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3.33 AVERAGE
3.33 AVERAGE
A sweet, occasionally tragic tale of a family in a town ruled by fact and industry. I liked how Dickens wrote a sympathetic flawed herione in Louisa.
My least favorite of Charles Dickens. It was a one note, depressing book. It felt political (which most of his books are) but without humor. Mr Dickens must have been going through a bad time in his life when he wrote this one.
I've been really glad to get back into Dickens lately. I enjoyed his writing as a teenager and have loved A Christmas Carol since I was a kid, but coming back to his major works as an adult has left me even more awestruck by his talents as a wordsmith, satirist, social critic, and master of characterization. So much of this story still feels so relevant today—it's a blistering indictment of the Victorian equivalent of "facts don't care about your feelings" capitalism and the way society educates not to allow its citizens to flourish but to shrink their souls and imaginations. It's at turns hilarious and tragic and, given its brevity compared to a lot of his other novels, a far less intimidating way to get your feet wet in his collection.
Right.
I have feeling about studying Dickens. In our lecture, people who study Dickens at university level or above were kind of 'pooh-poohed' as an obvious and easy option. Obviously, it also comes with the whole 'male, straight, white, English, middle class author' thing, which, yeah, true, but if anybody's writing actually deserves to be in the canon (and there are a lot of authors who fit that definition who don't), it's Dickens. For a start, just because he was writing for entertainment doesn't make his work less worthwhile (and whoever started thinking like that needs a knock around the head, a book doesn't have to be 'literary' to be GOOD). He was writing for perhaps the first generation of English working-class where the majority were able to read and write, and he was popular, to the point where he essentially wrote his family out of debtors prison (worth noting - he only finished his career as a middle class writer, he started out sticking labels on bottles of shoe polish). He's easy to read, even over a century later, and honestly, there are so many people out there who just don't get that that's just as important as pushing the boundaries of literature or whatever. His stories are still popular too. They have lasting value. Who today hasn't seen A Christmas Carol? He's part of a rare phenomenon, where you don't actually have to have read his books to know what they're about. How many people have actually sat down with a copy of Oliver Twist? Writing about working class lives gave his stories staying power, and you can't sniff at that. Stories that last through time with the same popularity are rare, and there is always a reason for it. Honestly, we know a lot about the everyday lives of working class people during the era because of Dickens' writing. Historical importance there too! Furthermore, because he was writing before the conventions of novel writing were established, there's basically not a single cliche to be found folded into these pages. All of his descriptions are thoughtful and memorable, able to make you see the world in a new way. There's a lot of canon authors praised for their literary skill who can't do that.
Dickens is a good writer, and no amount of criticism is going to change that.
I have feeling about studying Dickens. In our lecture, people who study Dickens at university level or above were kind of 'pooh-poohed' as an obvious and easy option. Obviously, it also comes with the whole 'male, straight, white, English, middle class author' thing, which, yeah, true, but if anybody's writing actually deserves to be in the canon (and there are a lot of authors who fit that definition who don't), it's Dickens. For a start, just because he was writing for entertainment doesn't make his work less worthwhile (and whoever started thinking like that needs a knock around the head, a book doesn't have to be 'literary' to be GOOD). He was writing for perhaps the first generation of English working-class where the majority were able to read and write, and he was popular, to the point where he essentially wrote his family out of debtors prison (worth noting - he only finished his career as a middle class writer, he started out sticking labels on bottles of shoe polish). He's easy to read, even over a century later, and honestly, there are so many people out there who just don't get that that's just as important as pushing the boundaries of literature or whatever. His stories are still popular too. They have lasting value. Who today hasn't seen A Christmas Carol? He's part of a rare phenomenon, where you don't actually have to have read his books to know what they're about. How many people have actually sat down with a copy of Oliver Twist? Writing about working class lives gave his stories staying power, and you can't sniff at that. Stories that last through time with the same popularity are rare, and there is always a reason for it. Honestly, we know a lot about the everyday lives of working class people during the era because of Dickens' writing. Historical importance there too! Furthermore, because he was writing before the conventions of novel writing were established, there's basically not a single cliche to be found folded into these pages. All of his descriptions are thoughtful and memorable, able to make you see the world in a new way. There's a lot of canon authors praised for their literary skill who can't do that.
Dickens is a good writer, and no amount of criticism is going to change that.
Hard times, indeed. But with a little bit of help from the genius of great authors, we manage.
My year in books closes very appropriately, with a masterpiece from Charles Dickens.
My year in books closes very appropriately, with a masterpiece from Charles Dickens.
This is only my second Dickens read, *gulp*, and it really wasn't the best one for a novice to read, but I got there. After gorging on fantasy recently, I've been craving the classics and so I pulled this one off my parents' shelf two weekends ago. It was a pretty savage critique of the extreme capitalist society that the Industrial Revolution gave birth to in England, along with all its attendant social, economic and environmental disasters. So savage that it bordered on satire for most of the time and I had to keep distancing myself from the story to wonder whether there really were people like Gradgrind and Bounderby out there. But then, I remembered my time working in parliament amongst a plethora of preening politicians, and yes, these personalities are still kicking around, to our pity and shame.
Although the writing was evocative, the story was a bit thin and seemed more like a vehicle for Dickens's heartfelt critique than a living, breathing entity in its own right. The main characters were either caricatural extremes or forgettable stand-ins for whatever virtues were required of the narrative. Stephen Blackpool, the true victim of the system, was the only one who actually seemed real, although Mrs Sparsit was also good value entertainment as a symbol of the dying aristocracy.
I'll read more Dickens, of course, but pick a more character and plot-driven book next time.
Although the writing was evocative, the story was a bit thin and seemed more like a vehicle for Dickens's heartfelt critique than a living, breathing entity in its own right. The main characters were either caricatural extremes or forgettable stand-ins for whatever virtues were required of the narrative. Stephen Blackpool, the true victim of the system, was the only one who actually seemed real, although Mrs Sparsit was also good value entertainment as a symbol of the dying aristocracy.
I'll read more Dickens, of course, but pick a more character and plot-driven book next time.
challenging
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Great read, and quite relevant I think to today's working class and the silly "I made this" crowd.
My first Dickens novel! (Sad, I know.) The story itself was a little underwhelming, but I enjoyed the character development and was pleasantly surprised at how good a writer Dickens is. This might be my first, but it will definitely not be my last!