More From Contributor

This vivid historical & political novel by Dickens is centred on the infamous ' No Popery' riots, instigated by Lord George Gordon, which terrorised London in 1780. Dickens targets are prejudice, intolerance, religious bigotry & nationalistic fervour, together with the villains who exploit these for selfish ends. HIs intense account of the riots is interwoven with the mysterious tale of a long-unsolved murder & with a romance involving forbidden love, treachery & heroism. Barnaby Rudge abounds in memorably strange, comic & grotesque characters. Furthermore, recent historical events have renewed its political topicality. ...

Archived Product

Dickens wrote of David Copperfield: ' Of all my books I like this the best'. Millions of readers in almost every language on earth have subsequently come to share the author's own enthusiasm for this greatly loved classic, possibly because of its autobiographical form. Following the life of David through many sufferings & great adversity, the reader will also find many light-hearted moments in the company of a host of English fiction's greatest stars including Mr Micawber, Traddles, Uriah Heep, Creakle, Betsy Trotwood, & the Peggotty family. Few readers, arriving at the end of David Copperfield, will not wish to echo Thackeray's famous praise, having read the first monthly part
- ' Bravo Dickens'.
...

Archived Product

Mr Dombey is a man obsessed with his firm. His son is groomed from birth to take his place within it, despite his visionary eccentricity & declining health. But Dombey also has a daughter, whose unfailing love for her father goes unreturned. ' Girls, ' said Mr Dombey, 'have nothing to do with Dombey & Son.' When Walter Gay, a young clerk in her father's office, rescues her from a bewildering experience in the streets of London, his unforgettable friends believe he is well on his way to receiving her hand in marriage & inheriting the company. It is to be a very different type of story. Dombey & Son moved grown men to tears (Thackeray despaired of 'writing against such power as this'), but its rich, comic characters & their joyful explosions of language draw laughter with equally unerring magic. ...

Archived Product

Unusually for Dickens, Hard Times is set, not in London, but in the imaginary mid-Victorian Northern industrial town of Coketown with its blackened factories, downtrodden workers & polluted environment. This is the soulless domain of the strict utilitarian Thomas Gradgrind & the heartless factory owner Josiah Bounderby. However, human joy is not excluded thanks to ' Mr Sleary's Horse-Riding' circus, a gin-soaked & hilarious troupe of open-hearted & affectionate people who act as an antidote to all the drudgery & misery endured by the ordinary citizens of Coketown. Macaulay attacked Hard Times for its 'sullen socialism', but 20th century critic such as George Bernard Shaw & F.R. Leavis have praised this book in the highest terms, while readers the world over have found inspiration & enjoyment from what is both Dickens' shortest completed novel & also one of his important statements on Victorian society. ...

Archived Product

Little Dorritt is a classic tale of imprisonment, both literal & metaphorical, while Dickens' working title for the novel, Nobody's Fault, highlights its concern with personal responsibility in private & public life. Dickens' childhood experiences inform the vivid scenes in Marshalsea debtor's prison, while his adult perceptions of governmental failures shape his satirical picture of the Circumlocution Office. The novel's range of characters
- the honest, the crooked, the selfish & the self-denying
- offers a portrait of a society about whose values Dickens had profound doubts. Little Dorrit is indisputably one of Dickens' finest works, written at the height of his powers. George Bernard Shaw called it 'a masterpiece among masterpieces', a verdict shared by the novel's many admirers.

...

Archived Product

Following the success of Pickwick Papers & Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby was hailed as a comic triumph & firmly established Dickens as a 'literary gentleman'. It has a full supporting cast of delectable characters that range from the iniquitous Wackford Squeers & his family, to he delightful Mrs Nickleby, taking in the eccentric Crummles & his travelling players, the Mantalinis, the Kenwigs & many more. Combining these with typically Dickensian elements of burlesque & farce, the novel is eminently suited to dramatic adaptation. So great was its impact as it left Dickens' pen that many pirated versions appeared in print & on stage before the original was even finished. ...

Archived Product

Dickens had already achieved renown with the Pickwick Papers. With Oliver Twist his reputation was enhanced & strengthened. The novel contains many classic Dickensian themes
- grinding poverty, desperation, fear, temptation & the eventual triumph of good into he face of great adversity. Oliver Twist features some of the author's most enduring characters, such as Oliver himself (who dares to ask for more), the tyrannical Bumble, the diabolical Fagin, the menacing Bill Sykes, Nancy & 'the Artful Dodger'. For any reader wishing to delve into he works of the great Victorian literary colossus, Oliver Twist is, without, an essential title.
...

Archived Product

Our Mutual Friend, Dickens' last novel, gives one of his most comprehensive & penetrating accounts of Victorian society. Its vision of a culture stifled by materialistic values emerges not just through its central narratives, but through its apparently incidental characters & scenes. The chief of its several plots centres on John Harmon who returns to England as his father's heir. He is believed drowned under suspicious circumstances
- a situation convenient to his wish for anonymity until he can evaluate Bella Wilfer whom he must marry to secure his inheritance. The story is filled with colourful characters & incidents
- the faded aristocrats & parvenus gathered at the Veneering's dinner table, Betty Higden & her terror of the workhouse & the greedy plottings of Silas Wegg.

...

Archived Product

The Old Curiosity Shop (1840-1841), with its combination of the sentimental, the grotesque & the socially concerned, & its story of pursuit & courage, which sets the downtrodden & the plucky against the malevolent & the villainous, was an immediate popular success. Little Nell quickly became one of Dickens' most celebrated characters, who so captured the imagination of his readers that while the novel was being serialised, many of them wrote to home about her fate. Dickens was conscious of the 'many friends' the novel had won for him, & 'the many hearts it turned to me when they were full of private sorrow', & it remains one of the most familiar & well-loved of his works. ...

Archived Product

Dickens's final novel, left unfinished at his death, is a tale of mystery who fast-paced action takes place in an ancient cathedral city & in some of the darkest places in nineteenth-century London. Drugs, sexual obsession, colonial adventuring & puzzles about identity are among the novel's themes. At the centre of the plot lie the baffling disappearance of Edwin Drood & the many explanations of his whereabouts. A sombre & menacing atmosphere, a fascinating, range of characters & Dickens's usual superb command of language combine to make this an exciting & tantalising story. Also included in this volume are a number of unjustly neglected stories & sketches, with subjects as different as murder & guilt & childhood romance. This unusual selection illustrates Dickens's immense creativity & versatility. ...

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Martin Chuzzlewit By Charles Dickens

Martin Chuzzlewit is Charles Dickens' comic masterpiece about which his biographer, Forster, noted that it marked a crucial phase in the author's development as he began to delve deeper into the 'springs of character'. Old Martin Chuzzlewit, tormented by the greed and selfishness of his family, effectively drives his grandson, young Martin, but also for his grandfather and his grandfather's servant, Mary Graham, with whom young Martin is in love. The commercial swindle of the Anglo-Bengalee Company and the fraudulent Eden Land Corporation have a topicality in our own time. This strong sub-plot shows evidence of Dickens's mastery of crime where characters such as the criminal Jonas Chuzzlewit, the old nurse Mrs Gamp, and the arch-hypocrite Seth Pecksniff are the equal to any in
his other great novels. Generations of readers have also delighted in Dickens' wonderful description of the London boarding - house - 'Todgers'.

Availability: Out Of Stock
Supplier: The Works
SKU: 9781853262050

Description Reviews / Comments Add New

Product Description

Martin Chuzzlewit is Charles Dickens' comic masterpiece about which his biographer, Forster, noted that it marked a crucial phase in the author's development as he began to delve deeper into the 'springs of character'. Old Martin Chuzzlewit, tormented by the greed & selfishness of his family, effectively drives his grandson, young Martin, but also for his grandfather & his grandfather's servant, Mary Graham, with whom young Martin is in love. The commercial swindle of the Anglo-Bengalee Company & the fraudulent Eden Land Corporation have a topicality in our own time. This strong sub-plot shows evidence of Dickens's mastery of crime where characters such as the criminal Jonas Chuzzlewit, the old nurse Mrs Gamp, & the arch-hypocrite Seth Pecksniff are the equal to any in his other great novels. Generations of readers have also delighted in Dickens' wonderful description of the London boarding
- house
- ' Todgers'.

Reviews/Comments

Add New

Intelligent Comparison

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Barnaby Rudge By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Oliver Twist By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Hard Times By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Little Dorritt By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics David Copperfield By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Our Mutual Friend By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics The Curiosity Shop By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Archived Product

Wordsworth Classics Dombey And Son By Charles Dickens The Works

£1.99

Supplier Information

The Works

With over 300 UK stores and more than 40000 different products in store each year, The Works is Britain's top discount book store. A well known presence on the high street, The Works was founded in 1981 to bring affordable books to the public. It now offers a large range of exciting products, including arts and crafts products, toys, gifts and seasonal products, all at discounted prices, making it a superb place to find items for hobbies and gifts for all ages. The book selection includes children's books, fiction and non-fiction books on a wide range of subjects from food and drink and craft and DIY to entertainment, autobiographies and history. Art and crafts products range from children's craft sets to sewing materials and professional artists' brushes. As well as big brands, The Works also sells their own high quality branded products.

More From Contributor

Wordsworth Classics Martin Chuzzlewit By Charles Dickens

Product Description

Reviews/Comments

Add New

Intelligent Comparison

Price History

Vouchers

Facebook

Jargon Buster

Supplier Information

Community Generated Product Tags

Contact Us

Information

My Account