I. Charles Dickens’ life
Charles Dickens was born on February 7, 1812 in Portsmouth. His father was a naval pay clerk. Ten years later, the family moved to London. When Charles was twelve, his father was imprisoned for debt. Charles had to work in a blacking factory. However, he continued there even after the family’s situation had improved, a fact he blamed on his mother.
Nevertheless he attended
school between 1824 and 1827.
At age fifteen, Dickens started working as a law clerk. He did not want to be a lawyer and in 1829 became a journalist instead, under the pen-name Boz. He became very successful reporting court hearings, and later parliamentary debates.
In 1830, Dickens fell in
love with Maria Beadnell. He was shattered not to be able to marry her
because they were so far apart on the social ladder.
He started writing his
first fictional pieces taking inspiration from his observations. These works
were collected and published under the title Sketches by Boz in
Feburary1836.
From March 1836 to
October 1837, Dickens published the twenty chapters of his first novel, The
Pickwick Papers, in installments. From then on Dickens was constantly
involved in both journalism and writing and publishing serialized novels and
short stories.
In April 1836, Dickens
married Catherine Hogarth. They would have ten children.
In 1837, Dickens was
devastated by the death of his wife’s sister Mary.
In 1842, he took his
first trip to the United States.
In 1856 Dickens bought a
country house in Kent named Gad’s Hill Place.
In 1857 Dickens met the
actress Ellen Ternan. In 1858 he got separated from his wife.
Also in 1858 he
initiated his public readings of his own works, which would later in his
life become an intensive and successful activity, throughout Great Britain and
the USA.
Dickens died on June 9, 1870.
He was buried in the Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.
II. Charles Dickens’ novels.
1.
1836-7:
The Pickwick Papers
2.
1837-9:
Oliver Twist
3.
1838-9:
Nicholas Nickleby
4.
1840-1:
The Old Curiosity Shop
5.
1841: Barnaby
Rudge
6.
1843: Martin
Chuzzlewitt
7.
1846-8:
Dombey and Son
8.
1849-50:
David Copperfield
9.
1851-3:
Bleak House
10.
1854: Hard
Times
11.
1855-7:
Little Dorrit
12.
1859: A
Tale of Two Cities
13.
1860-1:
Great Expectations
14.
1864-5:
Our Mutual Friend
·
Prince
Regent (1811-1820) and King of England (1820-1830): George IV.
·
King of England (1830-1837): George IV.
·
Queen of England (1837-1901): Victoria
Give two
definitions, a historical one and a moral one, of the adjective Victorian :
1.
of the
time of Queen Victoria (1837-1901).
2.
Victorian
morality is strict, even prudish and conservative, especially from a social
point of view.
William Thackeray: novelist (1811-63), author of Barry
Lyndon and Vanity Fair, Dickens’ friend.
Wilkie Collins: another novelist and friend of
Dickens’ (1824-89), a precursor of mystery fiction: The Woman in White, The
Moonstone. He and Dickens visited Italy together and collaborated on a
play.
H.C. Andersen: Danish author (1805-75), famous throughout the world for his fairy tales. He stayed at Dickens’ house in 1857.