Charles Dickens: Social Criticism & Autobiographical Elements in Novels, Dispense di Inglese

Scarica Charles Dickens: Social Criticism & Autobiographical Elements in Novels e più Dispense in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! Charles Dickens The most important features of Dickens’s fiction are: > episodic writing style. He published his novels in monthly and weekly instalments in journals. As a consequence, he was influenced by the audience reception of his chapters and its expectations, so his works were always partly in progress as he made changes to the original plots; > social criticism. He denounced child exploitation and ill-treatment, terrible conditions of industrial workers and prisoners, poverty, the system of law, capitalism and market speculation, greed for money and hypocrisy. However, he never really questioned the basic values of his time. He believed that hard work, family life, and Christianity constituted the basis for a happy and moral life; Dickens used the novel as a means to expose the evils of contemporary society: the poverty of the lower classes and the inadequacy of systems and laws to relieve them. In his criticism of the Victorian society he never shows a logical and steady vision of the social and political questions, he is mainly moved by his personal experience and his sympathy for the weak and poor. His task was never to induce revolution, or even encourage discontent, but to get the common intelligence to alleviate the sufferings of the poor. He opposes his humanitarian principles and an easy optimism to the social injustices. The majority of his novels ends with a warm appeal to goodness and generosity. > autobiographical elements. Many of Dickens’s novels incorporate events of his life such as his unhappy childhood experiences (David Copperfield and Oliver Twist), the law’s delay (Bleak House), prison life (Little Dorrit). He even based some memorable characters on the members of his family, including himself, and on other people he had met during his life; > characterization. He portrays a vivid picture of Victorian England. His characters are mainly from the lower and middle class and their physical features, clothes, gestures, accents by Dickens. He was a master in the portrayal of characters. He used physical description or even names to indicate the characters’ moral and spiritual virtues or vices. He also associated his characters to their surroundings, to the way they speak and act. However, althoug he drew his characters from reality, they are more literary ‘figures’ because of their exaggerated, humorous and caricaturist descriptions and lack of psychological insight. As a consequence Dickens’s characters can be often divided into good and evil; description of environment. The setting is always described in detail as it must incorporate the characters and convey the author’s assumptions. In his novels Dickens described several settings: the countryside, provincial towns, industrial settlements and, above all, London; > style. Dickens put together fantasy and reality, humour and sentimentalism, comic and tragic elements. This is reflected in his style, made up of a colourful choice of adjectives, often used in pairs, repetition of words and sentence structures, juxtaposition of contrasting images and ideas, ironic and hyperbolic remarks. description of environment. The setting is always described in detail as it must incorporate the characters and convey the author’s assumptions. In his novels Dickens described several settings: the countryside, provincial towns, industrial settlements and, above all, London; > style. Dickens put together fantasy and reality, humour and sentimentalism,