Scarica Essay about Charles Dickens e più Sintesi del corso in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! Despite its blunt contrasts and its turmoils, the Victorian Age was particularly brilliant as far as literary production is concerned. One of the most brilliant authors of this period was Charles Dickens. Born in 1812, he started working at a very young age because his father had been sent to prison. His rocky childhood, along with other tragic life events, made him very sensitive to themes such as child labour, poverty, education, which he developed in a completely innovative manner in his works. Dickens first approached the world of writing thanks to the job as an office boy he got when he was 15. He soon started writing articles and sketching for newspapers under the name “Boz”. His literary success came in 1836 with his first novel, “The Pickwick Papers”, and since then he published a total of 15 novels. These novels were often divided into chapters which were published - in monthly or weekly installments - in newspapers. His other works include “David Copperfield”, “A Christmas Carol” and “Oliver Twist”, which were and still are very popular. Dickens never stopped writing, in fact his last novel dates back to 1870, the year he died because of a stroke. Dickens’ novels were widely appreciated, and they represented a great innovation in the literary panorama of his time. First of all, he introduced realism in the description of every side of society: he wrote about people from all walks of life and he was unafraid to show the way things really were, and even to show disapproval of things he felt were wrong (such as the educations method used in Victorian Schools). He also knew how to play with people’s emotions: in a single chapter of one of his novels one can laugh at the goofy descriptions he gives of some characters, which almost resemble caricatures, and then weep at some truly tragic events he often writes about. Dickens’ novels have been of great inspiration to the authors who followed him, and even though some of them criticized his works for lacking depth, he had a huge impact not just on the literary language, but also on our everyday language, introducing words such as “boredom” or slang expressions like “butter-fingers”. His works also proved being very versatile, as some of them were transformed into plays. That was made possible by the meticulous descriptions Dickens gives of characters and places involved in his stories. Personally, when I first started studying Charles Dickens’ works years ago I thought they were not to my taste, as I found them boring and sad. Much to my surprise, looking at them now from a different perspective I think I enjoy them: I especially like the realistic elements he introduces and the grotesque descriptions. Plus, his novels are very fun to play on stage!
