Charles Dickens
The most famous celebrity of his era, Dickens pioneered serial publication and remains a literary giant.
Charles Dickens was an English writer and journalist born on 7 February 1812 in Portsmouth.[1][2] Many people consider Charles Dickens the Victorian era's finest novelist, and his fictional characters are among the most famous in literature.[1] Dickens's short stories and novels continue to have a broad readership in the present day.[3]
Quick Facts
- Birth name
- Charles John Huffam Dickens
- Born
- 7 February 1812
- Birthplace
- Portsmouth, Hampshire, England
- Died
- 9 June 1870
- Place of death
- Higham, Kent, England
- Resting place
- Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, England
- Occupation
- Novelist
- Partner
- Ellen Ternan (1857–1870, his death)
Facts from the source article.
Life and work
The introduction of Sam Weller in the fourth episode marked a sharp climb in popularity, and the final instalment sold 40,000 copies.[4] Between 1853 and his death in 1870, Dickens performed about 470 readings, with the Times praising them in 1868.[5] He died on 9 June 1870.[1] After his father John was sent to a debtors' prison, the 12-year-old Dickens left his schooling and began working at a boot-blacking factory.[2][6]
The serialization of The Pickwick Papers starting in 1836 marked the beginning of Dickens's literary success; the character Sam Weller, introduced in the fourth episode, turned the work into a publishing sensation.[7][8] Dickens gained worldwide literary fame in a short period, celebrated for his humor, satire, and sharp observations of society and character.[7] By issuing most of his novels in monthly or weekly parts, Dickens was a pioneer of serialized narrative fiction.[7] During the latter part of his career, Dickens responded to public demand by performing a series of public reading tours.[9]
What the cited sources add
Charles Darwin wrote admiringly of "Samivel, that prince of heroes" in an 1838 letter to geologist Charles Lyell.[8] Dickens ensured his books were available in cheap bindings for the lower orders as well as in morocco-and-gilt for people of quality.[8] The novelist said he did not invent but merely recorded what he heard and saw, considering his novels to come from some autonomous source.[5] Mrs Gamp from Martin Chuzzlewit intruded on Dickens by whispering to him in inopportune places, even in church.[5]
References
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: . (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Graves, "Every Hampshire town and city's most famous person including Martin Freeman and Colin Firth", HampshireLive, 21 May 2022 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: .; . (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: ; .; "The Sam Weller Bump"; "Chapter One – The Pickwick Phenomenon", Cambridge University Press; "The Sam Weller Bump" (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- "Hearing voices allowed Charles Dickens to create extraordinary fictional worlds", The Guardian. facts only, no text reused. theguardian.com
- Graves, "Every Hampshire town and city's most famous person including Martin Freeman and Colin Firth", HampshireLive, 21 May 2022. facts only, no text reused. hampshirelive.news
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: ; .; "Tune in next week", 2 December 2017; .; .; .; . (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- "The Sam Weller Bump". facts only, no text reused. theparisreview.org
- Wikipedia, "Charles Dickens" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Hearing voices allowed Charles Dickens to create extraordinary fictional worlds", The Guardian; "Oxford Dictionaries – Dickensian" . Oxford University Press.; "Dickensian meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary", Cambridge University Press (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Charles Dickens (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
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