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milesjmoran 's review for:
The Pickwick Papers
by Charles Dickens
My twelfth Dickens novel, The Pickwick Papers is like reading an 800+ page Jeeves and Wooster novel - as much as I love Jeeves, as much as I love Wodehouse, and as much as I obviously love Charles Dickens, it did get a little tiresome at times. Dickens notoriously rambles and pontificates but I've never minded it before and this was the first time I desperately wanted to trim portions of it away. There's a lot about Pickwick that I adored and thoroughly enjoyed: it's radiant with charm, twinkling with humour, and a majority of the characters lovable and vividly drawn. It was fascinating to see how Dickens started, to see the aspects of his writing and storytelling that he later honed and perfected, the themes that he continued to explore in his career and those that fell by the wayside. Even though the book is mostly lighthearted and jocose like its titular character, it does have its darker tones and sharp angles, particularly in the scenes set in Fleet prison. I read that sales for Pickwick drastically increased with the addition of Sam Weller, and I can definitely see why. He was easily my favourite character in the book, though I also loved Mr Winkle and Mr Pickwick himself.
Out of Dickens's 14 complete novels, I would say that, so far, The Pickwick Papers is my least favourite. The pacing wasn't quite there and it wasn't as engaging as his other works but that isn't to say that I didn't like it - in fact, I loved a lot of it, but it is, for me, his most flawed work.
Out of Dickens's 14 complete novels, I would say that, so far, The Pickwick Papers is my least favourite. The pacing wasn't quite there and it wasn't as engaging as his other works but that isn't to say that I didn't like it - in fact, I loved a lot of it, but it is, for me, his most flawed work.