Notable works by Charles Dickens[edit] Major Works[edit] A chronological list of Dickens' major works NameYear CompletedType Sketches by Boz1836Short Stories The Pickwick Papers1837Novel The Mudfog Papers1838Short Stories Oliver Twist1839Novel Nicholas Nickleby1839Novel The Old Curiosity Shop1841Novel Barnaby Rudge1841Novel Master Humphrey's Clock1841Non-novel American Notes1842Non-Fiction travelogue A Christmas Carol1843Novella Martin Chuzzlewit1844Novel The Chimes1844Novella The Cricket on the Hearth1845Novella Pictures from Italy1846Non-Fiction travelogue The Battle of Life1846Novella Dombey and Son1848Novel The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain1848Novella The Life of Our Lord1849Non-Fiction history David Copperfield1850Novel A Child's History of England1853Non-Fiction history Bleak House1853Novel The Long Voyage1853Short Story Hard Times1854Novel Little Dorrit1857Novel The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices1857Non-novel Reprinted Pieces1858Short Stories A Tale of Two Cities1859Novel The Haunted House1859Short Story Great Expectations1861Novel Our Mutual Friend1865Novel The Signal-Man1866Short Story No Thoroughfare1867Short Story A Holiday Romance1868Short Story The Uncommercial Traveller1869Short stories and reminiscences The Mystery of Edwin Drood1870. Novel Novels Name of novelPublicationNotes The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick ClubMonthly serial, April 1836 to November 1837[1] Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's ProgressMonthly serial in Bentley's Miscellany, February 1837 to April 1839 The Life and Adventures of Nicholas NicklebyMonthly serial, April 1838 to October 1839 The Old Curiosity ShopWeekly serial in Master Humphrey's Clock, April 1840 to November 1841 Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty'Weekly serial in Master Humphrey's Clock, 13 February 1841, to 27 November 1841Historical Novel A Christmas Carol, In Prose: Being a Ghost Story of Christmas1843Christmas novella; a ghost story The Life and Adventures of Martin ChuzzlewitMonthly serial, January 1843 to July 1844 The Chimes: A Goblin Story of Some Bells that Rang an Old Year Out and a New Year In1844Christmas novella The Cricket on the Hearth: A Fairy Tale of Home1845Christmas novella The Battle of Life: A Love Story1846Christmas novella Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son: Wholesale, Retail and for ExportationMonthly serial, October 1846 to April 1848 The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain, A Fancy for Christmas-Time1848Christmas novella; a ghost story The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone RookeryMonthly serial, May 1849 to November 1850 Bleak HouseMonthly serial, March 1852 to September 1853 Hard Times: For These TimesWeekly serial in Household Words, 1 April 1854, to 12 August 1854 Little DorritMonthly serial, December 1855 to June 1857 A Tale of Two CitiesWeekly serial in All the Year Round, 30 April 1859, to 26 November 1859Historical novel Great ExpectationsWeekly serial in All the Year Round, 1 December 1860 to 3 August 1861 Our Mutual FriendMonthly serial, May 1864 to November 1865 The Mystery of Edwin DroodMonthly serial, April 1870 to September 1870. Unfinished - Only six of twelve planned numbers completed Short Stories "The Lamplighter" (1838) "The Sewer-Dwelling Reptiles" (1841) "A Child's Dream of a Star" (1850) "Captain Murderer" (1850) "To be Read at Dusk" (1852) (a ghost story) "The Long Voyage" (1853) "Prince Bull" (1855) "Thousand and One Humbugs" (1855) "Hunted Down" (1859) "The Signal-Man" (1866) (a ghost story) "George Silverman's Explanation" (1868) "Holiday Romance" (1868) "The Queer Chair" (part of The Pickwick Papers; a ghost story) "The Ghosts of the Mail" (part of The Pickwick Papers; a ghost story) "The Baron of Grogzwig" (part of Nicholas Nickleby; a ghost story) "A Madman's Manuscript" (part of The Pickwick Papers; a ghost story) "A Ghost in the Bride's Chamber" (part of The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices; a ghost story) "The Goblins who Stole a Sexton" (part of The Pickwick Papers; a ghost story)
Christmas Short Stories •"A Christmas Tree" (1850) •"What Christmas is, as We Grow Older" (1851) •"The Poor Relation's Story" (1852) •"The Child's Story" (1852) •"The Schoolboy's Story" (1853) •"Nobody's Story" (1853) •"The Seven Poor Travellers" (1854) •"The Holly-tree Inn" (1855) •"The Wreck of the Golden Mary" (1856) •"The Perils of Certain English Prisoners" (1857) •"Going into Society" (1858) •"A Message from the Sea" (1860) •"Tom Tiddler's Ground" (1861) •"Somebody's Luggage" (1862) •"Mrs Lirriper's Lodgings" (1863) •"Mrs Lirriper's Legacy" (1864) •"Doctor Marigold's Prescriptions" (1865) •"The Trial for Murder" (1865; a ghost story) •"Mugby Junction" (1866) •"The Signal-Man" (1866; a ghost story) •"No Thoroughfare" (1867) Collaborative Works •"The Seven Poor Travellers" (1854) (with Wilkie Collins, Adelaide Procter, George Sala and Eliza Linton – about the Six Poor Travellers House) •"The Holly-tree Inn" (1855) (with Wilkie Collins, William Howitt, Harriet Parr and Adelaide Procter) •"The Wreck of the Golden Mary" (1856) (with Wilkie Collins, Adelaide Procter, Harriet Parr, Percy Fitzgerald and Reverend James White) •"The Perils of Certain English Prisoners" (1857) (with Wilkie Collins) •"The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices" (1857) (with Wilkie Collins) •"A House to Let" (1858) (with Wilkie Collins, Elizabeth Gaskell and Adelaide Procter) •"The Haunted House" (1859) (with Wilkie Collins, Elizabeth Gaskell, Adelaide Procter, George Sala and Hesba Stretton; a ghost story) •"A Message from the Sea" (1860) (with Wilkie Collins, Robert Buchanan, Charles Allston Collins, Amelia Edwards and Harriet Parr) •"Tom Tiddler's Ground" (1861) (with Wilkie Collins, Charles Allston Collins, Amelia Edwards and John Harwood) •"The Trial for Murder" (1865) (with Charles Allston Collins; a ghost story) •"Mugby Junction" (1866) (with Andrew Halliday, Hesba Stretton, Charles Allston Collins and Amelia Edwards) •"No Thoroughfare" (1867) (with Wilkie Collins) Short Story Collections •Sketches by Boz (1836) •Sketches of Young Gentlemen (1838) •Sketches of Young Couples (1840) •Master Humphrey's Clock (1840–41) •Boots at the Holly-tree Inn: And Other Stories (1858) •Reprinted Pieces (1861) •The Mudfog Papers (1880) aka Mudfog and Other Sketches Nonfiction, Poetry, and Plays •Sunday Under Three Heads (1836) (under the pseudonym "Timothy Sparks") •The Strange Gentleman (play, 1836) •The Village Coquettes (comic opera, 1836) •The Fine Old English Gentleman (poetry, 1841) •American Notes: For General Circulation (1842) •Pictures from Italy (1846) •The Life of Our Lord: As written for his children (1849) •A Child's History of England (1853) •The Frozen Deep (play, 1857) •The Uncommercial Traveller (1860–69) •Speeches, Letters and Sayings (1870) •Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins (1851–70, pub. 1982) •The Complete Poems of Charles Dickens (1885) Articles and Essays •"A Coal Miner's Evidence" •"Frauds on the Fairies" •"In Memoriam W. M. Thackeray the first!" •"The Lost Arctic Voyagers" (1854) Letters Editing and publication of Dicken's letters started in 1949 when publisher Rupert Hart-Davis persuaded Humphry House of Wadham College, Oxford University to edit a complete edition of the letters. House died suddenly aged 46 in 1955. However the work continued, and by 1997 Volume 9 had been published.
I read Great Expectations at least 4 times & would not try to say how many times I watched the movies of it.
If you want to encourage people to read Charles Dickens, how about you give them some quotations of his, such as this rather prophetic one: Electric communication will never be a substitute for the face of someone who with their soul encourages another person to be brave and true. A man who could build a church, as one may say, by squinting at a sheet of paper. Accidents will occur in the best regulated families. I do not know the American gentleman, god forgive me for putting two such words together. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Minds, like bodies, will often fall into a pimpled, ill-conditioned state from mere excess of comfort. No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another. Reflect on your present blessings, of which every man has many; not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some. Subdue your appetites, my dears, and you've conquered human nature. With affection beaming out of one eye, and calculation shining out of the other. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. We need never be ashamed of our tears.
Dickens's novels combine brutality with fairy-tale fantasy; sharp, realistic, concrete detail with romance, farce, and melodrama.; the ordinary with the strange. They range through the comic, tender, dramatic, sentimental, grotesque, melodramatic, horrible, eccentric, mysterious, violent, romantic, and morally earnest. Though Dickens was aware of what his readers wanted and was determined to make as much money as he could with his writing, he believed novels had a moral purpose–to arouse innate moral sentiments and to encourage virtuous behavior in readers. It was his moral purpose that led the London Times to call Dickens "the greatest instructor of the Nineteenth Century" in his obituary. During his lifetime, Charles Dickens was the most famous writer in Europe and America. When he visited America to give a series of lectures, his admirers followed him, waited outside his hotel, peered in windows at him, and harassed him in railway cars. In their enthusiasm, Dickens's admirers behaved very much like the fans of a superstar today. DICKENS'S CONTEMPORARY REPUTATION Success came early to Dickens; he was twenty-five when his first novel, Pickwick Papers, appeared and made him one of the foremost writers of his day. It is an exuberantly comic novel with almost no shadows, and readers expected all of his novels to follow this pattern. His next two novels, Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickelby, fit readers' expectations well enough, and they overlooked the social problems he exposed. As he aged, Dickens's view of his society and human nature grew increasingly somber, a fact which disturbed many readers and critics. A Tale of Two Cities was attacked for having little, if any humor. Always concerned to make money with his writings, Dickens took seriously the negative response many readers had to his darker novels. He deliberately addressed their discontent when he wrote Great Expectations, which he affirmed was written "in a most singular and comic manner." In a letter to a friend, he explained: You will not have to complain of the want of humour as in The Tale of Two Cities. I have made the opening, I hope, in its general effect exceedingly droll. I have put a child and a good-natured foolish man, in relations that seem to me very funny. Of course I have got in the pivot on which the story will turn too–and which indeed, as you will remember, was the grotesque tragi-comic conception that first encouraged me. To be quite sure that I had fallen into no unconscious repetitions, I read David Copperfield again the other day, and was affected by it to a degree you would hardly believe. After his death, his literary reputation waned and his novels tended not to be taken seriously. The novelist George Meredith found them intellectually lacking: Not much of Dickens will live, because it has so little correspondence to life. He was the incarnation of cockneydom, a caricaturist who aped the moralist; he should have kept to short stories. If his novels are read at all in the future, people will wonder what we saw in them. DICKENS AND LATER READERS Though Dickens's novels continued to be read by large numbers of readers, his literary reputation was in eclipse. There was a tendency to see his novels as appropriate for children and young adults. From 1880 through the early part of the twentieth century, Russian writers came into vogue and were generally regarded as superior to Dickens. This preference is ironic because the Russian novelists both admired Dickens and learned from him. Turgenev praised Dickens's work and even wrote for Dickens's magazine, Household Words, during the Crimean War. Tolstoi wrote of Dickens, "All his characters are my personal friends–I am constantly comparing them with living persons, and living persons with them, and what a spirit there was in all he wrote." Dostoevsky was so impressed that he imitated the death of Little Nell, including the sentimentality, in describing the death of Nelli Valkovsky in The Insulted and the Injured (1862). Supposedly, during his exile in Siberia, he read only Pickwick Papers and David Copperfield. Even if this story is apocryphal, Dickens' influence on Uncle's Dream and The Friend of the Family (1859), written while Dostoevsky was in Siberia, is unmistakable. In yet another irony, English critics in the 1880s were puzzled by Dostoevsky's similarities to Dickens. Dickens' literary standing was transformed in the 1940s and 1950s because of essays written by George Orwell and Edmund Wilson, who called him "the greatest writer of his time," and a full-length study by Humphrey House, The Dickens World. Critics discovered complexity, darkness, and even bitterness in his novels, and by the 1960s some critics felt that, like Shakespeare, Dickens could not be classified into existing literary categories. This view of Dickens as incomparable continues through the twentieth century. Edgar Johnson expresses the prevailing twentieth-century view in his assessment of Dickens: "Far more than a great entertainer, a great comic writer, he looks into the abyss. He is one of the great poets of the novel, a genius of his art." This is not to say that every critic or reader accepts Johnson's view; F.R. Leavis could not take Dickens so seriously: "The adult mind doesn't as a rule find in Dickens a challenge to an unusual and sustained seriousness." In the resurgence of Dickens's reputation, his essays, sketches, and articles have received attention and praise. K.J. Fielding believes, "If he were not so well known as a novelist, he might have been recognized as a great English essayist." http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/novel_19c/dickens/
