Charles Dickens

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Samantha PinterProfessor Owens

English 110215 July 2010

Dickens’ Choice of Characters

Within Dickens writings heroism isdrawn from among the

"middle class", often youngchildren and the poor, thefew of wealth and rank are

pictured harsh,unsympathetic, with much

sarcasm.

Child Laborer 1800’sDickens himself worked in a factory as a young child, using this experiences in many of his child characters.

Well Known Child

CharactersDavid Copperfield Tiny Tim Oliver Twist

Oliver TwistOliver Twist

•Young boy who grows up at the workhouse.

•Adopted by a gang of criminals to become a pick pocket thief.

•Oliver runs away because he does not wish to seal.

•Dickens portrays Oliver in an innocent light who is constantly being disappointed by the world.

Tiny TimThe Christmas Carol •Son of Bob Chatchit

•Father works for very little as a clerk for a rich banker.

•Crippled helpless child, his family has little money and can’t pay for medication.

•Tiny Tim inspires the rich banker Scrooge in turning his life around.

David CopperfieldDavid Copperfield

•Narrator of the novel, talks about his life growing up.•A naive but loving child who looses his mother.•Is abused as a child•Sent away for defending himself while being beaten.

…The Poor…• Dickens creates characters who are poor in a heroic

roles.

• The blacksmith• The baker• Fishermen• Corn Merchant

• These often are more rich in happiness then the wealthy.

Dickens Well Known Villains

…Wealth &Authority

AristocratsDickens depicted wealthy / authority figures as• heartless • selfish • Cruel• Villains

Full Deck of Wealth!

Ebenezer Scrooge

The Christmas Carol

•Rich banker who has no remorse for those less fortunate.

•Scrooge regarding the poor that would rather die then work in the workhouses ,

“If they'd rather die, then they had better do it and decrease the surplus population.”

Mr. BumbleOliver Twist

• Selfish Churchman at workhouse where Oliver works.

• Tells the children…“Cry your hardest now, it opens the lungs, washes the countenance, exercises the eyes and softens down the temper. So cry away. ”

Miss. Havisham

Great Expectations

•Wealthy spinster

•Adopts a young girl in order to mold her to break men’s heart.Pip eventually is the victim of her intent.

Mrs. MannOliver Twist

•Manager of Oliver's workhouse.

•Beats the children and starves them.

FaginOliver Twist

• Adopts children to become his thief's.• Oliver runs away.• Fagin later fills

one of Olvers only friends Nancy.

Dickens felt a true attachment to his characters.His writings always involved the average man which many can relate to.

 "Dickens wrote about greed and debts -- over and over," Timberg

says. "He himself was deeply scarred by his father's

fecklessness. And then he became a very rich man. And

boy, are we in the middle of that now. He wrote about rags to riches, but also about rags to

riches to rags."

Works Cited• Walsh, John. “Dickens of a Time.” The Independent 22, Dec. 2008: 2. Print• Yardley, Jonathan. “The Little People.” Washington Post 31, Jan. 2006:

C01 Print.• Timberg, Scott. "Boom and Gloom, Again; Dickens' stories of greed and

poverty speak to the 21st century's economic woes." Los Angeles Times 11, Apr. 2009: D.1 Print

• Powers, Kathrine A. "Easy Listening for Hard Times." The Washington

Post 17, Aug. 2008: T11 Print • Broadberry, Stephen. “A Unified Approach to the International

Comparison of Living Standards.” Journal of Economic History 70.2 (2010): 400-427. Print