Charles Dickens wrote about the object of persecution. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (1837)

"The Adventures of Oliver Twist" is the most famous novel by the great Dickens.

The story of a boy who finds himself orphaned and forced to wander through the dark slums of London. The vicissitudes of the little hero’s fate, numerous encounters along his path and the happy ending of difficult and dangerous adventures - all this arouses genuine interest among many readers around the world.


For some reason, it always seemed to me that this is a very sad story, where at the end the main character always dies. And since I am an impressionable person, I put off reading this book for a long time. And in vain :) As it turned out, Dickens was a kind person, and not wanting to upset his readers, he ended almost all of his works with a happy ending.

Oliver Twist is a wonderful story about the victory of good over evil, overcoming difficulties and belief in miracles. The book looks a little like a soap opera, in its best traditions)) Those who have read it will understand what I mean)) I think that younger readers will generally enjoy the book!

Charles Dickens "Greater Expectations"

The novel "Great Expectations" - one of Dickens's last works, the pearl of his work - tells the story of the life and disappointment of young Philip Pirrip, nicknamed Pip in childhood. Pip's dreams of a career, love and prosperity in the "world of gentlemen" are shattered in an instant, as soon as he learns the terrible secret of his unknown patron, who is being pursued by the police. Money, stained with blood and marked with the seal of crime, as Pip is convinced, cannot bring happiness. But what can it do in this case? And where will his dreams and great hopes lead the hero?

I got goosebumps while reading this book! A story of great hopes, and no less great failures... It’s easy to read, it’s even, to some extent, a detective story, so the book won’t let you go, I promise :)

And again, thanks to Dickens for his kindness... I know, initially the author planned a different ending...

Charles Dickens "David Copperfield"

The Life of David Copperfield is truly Dickens' most popular novel. A novel translated into all languages ​​of the world, filmed dozens of times - and still captivates the reader with its simplicity and perfection.
This is the story of a young man who is ready to overcome any obstacles, endure any hardships and, for the sake of love, commit the most desperate and courageous acts. The story of the endlessly charming David, the grotesquely insignificant Uriah and the sweet, charming Dora. A story that embodies the charm of “good old England”, nostalgia for which is amazingly felt today by people living in different countries on different continents.

Here in Dickens, if there is a villain, then he is one that can be seen from a kilometer away! And if it’s positive, then it’s like an angel with wings :) Perhaps this book is my favorite of the works presented here. The book describes David's life from birth to old age, everything is full of events, adventures and experiences.

I liked the part about the hero’s childhood more than the part about his adult life. But overall the book is very worthy, I recommend reading it, just like any other by this author. Dickens has an amazing way of writing books, it is such a wonderful, lively style, there is a lot of humor in his books, at some points I really laughed, which is something you don’t expect in general from classic books (well, or I don’t expect..))

Journalistic activity was by no means an episode in the writer’s biography. Dickens's complete collection of speeches and articles, comprising two substantial volumes, shows that the writer often spoke on public issues. This was organically combined with Dickens’s literary work, which from beginning to end was imbued with the pathos of the struggle against various forms of social injustice. As is known, journalistic motives are very significant in Dickens's novels. It is therefore not surprising that he often put down his novelist's pen to write an article or give a speech. Civic feeling and social temperament were organically inherent in Dickens. All his journalism is imbued with a keen interest in what was the subject of greatest importance for modern society.
From the very beginning of his literary career, Dickens declared his task to be serving the interests of society, primarily the common people. Speaking at a banquet on June 25, 1841, Dickens spoke about the motives that drove his work: “I was possessed by a serious and humble desire - and it will never leave me - to make the world more harmless fun and cheerfulness. I felt that the world is not only worthy of contempt, but that it is worth living in, and for many reasons. I sought to find, as the professor put it, the grain of good that the Creator planted even in the most evil souls. I sought to show that virtue can be found in the most remote corners - which is not true, as if it is incompatible with poverty, even with rags..."
This humane disposition is characteristic of both Dickens's novels and journalism. Both Dickens's novels and journalism pursued one goal: to arouse hatred of all manifestations of social injustice and teach people goodness.
Dickens was aware that such large moral, educational and educational tasks were beyond the capabilities of one person. Therefore, throughout almost all the years of his literary work, he gathered around him writers who could support his desire to create literature that would influence the consciousness of the people. Hence Dickens’s constant desire to have a press organ that would appeal to the broadest strata of society.
Dickens first contributed to the weekly newspaper The Examiner. It was one of the most progressive organs of the English press of the first half of the 19th century. Its founders were brothers John and Lee Hunt. Leigh Hunt led the radicals' struggle against political reaction during the period of the "Holy Alliance". In 1821, Albany Fontblanc became editor of the magazine, and then John Forster, Dickens's lifelong friend and subsequently his first biographer. Dickens contributed to the Examiner, that organ of radical bourgeois democracy, in 1838-1849. Articles from those years are reproduced in this volume.
Dickens wanted to publish a newspaper or magazine himself, to determine the ideological and artistic line of a large mass organ. In 1845, the writer planned to publish a weekly literary and political magazine, for which he came up with the name “Cricket”. This intention remained unfulfilled, but the plan was not fruitless for Dickens. The idea for "The Cricket" gave rise to the idea for the Christmas story "The Cricket Behind the Hearth."
Dreams of a weekly newspaper faded into the background when Dickens received an offer to become editor of the Daily News. Although his faithful friend Forster dissuades him, Dickens eagerly takes up the preparatory work. January 21, 1846-. The first issue of the newspaper is published. Her political position was radical reformist. The newspaper advocated the abolition of outdated social institutions and laws, in particular, it sought the abolition of grain duties, which placed a heavy burden on the people. But at the same time, it supported the principle of free trade, which was beneficial to the bourgeoisie. F. Engels wrote that the Daily News is “the London organ of the industrial bourgeoisie” (K. Marx and F. Engels, Works, 1st ed., vol. VIII, p. 439.). The newspaper expressed the positions of the liberal part of the bourgeois class.
To us, who are now familiar with these facts, it seems somewhat inconsistent for Dickens to participate in an organ of such a trend, since the writer’s novels were essentially anti-bourgeois. Comparing this with the fact that Dickens wrote about the bourgeoisie before 1846 in his novels Nicholas Nickleby, The Curiosity Shop, Martin Chuzzlewit, one cannot help but feel that Dickens, having taken on the editorship of the Daily News, found himself involved in affairs of the political kitchen, which always disgusted him. Work in the editorial office began to weigh heavily on him and, quite nervous about the difficulties of his new position, Dickens took a vacation, which actually resembled an escape. He went to Switzerland. John Forster took over the leadership of the newspaper; Dickens limited himself to advice for some time, and then completely moved away from the Daily News.
The episode with the Daily News is typical of Dickens. Although he was always interested in big social problems, he was alien to the intricacies of political struggle. Speaking on February 7, 1842 at a banquet in the United States, Dickens openly admitted: “my moral ideals are very broad and comprehensive, not falling within the framework of any sect or party...” The writer wanted to be a judge of life from the point of view of the highest ideals humanity. At the same time, his sympathies were on the side of the oppressed and disadvantaged. In the same speech, Dickens expressed his credo this way: “I believe that our lives, our sympathies, hopes and strengths are given to us to devote from them to many, and not to a select few. That it is our duty to shine a bright ray of contempt and hatred ", so that everyone can see them, any meanness, falsehood, cruelty and oppression, no matter what they are expressed in. And the main thing is that what occupies a high position is not always high, and what occupies a low position is not always low."
Dickens is a staunch supporter of popular art and literature. That is why he could not accept the aesthetically sophisticated art of the Pre-Raphaelites (see the article “Old lamps instead of new ones”), while the moralizing art of the artist Cruikshank was close to him both in its realism and democratic ideological orientation (“Children of the Drunkard” by Cruickshank). The place of the writer in public life was very clearly defined by Dickens in a speech at a banquet in honor of literature and art in Birmingham on January 6, 1853. Having devoted myself to the literary profession, I, said Dickens, “are firmly convinced that literature, in its turn, must be faithful to the people , is obliged to passionately and zealously advocate for his progress, prosperity and happiness."
The above applies equally to the artistic creativity and journalism of Dickens. In his articles and speeches he strictly followed these principles. If from our point of view the writer’s program may seem somewhat general and vague, then in Dickens’s practice the position he took always led to a struggle against very specific forms of social evil.
It is enough to read his essay “A Night Scene in London” to be convinced of the absence of any “abstractness” of Dickens’s humanism. He shows here the terrible abysses of poverty, the very bottom of London, a poverty that cannot be worse. His description is imbued with anger against social orders that allow such terrible humiliation of a person.
Dickens was humane, but he did not at all believe that evil should go unpunished. The reader will find in this book a series of articles devoted to the sensational case of the rogue Drouet, whose school in its horrors was many times greater than Squeers's institution, described in the novel "Nicholas Nickleby." The writer is outraged by the class court, which allows impunity for those who profit from the suffering of the defenseless (see the articles “Paradise in Tooting”, “Farm in Tooting”, “The verdict in the Drouet case”).
At the same time, recognizing the need for harsh measures against criminals, Dickens resolutely opposed the barbaric custom of public executions that persisted at that time, as well as against the death penalty in general (“On the Death Penalty,” “Public Executions”). Dickens's voice in these articles sounds in unison with the speeches of the great French humanist writer Victor Hugo (Claude Gue, The Last Day of a Man Condemned to Death).
Dickens also touched upon such consequences of public poverty as prostitution. However, his “Call to Fallen Women” sounds naive, because the solution to the problem was not at all in the desire or unwillingness to take the path of morality, but in the fact that the capitalist order doomed women to trade in their bodies.
Dickens ardently supported all initiatives that could help educate the people and alleviate their plight. Evidence of this are his speeches at a school evening for workers, at the opening of a public library, and in defense of a hospital for poor children. He supports professional organizations that set themselves the goal of protecting the interests of people in creative professions - a society of musicians, a theater foundation, a newspaper foundation. Dickens fought especially hard to establish international copyright (see Dickens's speech at a banquet in his honor in Hartford (USA) on February 7, 1842). Finally, as a writer, he brought a touching tribute of gratitude to the workers of printing houses and proofreaders (speeches in the society of printers and in the association of proofreaders).
The idea of ​​creating his own literary and social magazine did not leave Dickens even after he became disillusioned with newspaper work. He began publishing such a weekly magazine in 1850 under the name Household Words. In his “Address to the Readers,” Dickens formulated the goals and principles of his journal activities. The magazine was not supposed to provide direct responses to the political issues of the day. Its main function was cognitive and social-educational. But at the same time, Dickens, as always, resolutely distanced himself from utilitarian aspirations: “Neither the utilitarian spirit nor the oppression of brute facts will be allowed onto the pages of our Home Reading,” declared Dickens the publisher. And Dickens the writer declared such a magazine program that It is worth quoting, because it is important not only for understanding the direction of the magazine, but also for the entire aesthetics of Dickens's work. The value of this declaration lies in the fact that it best characterizes the most important features of Dickens's artistic method, whose realism was free from naturalistic tendencies and gravitated towards romance.
“In the breasts of people young and old, rich and poor, we will carefully cherish that spark of fantasy that necessarily glimmers in any human breast, although in some, if it is nourished, it flares up into a bright flame of inspiration, while in others it only flickers slightly, but never fades away completely - or woe to that day! To show everyone that in the most familiar things, even endowed with a repulsive shell, there is always hidden something romantic that just needs to be found; to reveal to the diligent servants of the madly spinning wheel of labor that they are not at all doomed to languish under the yoke dry and immutable facts that the consolation and charms of imagination are available to them; to gather both the highest and the lowest in this vast field and awaken in them a mutual desire to know each other better, a benevolent readiness to understand each other - this is why “Home Reading” is published - wrote Dickens. To these words of his we will add: this is why he wrote his works.
Dickens recruited writers who accepted this program to participate in the magazine. The most famous among them were Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Lever, Bulwer-Lytton and the young Wilkie Collins, who became one of Dickens's closest friends and collaborators. The magazine has won a significant number of readers among the people. Since the summer of 1859, “Home Reading” was renamed “All the Year Round”. The old employees were retained, the program remained the same: “the merging of the gifts of imagination with the true features of life, which is necessary for the prosperity of any society” (Announcement in “Home Reading” about the proposed publication of “All the Year Round”). Dickens participated in the publication of "All the Year Round" until his death.
The desire to make literature a means of spiritual unity of the people runs through all the activities of Dickens - writer and publisher. This position placed him in a very special position in the era of sharp class antagonisms that characterized that part of the 19th century when he lived and worked. The idea of ​​class peace, asserted by Dickens, was an attempt by a humanist writer to find a solution to social contradictions that would help avoid unnecessary cruelty and bloodshed. The writer appealed to the workers not to resort to extreme means of struggle. So, in particular, he wrote one article in which he condemned the railway strike. The article was published in the magazine "Home Reading" on January 11, 1851 (not included in this publication). Considering the behavior of the striking workers to be reckless, Dickens, however, in no way wanted to discredit the working class or use the strike to slander the working people, as the reactionaries did. Dickens states that "in spite of what happened, the English workmen have always been known as a people who love their country and are completely trustworthy." He protests against the demands of the embittered bourgeoisie, who insisted on the publication of laws on repression against workers. “How is it possible,” Dickens wrote, “how can one now, reasoning calmly and soberly, treat the English craftsman as a creature working under pressure, or even suspect him of needing one? "He has a noble soul and a kind heart. He belongs to a great nation, and throughout the whole earth there is a good reputation about him. And if the mistakes of any human being should be generously forgiven, we should forgive him too."
This episode is indicative of Dickens the humanist. His idea of ​​a class world was undoubtedly illusory. But Dickens’s position cannot be identified with the position of bourgeois liberals and opportunists; the Writer was driven by sincere love for working people and naively believed that his preaching of reconciliation of warring social forces could actually be realized. Dickens's position cannot be compared to the views of defenders of the bourgeoisie also because, both in his artistic works and in his journalism, he mercilessly criticized the ruling classes. A significant part of his articles is devoted to exposing the vices of those who held political power in the country in their hands. Dickens's articles against the ruling elite of England belong to remarkable examples of militant political journalism. They are distinguished not only by their courage, but also by their brilliant literary form.
With what brilliance he ridicules the system of education of the sons of aristocrats and capitalists in the parody “Report of the Commission examining the position and living conditions of persons engaged in various types of mental labor at the University of Oxford.” The writer exposes the class nature of the caste education of those who are subsequently given both political power and spiritual leadership of the people. He proposes to rename the degrees granted by the university and call the nation's certified leaders "Bachelors of Idiocy," "Masters of Fabrication," and "Doctors of Ecclesiastical Idleness."
The ruling class always surrounds its power with an aura of holiness and infallibility. For this purpose, all kinds of solemn rituals are created, designed to arouse reverence among the people for those in power. The democrat Dickens was deeply disgusted by the comedies of all kinds of ceremonies that were developed by generations of rulers. The writer ridicules the prim rituals created by the ruling clique, which seeks to place itself above the people by such means. The article "Reflections of the Lord Mayor" exposes the emptiness and hypocrisy of the decorous ceremonies adopted by the ruling classes.
In the article “Islandisms,” Dickens states, not without bitterness, that all kinds of features that are generally considered to be the national characteristics of the English are unnatural and at odds with common sense. What upsets the writer most of all is that some part of the nation has believed in such “islandisms” and grovels before the nobility, considering servility to power and wealth a national trait.
In the pamphlet-type article "Why?" Dickens attacks the admiration of the military (“Why do we rush with cries of delight around an officer who did not escape from the battlefield - as if all our other officers escaped?”), on the insignificance of bourgeois politicians (“Why should I be ready to shed tears of delight and joy that Buffy and Boodle are at the helm of power?"), at the notorious English judicial system ("I wonder why I rejoice so much when I see learned judges making every effort to prevent the defendant from telling the truth?") .
Dickens is deeply indignant when patriotic significance is attributed to something about which the people do not care, when national dignity is associated with all kinds of prejudices and unjust practices. He was an opponent of the fruitless and ruinous Crimean War for the country, in which “Britain so delightfully exercises her dominion over the seas that with every wave of her trident she kills thousands of her children, who will never, never, never be slaves, but very, very, very often remain fools" ("For Dogs to Eat").
The constant object of Dickens's satire, both in novels and in journalism, is bureaucracy, the soullessness of the state machine, this costly burden for the people. The unforgettable pages about the Ministry of Red Tape in Little Dorrit were prepared by the kind of sketches found among Dickens's articles. One of these articles is “Red Braid”. "Red Braid" is an allegory commonly used in English to denote bureaucracy. Dickens condemned the government bureaucracy not only for parasitism. He rightly saw in it the main obstacle to reforms and changes urgently needed for the people: “Neither from iron, nor from steel, nor from diamond can one make such a strong brake chain as the Red Braid creates.” This Red Band is not at all harmless. Inactive, when it is necessary to do something useful for the people, she shows extraordinary agility as soon as the opportunity arises to cause them harm.
A supplement to this article is another - "Penny Patriotism", written in the form of a clerk's story about his career and the activities of the department in which he serves. Dickens emphasizes here that all the ills of bureaucracy come not from small clerks, but from high-ranking bureaucrats. The article concludes with an unequivocal conclusion: “You cannot expect good from any highly principled reforms, the entire principle of which is directed only at junior clerks. Such transformations are generated by the most penniless and most hypocritical patriotism in the world. Our state system is set upside down, with its roots to the sky. Start with them , and then the small branches will soon come into order by themselves.”
Dickens spoke out against the roots, that is, against those who run this bureaucratic state machine, in his articles more than once. Among his anti-government pamphlets, "Mr. Bull's Sleepwalker" and "The All-British Jokebook Project" are particularly interesting. In the first of these articles, to characterize the government (cabinet of ministers), Dickens resorted to the following metaphor: “Mr. It should be forgotten that it is assembled from pieces of the most diverse origin and quality; however, I must admit that they are poorly fitted to each other and Mr. Bull’s “office” is ready to fall apart at any moment.” The collection of jokes offered by Dickens is a satirical miniature, or rather several miniatures, ridiculing the entire dominant system and the ruling class.
It is known that Dickens was opposed to the revolutionary overthrow of the social and state system that existed in his time. But he did not at all want to preserve it forever. Disagreeing with revolutionary methods, Dickens undoubtedly wanted greater and more serious changes. At the same time, he always persistently emphasized that reforms must begin from the top - with a change in the ruling system and a change in rulers, the principle of selecting these latter. He openly expressed these views in articles and expressed them especially clearly in a speech delivered at the Association for the Reform of Government of the Country (June 27, 1855). He resorted here to likening the government to a troupe performing a play under the direction of the prime minister. This was Dickens's response to Prime Minister Lord Palmerston, who called the Association's meeting at the Drury Lane Theater an "amateur performance." “The official performance, which the noble lord has condescended to direct, is so unbearably bad, its mechanism is so cumbersome, the roles are distributed so poorly, there are so many “faces without speeches” in the troupe, the directors have such large families and such a strong tendency to promote these families to the first roles - not because of their special abilities, but because these are their families - that we were simply forced to organize an opposition. The “Comedy of Errors” in their production looked so much like a tragedy that we had no strength to watch. Therefore, we took the liberty of staging " School of Reforms..."
Dickens rejects the charge that reformers want to pit one class against another, and repeats here his concept of class peace, but at the same time he warns that if the ruling elite does not understand the need for fundamental change, they themselves will invite disaster. “I think I will not be mistaken if, in conclusion, I say that the stubborn desire to keep at all costs old rubbish, which has long outlived its usefulness, is, by its very essence, more or less harmful and harmful: that sooner or later such rubbish can cause fire; that, if thrown into a landfill, it would be harmless, but if you stubbornly cling to it, then disaster will not be avoided." This idea was persistently explained by Dickens. It constituted the germ of the idea for a novel about the French Revolution - A Tale of Two Cities, where Dickens, using the example of France, warned the ruling classes of England that neglect of the needs of the people and unscrupulous exploitation of them could lead to an explosion similar to the one that occurred in 1789. (We note, by the way, that in the article “On Judges’ Speeches” there are interesting thoughts about the causes of the French Revolution, which echo what is said in the quoted speech.)
We will conclude our discussion of Dickens's political views with reference to a speech he delivered in Birmingham on September 27, 1869. In it, Dickens the reformist appeared skeptical notes. One feels that he no longer has any illusions about the possibility of achieving serious changes from the ruling elite. He expressed his thoughts with a quotation from Buckle's History of Civilization in England. Hopes for reform are nothing more than chimeras. A reasonable person should know “that almost always legislators do not help society, but retard its progress, and that in those extremely rare cases when their measures lead to good, this is explained by the fact that, contrary to usual, they listened to the spirit of the times and turned out to be merely servants of the people, as they should always have been, for their duty is only to provide public support for the wishes of the people and to clothe them in the form of laws." Declaring his complete solidarity with these words of Buckle, Dickens, in the same speech, expressed the same idea even more clearly and simply. His “political creed,” he said, “consists of two articles and does not refer to any individuals or parties. My faith in the people who govern is, in general, insignificant; my faith in the people who are governed, in general, is infinite ".
Dickens's journalism does not consist of declarations alone. Dickens used all his literary skill to express the views that he wanted to convey to the people. Although we call his journalistic works articles, they are by no means homogeneous in genre. Only a very small number of them are written in direct declarative form. Most of the articles belong to varieties of the genre that the British call “essays”. These are almost always articles written in a humorous or satirical manner. Letters from imaginary persons, parables, satirical allegories, novellas, fantasies - these are some of the forms used by Dickens in his articles. I would like to draw the readers' attention to some articles by Dickens that are not mentioned here, interesting not only for their content, but also for their form. These are “Thoughts of the Raven from the Happy Family”, “Friend of the Lions”, “The Whole Pigs”, “Please, leave the umbrella!” "Few people know", "Why?" Satirical allegory is also a frequent technique in Dickens's journalism. In addition to the articles of this type mentioned above, one cannot help but pay attention to the "essay" "Nimble Turtles", which is a small satirical masterpiece directed against the conservative bourgeoisie .
Dickens's journalistic works, published in this volume, expand and enrich our understanding of the humanistic nature of Dickens's worldview and creativity.
A. ANIKST

The hat helped the Stavropol resident win 90 thousand rubles. Photographer from Mikhailovsk Elena Yakimova defeated the experts of the “What? Where? When?” club, who were unable to correctly answer the question of our fellow countrywoman.

The riddle from a resident of the Stavropol Territory was uttered in the 10th round of the program, when the experts beat the viewers with a minimal advantage.

Considerable composure and a considerable dose of prudence are required when capturing her. You should not rush, otherwise you will overtake it. You should not go to the other extreme, otherwise you will completely lose it. The best way is to run lightly, keeping up with the object of pursuit, wait for an opportunity, quickly grab it and smile benevolently all the time, as if it amuses you no less than everyone else. Attention, question: what object of persecution did Charles Dickens write about? - the presenter announced the task.

This seemingly simple and at the same time very confusing question was asked by our fellow countrywoman to the experts.

Luck! - almost without hesitation, suggested one of the experts.

Photographer... - another doubted this, thinking that the answer should be related to the profession of a TV viewer.

Butterfly? - another team member put forward her version.

A lot of options immediately arose, experts put forward assumptions, immediately rejected many and continued to reason.

It seems to me that this is something inanimate! We weren’t told about some kind of object we are talking about,” another team member thought.

Meanwhile, one of the players listed the signs of the “object of persecution” that were heard in anticipation of the question asked.

Let’s start with a simple one: a butterfly,” the only girl on the team suggested again.

Then it’s more likely a snake,” another participant objected.

Fortune? - asked the third question.

In the stream of assumptions it was difficult to even hear everything.

Maybe this is love if we are talking about a girl?

And the muse? Badly?

Muse, I don’t understand why...

Because if a writer has a bad muse...

Then those gathered at the round table began to remember what they knew about Dickens, about the problems of his works. And again assumptions about family, muse, wealth, victory, luck began to arise. Experts were most inclined towards the latter option.

Before announcing the team's decision, the participant asked the presenter to repeat the question.

After listening to the task again, she thought about it and took a long pause.

I really want to answer that it is a butterfly, but I don’t believe in it. Let’s assume it’s luck,” the girl replied.

The gong sounded.

And now, attention, the correct answer. Alena, please tell me,” the presenter turned to the respondent, “why “smile complacently, as if it amuses you no less than everyone else”? That is, everyone around you laughs when you do this...

The hat, of course... - the representative of the team of experts answered upset, while the other player dejectedly tapped his forehead.

Dickens described the chase for the hat, the presenter confirmed.

Having won this round, Elena Yakimova received 90 thousand rubles.

BY THE WAY

Stavropol residents have repeatedly won against experts in “What? Where? When?” For example, a resident of the regional center received 30 thousand rubles back in 2009, and an electrician from Georgievsk

Charles John Huffam Dickens - English writer, novelist, essayist
February 7 marks the 205th anniversary of the writer’s birth.

Charles Dickens
(1812-1870)
“A person cannot truly improve unless he helps others improve.”

Charles Dickens was born in 1812 in Landport. His parents were John and Elizabeth Dickens. Charles was the second child of eight children in the family. His father worked at a Royal Navy naval base, but was not a worker, but an official.

Little Dickens inherited from his father a rich imagination and ease of speech, apparently adding to this some seriousness in life inherited from his mother, on whose shoulders all the everyday worries of preserving the family’s well-being fell.

The boy’s rich abilities delighted his parents, and the artistically inclined father literally tormented his son, forcing him to act out different scenes, tell his impressions, improvise, read poetry, etc. Dickens turned into a little actor, full of narcissism and vanity.

However, Dickens's family was suddenly completely ruined. The father was thrown into debtor's prison for many years, and the mother had to fight poverty. Pampered, fragile in health, full of imagination, a boy in love with himself found himself in difficult operating conditions at a blacking factory.

In his subsequent life, Dickens considered this ruin of his family and this wax of his to be the greatest insult to himself, an undeserved and humiliating blow. He did not like to talk about it, he even hid these facts, but here, from the bottom of poverty, Dickens drew his ardent love for the offended, for the needy, his understanding of their suffering, understanding of the cruelty that they meet from above, deep knowledge of the life of poverty and such horrifying social institutions, like the then schools for poor children and orphanages, like the exploitation of child labor in factories, like debtor's prisons, where he visited his father, etc.

Dickens also brought out from his adolescence a great, dark hatred of the rich, of the ruling classes. Colossal ambition possessed young Dickens. The dream of rising back into the ranks of the wealthy, the dream of outgrowing his original social place, of winning wealth, pleasure, freedom - that was what excited this teenager with a shock of brown hair over a deathly pale face, with huge eyes burning with a healthy fire.

After his father's release from prison, Charles remained in his service at the insistence of his mother. He also began attending Wellington Academy, from which he graduated in 1827. In May of the same year, Charles Dickens got a job as a junior clerk in a law firm, and a year and a half later, having thoroughly mastered shorthand, he began working as a freelance reporter. In 1830 he was invited to the Morning Chronicle.

The public immediately accepted the aspiring reporter. His notes attracted the attention of many. In 1836, the writer's first literary experiments were published - the morally descriptive "Essays of Boz". He mainly wrote about the petty bourgeoisie, its interests and state of affairs, and painted literary portraits of Londoners and psychological sketches. It must be said that Charles Dickens, whose short biography does not allow us to cover all the details of his life, began publishing his novels in newspapers in separate chapters.

"Posthumous Notes of the Pickwick Club." The novel began to be published in 1836. The novel created an incredible sensation. Dogs immediately began to be named after heroes, given nicknames, and wore hats and umbrellas like Pickwick’s.

Charles Dickens, whose biography is known to every resident of Foggy Albion, made the whole of England laugh. But this helped him to solve more serious problems. His next work was the novel The Life and Adventures of Oliver Twist. It is difficult now to imagine a person who does not know the story of the orphan Oliver from the London slums. Charles Dickens portrayed a broad social picture in his novel, addressing the issue of workhouses and contrasting the lives of the wealthy bourgeoisie.

Dickens's fame grew rapidly. Both liberals saw him as their ally, because he defended freedom, and conservatives, because he pointed out the cruelty of new social relationships.
In 1843, “A Christmas Carol” was published, which became one of the most popular and widely read stories about this magical holiday.

In 1848, the novel “Dombey and Son” was published, called the best in the writer’s work. His next work is "David Copperfield". To some extent, the novel is autobiographical. Dickens brings into the work a spirit of protest against capitalist England and the old principles of morality.
The novel “Our Mutual Friend” attracts with its versatility; in it the writer takes a break from social topics. And this is where his writing style changes. It continues to transform in the author’s subsequent works, which, unfortunately, are not finished.

In the 1850s. Dickens reached the zenith of his fame. He was the darling of fate - a famous writer, master of thoughts and a rich man - in a word, a person for whom fate did not skimp on gifts.

But Dickens's needs were broader than his income. His disorderly, purely bohemian nature did not allow him to bring any kind of order into his affairs. He not only tormented his rich and fertile brain by over-working it creatively, but being an extraordinarily brilliant reader, he endeavored to earn enormous fees by lecturing and reading excerpts from his novels. The impression from this purely acting reading was always colossal. Apparently, Dickens was one of the greatest reading virtuosos. But on his trips he fell into the hands of some entrepreneurs and, while earning a lot, at the same time time brought himself to the point of exhaustion.

His family life was difficult. Disagreements with his wife, some complex and dark relationships with her entire family, fear for sick children made Dickens from his family rather a source of constant worries and torment.

On June 9, 1870, fifty-eight-year-old Dickens, not old in years, but exhausted by colossal work, a rather chaotic life and a lot of all sorts of troubles, dies in Gadeshill from a stroke.

Do you know that

∙ Charles Dickens always slept with his head facing north. Also, when I wrote my works, I sat facing this direction.

∙ One of Charles Dickens' favorite pastimes was going to the Paris morgue, where he could spend whole days captivated by the sight of unidentified remains.

∙ From the very beginning of the relationship, Charles Dickens told Catherine Hogarth, his future wife, that her main purpose was to bear children and do what he told her. Over the years of their life together, she gave birth to ten children, and all this time she unquestioningly followed any instructions from her husband. However, over the years, he simply began to despise her.

∙ Dickens was a very superstitious person: he touched everything three times for good luck, considered Friday his lucky day, and on the day the last part of his next novel was published he would certainly leave London.

∙ Dickens assured that he sees and hears the characters in his works. They, in turn, constantly get in the way and do not want the writer to do anything other than them.

∙ Charles very often fell into a trance, which his comrades noticed more than once. He was constantly haunted by a feeling of déjà vu.

Internet resources:

Dickens Charles. All books by the same author[Electronic resource] / Charles Dickens / / RoyalLib.Com: electronic library. – Access mode: http://royallib.com/author/dikkens_charlz.html

Dickens Charles. All books by the author[Electronic resource] / Charles Dickens / / Read books online: electronic library. – Access mode: http://www.bookol.ru/author.php?author=%D0%A7%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%BB%D1%8C%D0%B7%20%D0%94 %D0%B8%D0%BA%D0%BA%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%81

Charles Dickens. Collected works[Electronic resource] / Charles Dickens // Lib.Ru: Maxim Moshkov’s library. – Access mode: http://lib.ru/INPROZ/DIKKENS/

Charles Dickens: biography[Electronic resource] // Litra.ru. – Access mode: http://www.litra.ru/biography/get/wrid/00286561224697217406/

Charles Dickens. Articles. Speeches. Letters[Electronic resource] // Librarian. Ru.: electronic library of non-fiction literature. - Access mode: http://www.bibliotekar.ru/dikkens/

Aphorisms and quotes:

Our world is a world of disappointments, and often disappointments in those hopes that we most cherish, and in hopes that do great honor to our nature.

Tears cleanse the lungs, wash the face, strengthen vision and calm the nerves - so cry well!

There are books where the best thing is the spine and cover.

Women know how to explain everything in a nutshell, unless they start to fume.

I decided that if my world cannot be yours, I will make your world mine.

There is no repentance more cruel than useless repentance.

In this world, anyone who lightens the burden of another person benefits.

What occupies a high position is not always high. And what occupies a low position is not always low.

Printing is the greatest discovery in the world of art, culture and all technical inventions.

Why was life given to us? So that we defend her bravely until our last breath.

Perseverance will reach the top of any hill.

What is braver than the truth?

The key to your prosperity is hard work.

By helping others learn and develop, we improve ourselves.

Children feel injustice more keenly and more subtly than adults.

A dead person is not as scary as a living but mindless person.

A lie is always a lie, whether you say it or hide it.

Tears are rain that washes away the earthly dust that covers our hardened hearts.

Any wonderful goal can be achieved by honest means. And if you can’t, then this goal is bad.