricket on the Hearth• 1846 -- The Battle of Life• 1846 -- Dombey and Son• 1850 -- David Copperfield• 1853 -- Bleak House• 1853 -- A Child’s History of England and... a near nervous

breakdown• 1854 -- Hard Times• 1857 -- Little Dorrit

IS HE DONE YET?• 1859 -- A Tale of Two Cities• 1861 -- Great Expectations• 1865 -- Our Mutual Friends• 1869 -- The Mystery of Edwin

Drood (unfinished)a

Dickens wrote 15 major novels in a career spanning 33 years.

His peak of creativity and literary prowess was in mid - late career from 1848 - 1865.

HE EXERCISED HIS SOCIAL CONSCIENCE

• He crusaded for children’s rights.• He was an advocate of child labor laws to protect

children.• He opposed cruelty, deprivation, and corporal

punishment of children.• He believed in and lobbied for just treatment of

criminals.• He gave 16 public readings in 1858 to raise

money for the Hospital for Sick Children

In addition, •He protested a greedy, uncaring,

materialistic society through such works as A Christmas Carol, which Dickens called “a sledgehammer” he used figuratively to wake up the reading public

•He repeatedly used satire to highlight problems in his society

A sad ending• 1870 -- Dickens, who had been in declining

health since 1866, died of a cerebral hemorrhage.

• He is buried in the Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey in London

POETS’ CORNER Dickens’ epitaph:

“He was a sympathizer to the poor, the suffering, and the oppressed; and by his death, one of England’s greatest writers is lost to the world.”

*What about Oliver Twist?

*Dickens wrote, “I wished to show in little Oliver, the principle of Good surviving through every adverse circumstance and triumphing at last.”

Themes O The powerlessness of childrenO Good’s ability to triumph over evilO Man’s humanity to manO Man’s inhumanity to manO The outcast’s search for status and

identityO The heinous nature of crime and

criminalsO Use of ironyO Use of coincidenceO Use of humor