This passage concludes chapter 9 of David Copperfield, Charles Dickens’ eighth novel published in serialised form between 1849 and 1850. David, an orphan and the narrator of the novel, spent his early childhood with his mother Clara and their devoted servant Peggotty. Then David’s mother got married again to a tyrannical man named Edward Murdstone who settled in the Copperfields’ house with his sister Jane. In order to get rid of the boy, Murdstone sent him to a boarding school. This is where, on the day he turns nine, he learns that his mother has died. He is at once sent home, where Peggotty relates to him his mother’s death.

This passage revolves around mother figures. I will first deal with the importance of Peggotty in this passage. I will then turn my attention to the object of her narrative: the death of Clara.

At this precise point of the novel, Peggotty takes a huge importance in David’s life. Now that his mother is dead, she becomes the only character who loves him and his only link to childhood. Her role is central in this extract.

For this scene, the narrator creates an ambivalent atmosphere which matches the ambiguity of the day, marked by David’s birthday and his mother’s death. On the one hand, the atmosphere is almost that of a ceremony, extremely quiet and silent: as the narrator writes, he remembers, the day “was so like Sunday”, the day of the week on which Christians keep Sabbath, because of its “stillness”. This unusual quiet is a constant reminder of the recent death of Clara. On the other hand, David and Peggotty are sharing a moment of confidence and warmth in the boy’s bedroom, Peggotty holding his hand, kissing and stroking it throughout the scene (l. 6-8). Thus Peggotty’s character almost brightens this lugubrious scene thanks to her mother-like, comforting tenderness. Conversely, the ghastly surroundings of the house filled by a funeral atmosphere and dominated by the uncaring Murdstones brings out the relief brought by Peggotty.

This passage takes the form of a narration inside the narration. David the narrator gives Peggotty the narration of Clara’s death, and makes David the character the recipient of her narration. The decision to give Peggotty this “spot” is crucial in terms of tone. Peggotty is a servant. Her command of language is not that of a scholar. She is not always comfortable with words (for example, she can never get “crocodile” right). Therefore her narrative style is marked by simplicity and spontaneity rather than sophistication. Her sentences are fairly basic in structure. In addition, her use of adjective and adverbs is very scarce and limited to the expression of deep, sincere emotions: “such a patient smile, the dear ! – so beautiful!” (l. 92-3), “the poor lamb” (referring to Clara’s baby, l. 80). The only occurrence of a chain of three adjectives in a row: “her stupid cross old Peggotty” is devoted to mock-self-deprecation. The reader senses that Peggotty’s emotion is as strong as her way of expressing it is plain.

Dickens here seems to have learnt from his failure of The Old Curiosity Shop, where the death of Little Nell was notoriously stretched to pages upon pages of unbearably sentimental, pompous prose, which made this episode an irritating or even involuntarily comic one to many readers. Most crucially, this passage gives the act of narration a vital importance. Indeed Peggotty, through her narrative, helps David overcome, or at least cope with, the trauma of his mother’s death.

Mother-like qualities are conflated in Peggotty in this extract. Now that Clara is dead and that Peggotty relates her death to David, she more or less becomes her substitute. Clara’s figure is brought up by Peggotty’s narration. Besides, Peggotty becomes Clara’s mouthpiece when she brings her last words to David: “tell him that his mother, when she lay here, blessed him not once, but a thousand times” (l. 83).

The fact that Clara is, as it were, fused with Peggotty, may explain why this scene is far from being as gruesome as it might have been. Clara is still present, in a way, and her qualities are merged with the more mother-like protectiveness of Peggotty.

Peggotty provides David with the last image he will ever have of his mother. Her narration is therefore crucial in the building of her “legend”. The features of her character that the reader already knows are presented again and linked to her death. The reader is reminded of her lack of strength and self-confidence: “she was uncertain in her mind” (l. 15-6) during her pregnancy. There is a brief improvement in her condition after the baby’s birth (l. 17-8), but the way she sings to her baby “like a voice up in the air, that was rising away” (l. 25-6) is already ominous. On the whole Clara’s uncertainty increases with the approach of death: “she got to be more timid and more frightened-like” (l. 27-9).

This is once more the occasion to oppose Clara’s two husbands. Clara reminds Peggotty of the way Mr Copperfield, David’s father, did his best to conquer her self-doubts (l. 95-102). On the other hand, Mr Murdstone and his intrusive sister keep forcing on her the self-image of a silly, immature girl unable to look after herself: “thoughtless” and “light-hearted” (l. 46-7). “He will believe it more and more” (l. 57-8) implies that her second husband does not take her declining health seriously. Apart from the flippant, rude mention of “them two downstairs” (l. 67), the Murdstones are surprisingly absent from Peggotty’s narration. We must not forget that she is hardly a detached, impartial narrator, so her resentment may lead her to downplay their part as much as possible. However, Dickens so constantly stresses her honesty that he cannot expect us to suspect her of not being truthful. The Murstones’ near-total absence in is probably the consequence of their lack of emotional involvement with Clara. Moreover, their presence would pollute this narrative and possibly change its tone to one of anger and resentment, while Dickens’s aim was cleary to preserve the warm intimacy of this key passage.

Nevertheless, both David and the reader can’t but know that Clara has died to the hands of the Murdstones, a victim of their manipulation. Their apparent indifference enhances the pathos of her death. This pathos relies on forebodings (l. 41-3, 54, 57-60, 76-9), a message to David (l. 81-5) and the dignified, gradual way in which life slips out of her (many elements throughout the passage).

Peggotty’s narration seems calculated to cause an idealisation of her person by David. He notes that his mother’s death obliterates his recent experience of alienation from her after her second marriage (l. 119-20, l. 133-4). Without insisting on the obvious angelic nature of his image of his mother (once again, the lesson of The Old Curiosity Shop), he hints to it with two discreet metaphors: “a voice up in the air, that was rising away” (l. 25-6) and “she winged her way…” (l. 132).

To conclude, I wish to focus on David’s step-brother, here alluded to three times. Peggotty’s narration seems to attribute Clara’s death to her pregnancy, although her baby’s birth does her good (§ 2). Later, Peggotty relates her wish to be buried with him if he were to die (l. 76-81). In David’s own conclusion to the chapter, he identifies to this dead baby (last paragraph). Maybe this is attributable to the narrator rather than the character. Anyway, this image sums up the feeling that David’s childhood is over, buried with his mother and an image of himself, his entire previous life erased. A first David is dead, another one is to be born.

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