Dickens’s social criticism

1. The Industrial Revolution and… Dickens’ssocial criticism

2. The Industrial Revolution:a period of big changes 1760 - 1890 • BEFORE • Britain was a rural country • Most people lived and worked in farms • Towns were small LATER Richer farmers took over the smaller ones Small farmers lost their job and moved to town Factories became bigger Many towns grew rapidly

3. The Industrial Revolution had its roots in the slow but continuous pace of improvements and innovations of the previous periods: • the exploitation of the New World and the creation of an overseas empire whichprovidedrawmaterials and absorbedmanufacturedproducts • the availability of capital; • the development of trade and commerce; • the growth in population; • the improvedconditions in transport and communication (railways, roads and canals); • scientific progress causedgreatchanges in industry: the invention of new machineryimproved the workingtechniques.

4. Immigration to the new industrial districts brought many evils in factories and houses: Overpopulation and lack of elementary principles of sanitation. Men, women, and children worked to the limits of physical endurance and for starvation wages.

5. Working and living conditions In the factories workers worked 13 hours a day for little money. 2/3 of them were children. Whole families were crowded in single rooms where lack of hygiene led to cholera and other health diseases.

6. The Victorian age (1837-1901) • Victoria wasthe niece of King William IV. • Shebecame Queen whenshewasonly 18 butshewas to reign for 64 years. • Shefound a country in difficultcircumstancesowing to: • a slump in industry; • a period of badcrops. Allthisled to a period of miserycalled"the hungryforties".

7. The Victorian age was marked by a number of social achievements such as:

8. An important Victorian novelist • NAME: Charles Dickens • BORN:1812,near Portsmouth • EDUCATION:at William Giles’s School, Chatham. He attended Wellington House Academy in London between 1824 and 1827. • JOB: he worked as a clerk in a lawyer’s office, as a journalist, as a parliamentary reporter. • IMPORTANT EVENTS: at the age of 12, his father was sent to jail for debts. D. was forced to work in a factory.

9. D’s most famous novels • Pickwick Papers: a series of anecdotal stories regarding the members of a London club and their comic encounters. • Oliver Twist: the story of a boy who lives in an orphanage and then moves to a workhouse where he experiences brutality. • A Christmas Carol. This morality tale tells the story of Mr. Scrooge, a man who undergoes an experience of redemption during the night of Christmas Eve.

10. Other novels David Copperfield: his most autobiographical novel, about the life of a boy from childhood to maturity. Hard Times: set in the fictitious industrial town of Coketown. Bleak houses: against the abuses and the procrastinations of the law. Great Expectations: about Pip, an orphan brought up by his half-sister and her father.

11. D’s most important features Social criticism In hisworks D. denoucedchildexploitation and ill-treatment, terribleconditions of industrial workers and prisoners, poverty, the system of law, hypocrisy and greed for money. Autobiographicalelements Manynovels incorporate elements of his life suchasunhappychildhoodexperiences, prison life. He evenbased some memorablecharacters on the members of his family.

12. Characterization He was a master in the portrayal of characters. He usedphysicaldescription or evennames to indicate the characters’moralor spiritual values or vices. However, hischaracters are more literary"figures" because of theirexageratedhumorous and caricaturistdescriptions and lack of psychologicalinsight. Description of environment The setting of Dickens’snovelsisalwaysdescribed in detailasit must incorporate the characters and convey the author’sassumptions. In hisnovels Dickens describedseveralsettings: the contryside, provincialtowns, industrial settlements and aboveallLondon.

13. Style Dickens put together fantasy and reality, humour and sentimentalism, comic and tragicelements. Thisisreflected in his style, made up of a colourful and carefulchoice of adjectives, repetition of words, contrasting images, ideas and ironicremarks.