One of Dickens''s best-loved and most personal novels, David Copperfield is the embodiment of Dickens''s own boyhood experience recalling his employment as a child in a London warehouse. This edition, which has the accurate Clarendon text, includes Dickens''s trial titles and working notes, and eight original illustrations by "Phiz."
In his shorter fiction, Dickens felt free to investigate themes and experiment with narrative techniques in ways denied him by the constraints of novel-writing. In this selection, a literary master is brilliantly indulging the very essence of his art. His exuberant sense of comedy is allowed free rein and his exploration of the secret workings of the human psyche often surpasses anything in his longer work. Divided into three sections - Tales of the Supernatural, Impressionistic Sketches and Dramatic Monologues - this volume reveals Dickens's recurring concerns and places them clearly in the context of related elements in his novels.
Coketown is dominated by the figure of Mr Thomas Gradgrind, school headmaster and model of Utilitarian success. Feeding both his pupils and family with facts, he bans fancy and wonder from any young minds. As a consequence his obedient daughter Louisa marries the loveless businessman and 'bully of humanity' Mr Bounderby, and his son Tom rebels to become embroiled in gambling and robbery. And, as their fortunes cross with those of free-spirited circus girl Sissy Jupe and victimized weaver Stephen Blackpool, Gradgrind is eventually forced to recognize the value of the human heart in an age of materialism and machinery.
