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So very long. I'm sorry--this was bout an old curiosity shop? And it started with a first-person narrator and then suddenly got handed off to a third-person narrator? And why, exactly, was I to care very much about Nell or her grandfather?
I didn't hate this, and it served to pass the time (six weeks!), but really I don't think I would have stuck with it if I didn't want to read everything Dickens had written.
I didn't hate this, and it served to pass the time (six weeks!), but really I don't think I would have stuck with it if I didn't want to read everything Dickens had written.
The plot of this book was not as cohesive as some of the other Dickens novels I have read. The characters and events seem relatively loosely connected, and the ending was pretty tragic. Not sure I would really recommend it, but it was ok.
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Just took me seven years to read! haha - I like Dickens in film form, but his writing leaves something to be desired, in my way of thinking. Detailed descriptions go on for pages and I wonder why I should even care about most of the characters. Yes, they play into the story, but at least in this book there was little exciting or interesting about the story in the way it was laid out. But I didn't want to leave it unfinished! However, sometimes it was fun to read aloud with a British accent.
The plot is a little thin, but the characters are all so delightful that it hardly matters.
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I promised myself that I would read at least 50 pages before giving up. I made it to 51, which covers the first six chapters. The first three are almost unreadable. They are narrated by a character who is intrigued by what he sees but refuses to ask any pertinent questions and is the kind of infuriating old timey character who can tell who is good and can be trusted and who is bad and will never be redeemed simply by glancing at their face. In these chapters, it is wall-to-wall waffle with almost no discernible plot. Then Dickens gets tired of this and decides to write the rest of the book in third person. I realise this change came about because the work was originally serialised, but couldn't he have rewritten it for when it was published in novel form? So the story greatly improves when it moves into third person; there's much less waffle and events and characters seem to wake up a little bit. However, we spend these three chapters in the company of Mr Quilp who is so ridiculously grotesque and evil that I really couldn't bear to read more about him. I hoped perhaps the book might end with Mrs Quilp murdering everyone. So, loath to continue with a 600-page story that started off as boring and then headed into unpleasant if I had no idea if my efforts would be rewarded, I took a quick peruse of Wikipedia. Turns out that the plot and characters seem to continue to suffer from 'Dickens changes his mind as he goes along serialisation' and damn, does it not have a satisfactory ending, so, um, pass.
Amazing
A fantastic tale. The title is quite misgiving. It's a great tale of Quilp, the venomous dwarf, whose devious intentions create for a great yarn, and even better villain. Dickens is at his humorous and poetic best.
A fantastic tale. The title is quite misgiving. It's a great tale of Quilp, the venomous dwarf, whose devious intentions create for a great yarn, and even better villain. Dickens is at his humorous and poetic best.
I like Dickens very much. I think I need to ruminate on this one more. I know there is a point he's making in there that I'm just not seeing yet. Perhaps about Little Nell being a victim of all the short-sighted fools around her.
“The Old Curiosity Shop” is one of those books people tend to to know just one thing about - namely that Little Nell dies. I find it remarkable just how many of those books Dickens has managed to write - that is, books with plots or characters that people are aware of without maybe even knowing the title of the book. That was a very convoluted sentence. What I mean is that after now having read all of Dickens’ completed novels I find it striking how many things I was aware of before reading the books. Not sure that was less convoluted, but oh well.
In any case, while Little Nell and her death is what is generally known about this book, it wasn’t exactly my favorite thing. Over the course of the last 15 months, I’ve come to realize I prefer Dickens when he’s funny and angry rather than when he is writing about self-sacrificing, unselfishly good women. To be honest, during the Nell parts of the book I was rolling my eyes more often than not, and her death didn’t move me as much as deaths in other of Dickens’ books. There’s another plot thread though, about Nell’s childhood friend Kit and his adventures, and I rather enjoyed that. It’s obvious that at this point Dickens wasn’t as good at threading different plots together yet, and so it sometimes feels a little clunky while reading.
I didn’t expect this to become a favorite, and it didn’t, although Kit and Dick Swiveller have been added to the list of my favorite characters (which is not an actual thing I have, but I did like them a lot). Speaking of lists - here’s the thing people actually have been asking me about, a list of Dickens’ novels in order of my preference:
1. Bleak House
2. David Copperfield
3. Great Expectations
4. Dombey and Son
5. Our Mutual Friend
6. A Tale of Two Cities
7. The Pickwick Papers
8. Nicholas Nickleby
9. Little Dorrit
10. Barnaby Rudge
11. The Old Curiosity Shop
12. Martin Chuzzlewit
13. Hard Times
14. Oliver Twist
A few notes about that: while I feel comfortable about my top three and the very bottom of the list, everything in between was very difficult to rank for me. Also, this is very much *my* preference, and I am not only judging on literary quality but also on sheer enjoyment. “David Copperfield” will probably always remain my favorite of the heart, but “Bleak House” is truly the culmination of all that Dickens can do. At the same time, because reading is complicated, I’m not sure that I’d say if you only read one Dickens, read “Bleak House”. It very much depends on what you’re in the mood for and how much patience you have.
One thing I don’t feel conflicted about is ranking “Oliver Twist” last - I did not enjoy it at all. I can appreciate the impact it had and its message but as a book it did not work for me.
I have now read 9.914 pages of Dickens - I still have “Drood” waiting for me, so at the end I will have read 10.000 pages of Dickens. You know, this was one of those weird obsessive projects I sometimes start, but I have no regrets.
In any case, while Little Nell and her death is what is generally known about this book, it wasn’t exactly my favorite thing. Over the course of the last 15 months, I’ve come to realize I prefer Dickens when he’s funny and angry rather than when he is writing about self-sacrificing, unselfishly good women. To be honest, during the Nell parts of the book I was rolling my eyes more often than not, and her death didn’t move me as much as deaths in other of Dickens’ books. There’s another plot thread though, about Nell’s childhood friend Kit and his adventures, and I rather enjoyed that. It’s obvious that at this point Dickens wasn’t as good at threading different plots together yet, and so it sometimes feels a little clunky while reading.
I didn’t expect this to become a favorite, and it didn’t, although Kit and Dick Swiveller have been added to the list of my favorite characters (which is not an actual thing I have, but I did like them a lot). Speaking of lists - here’s the thing people actually have been asking me about, a list of Dickens’ novels in order of my preference:
1. Bleak House
2. David Copperfield
3. Great Expectations
4. Dombey and Son
5. Our Mutual Friend
6. A Tale of Two Cities
7. The Pickwick Papers
8. Nicholas Nickleby
9. Little Dorrit
10. Barnaby Rudge
11. The Old Curiosity Shop
12. Martin Chuzzlewit
13. Hard Times
14. Oliver Twist
A few notes about that: while I feel comfortable about my top three and the very bottom of the list, everything in between was very difficult to rank for me. Also, this is very much *my* preference, and I am not only judging on literary quality but also on sheer enjoyment. “David Copperfield” will probably always remain my favorite of the heart, but “Bleak House” is truly the culmination of all that Dickens can do. At the same time, because reading is complicated, I’m not sure that I’d say if you only read one Dickens, read “Bleak House”. It very much depends on what you’re in the mood for and how much patience you have.
One thing I don’t feel conflicted about is ranking “Oliver Twist” last - I did not enjoy it at all. I can appreciate the impact it had and its message but as a book it did not work for me.
I have now read 9.914 pages of Dickens - I still have “Drood” waiting for me, so at the end I will have read 10.000 pages of Dickens. You know, this was one of those weird obsessive projects I sometimes start, but I have no regrets.
This novel from 1840-41 is a mix of social commentary and twisting narrative, populated by unforgettable classic Dickensian characters. At its heart is the journey by Little Nell and her grandfather north out of London through the Black Country, filled with colourful, vivid sketches of early 19th-century life such as the dehumanising effects of industrialisation. It also presents an engaging cast of heroes and villains back in London, from Kit Nubbles and Dick Swiveller to crooked lawyers Sally and Samson Brass and the evil Daniel Quilp. Its indictment of the treatment and lot of children in Victorian England is almost on a par with Oliver Twist, making it both an angry and sentimental story, enhanced in the Penguin Classics edition by plenty of illustrations from the original serialisation.