Charles Dickens
“The greatest dramatic writer that the English had had since Shakespeare who created the largest and most varied world.” ----Literary critic Edmund Wilson on Dickens.
Biographical information:
· born 1812 in Portsmouth England--second of eight children to John and Elizabeth
· Early years – idyllic time; read voraciously, fond of outdoors
· He had a photographic memory of the people and events that helped to bring his fiction of life.
· He liked to entertain and perform for his family.
· Prosperous middle class family beginning – Charles was privately educated
· But his father spent beyond their means and was put in Marshalsea debtor’s prison. (the family joined him in residence at Marshalsea and this provided the setting for Dickens’ Little Dorrit.)
· Just before his father’s arrest, Charles (he was an “economic resource”) had begun working at age 12 – ten hours a day – at a blackening (shoe polish) warehouse on an assembly line earning six shillings a week pasting labels on jars of thick shoe polish.
· He worked among working class boys and the word was repetitive…The money helped support the family and paid for his own lodgings. An experience that filled him with shame and guilt that had a lasting effect but also gave him material to write about.
· Many of the places where he lived and worked provided him with inspiration for his writings.
· The mostly unregulated, strenuous and often cruel work conditions of the factory employees – especially children – made a deep impression on Dickens. It served as the foundation for his fiction and later social reform.
· His father was released from prison when he received an inheritance and paid his debts. His mother insisted that Charles continue to work at the factory and this contributed towards his attitude that men should rule the home and not women.
Major themes:
· resentment from his situation & conditions under which working class people lived
· Eventually he returned to school and at 15 began as a clerk in a lawyer’s office. Developed a dislike for lawyers and depicted them in a negative light.
· Jobs as Parliamentary reporter – (similar to a court stenographer); then a reporter in political elections – he was very successful.
· Kept his eyes and ears open learned about social conditions, government and life.
· @1833 first serious love – daughter of banker – he was rejected.
· Sketches by Boz.; Socialized in Literary Circles
· April 1836 married Katherine Hogarth– He was in charge in the marriage – blissful in early days. Her sister Mary later moved in (died in her youth – Charles was devoted to her memory – depicting her as characters)
· Approached by publishers to do Pickwick Papers – chose his own illustrator. Serialized format – enormous successful 40,000 copies. He was famous when he was young – in his twenties!
· Worked in busy household, often writing in living room and on more than a book at a time. He’d walk the city of London for gathering ideas.
· 1842 Lecture tour in America – he found America disappointing.
· Wrote :A Christmas Carol because he needed to pay off loans to publishers. He was a working man – needed to write for economic reasons, but he also had tremendous drive.
· View of the world – rich in comedy, horror and pathos (Dickensian)
“Dickens life is an amazing story of the power of the imagination to produce a seemingly inexhaustible supply of unforgettable characters in an imaginary yet recognizable universe animated by the novelist’s great power of visualization.”---Daniel S. Burt