As part of coursework, I had to read David Copperfield when I was 11. Thus began a relationship with Dickens, an author with whom I could instantly connect and understand. When I was 15, I had to do Great Expectations, again, coursework. By then, I had read pretty much all of the famous stuff he had ever written, and I couldn’t be more excited! I have seldom had to read anything else so many times, they did give us tough questions, but every read I have enjoyed.
Dickens had a poor childhood, he led the life of a workhouse mongrel, faced harsh truths about life and debt too early, but from those experiences were born amazing characters, Estella and Fagin, Agnes and Miss Havisham, Uriah Heep and Magwitch.
This is the list that I haven’t read. But I’m sure our paths shall keep crossing.
- The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club
- The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby
- The Old Curiosity Shop
- Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of ‘Eighty
- A Christmas Carol
- The Chimes
- The Cricket on the Hearth
- The Battle of Life
- The Haunted Man and the Ghost’s Bargain
- The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit
- Dombey and Son
- Bleak House
- Little Dorrit
- Our Mutual Friend
- The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Have you read any of them? What do you think?
