Charles Dickens s life born in Portsmouth on February

Charles Dickens’s life born in Portsmouth on February 7 th 1812 the second of 8 children at 5 he moved to Kent with his family where he spent most of his childhood

his father, John Dickens, lived beyond his means the family had financial difficulties 1822: because of his father’s job the family moved to London 1824: J. Dickens’s financial situation got worse he is imprisoned in the Marshalsea debtors’ prison; his family – except for Charles – joined him in prison (Marshalsea will be the setting of Little Dorrit)

at 12 Charles Dickens has to work in a blacking factory and he makes a living for himself (Oliver Twist and David Copperfield deal with his factory working experience) only thanks to a family legacy the family is released from prison works carried out by C. Dickens: (Bleak House deals with the faulty legal system) freelance reporter (legal proceedings) editor junior clerk (in an office of attorneys) political journalist (travels throughout the UK)

as a newspaper reporter, his pen name is BOZ The Pickwick Papers is the collection of articles about London people and situations soon after the publication of Sketches by Boz great ability at characterization V. Woolf: “we remodel our psychological geography when we read Dickens [as he produces] characters who exist not in detail, not accurately or exactly, but abundantly in a cluster of wild yet extraordinary revealing remarks”

1836 - 1843 marries Catherine Hogarth, daughter of the editor of the Evening Chronicle they will have 10 children first trip to the US and Canada; support for the abolition of slavery meets president J. Tyler at the White House

1838 - 1843 Oliver Twist, immediate success of his first authobiographical novel (1838) Nicholas Nickleby (1838 – 39) The old curiosity shop (1840 - 41) Barnaby Rudge (1841) Martin Chuzzlewit (1843) A Christmas Carol (1843)

short novel which redefined the spirit of Christmas in Britain and US before that book Xmas was in decline, maybe for a Puritan heritage Dickens proposes a family-centred festival of generosity in contrast with the Puritan community-based / church-centred religious observation

E. Scrooge = an archetypal figure of Western cultural consciousness W. M. Thackeray called the book: “a national benefit, and to every man and woman who reads it a personal kindness. ”

Some considerations about Dickens’s REALISM: humorous & tender in contrast with the gloomy, cynical and overwhelming one that was to prevail later toward the end of the Victorian Age now lit up by laughter, now warmed by pity distorted and lively caricatures, sometimes fantastic and poetic familiar and popular language free from being overawed by the lack of classical education

1844 - 1857 Dickens spends some time in Italy and in Switzerland => Dombey and Son (1846 – 48) thanks to some donations of a rich woman (Angela Burdett Coutts), he founds “Urania Cottage”, a house to welcome “fallen women” not meant as a punishing institution he buys Gad’s Hill Place, Kent (1856) David Copperfield (1849 – 50) Bleak House (1852 – 53) Hard Times (1854) Little Dorrit (1857)

1858 - 1861 Dickens starts giving public readings of his works, for his own profit and for charity (England, Scotland, Ireland, the US) A tale of two cities (1859) [historical novel] Great Expectation (1861) [novel of formation]

The “invisible woman”: Ellen Ternan staging the play The Frozen Deep (1857) – written with W. Collins – Dickens falls in love with a young actress, Ellen Ternan Ellen secretly lives with Dickens for the rest of his life becoming an “invisible woman” 1858: Dickens separates from his wife, unthinkable behaviour for the age

1856 - 1870 Staplehurst railway crash (he never really recovered from this traumatic experience) – 9 th June 1865 second US reading tour – meets R. W. Emerson. Promises never to denounce America again 1 st 1869: light stroke, while giving public reading 9 th June 1870: 5 years after the railway crash, Dickens dies in his house. Buried in the Poets’ corner, Westminster Abbey.

Dickens as a journalist also an editor of magazines all his novels were first published in instalments in journals and later reprinted in book form 1836 starts with “Bentley’s Miscellany” a literary magazine, he serialized Oliver Twist in it.

Advantages of instalments: made the stories cheap and so accessible for anybody technique of cliff-hanger made each new episode widely anticipated

American fans even waited at the New York docks shouting out at the crew on an incoming ship: “Is Little Nell dead? ” SENTIMENTALISM: necessary to sell the new instalment greatly appreciated by Victorian readers …but not by all of them… “You need to have a heart of stone, not to laugh at the death of little Nell. ” (O. Wilde) “It is not the death of little Nell, but the life of little Nell I object to. ” (G. K. Chesterton)

The Daily News (1846) Dickens is its FOUNDER and first EDITOR (for 17 years) conceived as a radical rival to the right-wing Morning Chronicle G. B. Shaw H. G. Wells G. K. Chesterton were among the leading reformist writers who wrote for the newspaper during its heyday

The Daily News: (a) contributed to women’s suffrage movement (b) 1901: bought by G. Cadbury (Quacker chocolate manufacturer) and used to campaign: - for old age pensions - against sweatshop labour -against the Boer war

Household Words (1858) also editor of it, for a short period then he founded a new weekly magazine – he owned and controlled it entirely All the Year Around (1859) [title derived from Shakespeare’s Othello – Act I, sc. 3] successfully published A Tale of Two Cities in instalments

All the Year Around : contained the same mixture of fiction and non-fiction as Household Words greater emphasis on literary matters and less on journalism nearly 11% of its non-fiction articles were about aspects of INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS & CULTURE (Dickens’s special care dealing with the American Civil War)

Other topics of All the Year Around : -old tales of crime (Italy and France as favourite setting) -new developments in science (including theories of Charles Darwin) -lives and struggles of inventors -tales of exploration and adventures in distant places -examples of self-help among the humble people

Not only an entartainer but also a REPORTER and a REFORMER It is said the prison scenes in The Pickwick Papers have the Fleet Prison shut down K. Marx: “[Dickens and other novelists of Victorian England] issued to the world more political and social truths than have been uttered by all the professional politicians, publicists and moralists put together. ”

In the XX century, since the invention of the cinema, there have been at least 180 films and TV adaptations based on Dickens’s works

Chronological list of Dickens’s essential works: Sketches by Boz (1836) The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (1836 – 37) Oliver Twist (1837 – 39) Nicholas Nickleby (1838 – 1839) The Old curiosity Shop (1840 – 1841) Barnaby Rudge (1841) A Christmas Carol (1843) The Cricket on the Hearth (1843) Martin Chuzzlewit (1843 – 1844) Dombey and Son (1846 – 1848) David Copperfield (1849 – 1850) Bleak House (1852 – 1853) Hard Times (1854) Little Dorrit (1855 – 1857) A Tale of Two Cities (1859) Great Expectations (1860 – 1861) Our Mutual Friend (1864 – 1865) The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870) THE END