Charles Dickens: Life, Novels, and Critique of Victorian Society and Education, Dispense di Inglese

Scarica Charles Dickens: Life, Novels, and Critique of Victorian Society and Education e più Dispense in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! Charles Dickens (1812 – 70) When he was 12, his father was imprisoned for debt, so he was sent to work in a factory, an experience which influenced his works. Later, he went back to school and then began his career first as a parliamentary reporter and then as a journalist. Between 1837 and 1857 he published 14 novels, all in installments. His early novels are of different kinds: adventure stories (Oliver Twist), historical novels (Barnaby Rudge), sentimental novels and autobiographical novels (David Copperfield). His late novels become more critical of Victorian society (Great Expectations, Bleak House, hard times, Little Dorrit). He also wrote short stories, such as A Christmas Carol. • Setting: most of his novels are set in London. He knew well the social scene of London, and was critical against the impact of industrialism to society (corruption, public abuses, crimes). He described the urban slums using Gothic colours, and emphasized their cruelty. • Characters: he created caricatures (stereotypes), mainly of the middle and lower classes. He was on the side of the poor, the outcast (differently from the XVIIIth cent. Novel: he didn’t decsribe the world of the upper-middle class but that of the working class). • Didactic Aim: children were very often the moral teachers of the adults. They were good, despite the difficult circumstances in which they lived. With his novels Dickens made the wealthier classes aware of the condition of the working classes. • Text on page 241-242: • Briefly summarize what happens in the passage. • How does Dickens criticize Victorian education? • Explain the choice of the names “Coketown” and “Gradgrind”. • Dickens uses some metaphors to describe the students (line 14) and to describe Mr Gradgrind (lines 16-20). Explain them. • Why doesn’t Gradgrind like nicknames? How does she call the girl? • Why does Gradgrind like Bitzer’s answer? • Find examples of irony in the text. Oliver Twist (1837) • It is set in London • Three different social levels are explored: 1. The world of the workhouse: lower-middle classes, insensible to the feelings of the poor. 2. The criminal world: Dickens shows how poverty drives many people to crime and violence. 3. Victorian middle-class: respectable pople who believe in moral values. • Dickens criticized the social evils of his times, he described the appalling living conditions in workhouses. They were run by parishes to relieve the suffering of the poor, but the whole social system didn’t really allow the poors to change their situation and climb up the social ladder. • Dickens also described the terrible situation of poor children and orphans living in workhouses. • The innocence of childhood is a critique to the oppressions and corruption of the adult world.