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What is Charles Dickens' importance in Victorian era literature?
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Charles Dickens was one of the most prominent and most important writers of the Victorian era, and his novels provide great insight into Victorian society. He was an advocate for social justice and fought for the rights of the poor and underprivileged, and his works often reflect the need for social change and reform.
An immensely popular author during the Victorian era, an era that wrought the Industrial Revolution, Charles Dickens also was a social reformer as well as a critic and satirist in his literary works. In fact, Dickens was himself influential in the modification of the Poor Laws, an underlying subject of his novels Oliver Twist and his novella, A Christmas Carol in which Dickens describes the squalid, dirty conditions of London in vivid detail. In his novel Bleak House , Dickens sharply criticizes utilitarianism, pointing to the difference between the ideal and the reality. He believed that in practical terms, the pursuit of an unimaginative, totally rationalized society led to misery. His character Mr. Gradgind speaks the beginning words of the novel, "Now what I want is facts"; however, his own daughter, Louisa Gradgind, given a practical education without imagination or any artistic endeavors, has a life that parallels the real-life advocate of utilitarianism, John Stuart Mills. ...
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For, in only his twenties, Mills, who believed in the ideal of "the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest numbers" suffered a nervous breakdown from such a stringent, analytical education himself.
Further, in his novel Bleak House, Dickens satirizes the injustice of delay in court proceedings. Dickens's attack upon the flaws of the British judiciary system is based partly on his own experiences as a law clerk as a young man, as well in part on his experiences as a Chancery litigant as he sought to enforce his copyright on his earlier books. In Great Expectationshe continues his assault upon the corruption of the judicial system that has a justice for the rich and a different one for the poor, by using Magwitch and the "gentleman" Compeyson to portray this corrupt system of justice that gives a poor man a greater sentence for a lesser crime.
An advocate for the lower middle class, often Dickens's moral characters come not from what he considered a frivolous upper class, but from the commoners. In Great Expectations, for example, the poor orphan Biddy and the barely literate Joe Gargery are exemplary characters. And, of course, in A Christmas Carol it is Bob Crachit and his family who are the greatest Christians.
Certainly, the writings of Charles Dickens were influential in effecting awareness of social conditions as well as reform of these often deplorable conditions.
What makes Charles Dickens important?
Charles Dickens was arguably the most important writer of the Victorian Age, an author who captured the time, and whose exposure of the period's social conditions effected significant legal and societal changes in England.
His works are renowned for their social criticisms, realism, outstanding characterizations, comedy, and style. After the publication of Oliver Twist, for instance, a novel which traces an orphan's life in the slums of London, the social conscience of the English was stirred to examine the criminality in their city. Also Dickens brought attention in the first pages to the Poor Law of 1834. Then, he exposed the cruel victimization of small children as chimney sweeps and as professional mourners, etc.
Other works of Dickens examine other laws, education, and industrial relations. For instance, in Hard Times there are detailed descriptions of an industrial town in England during the great economic expansion of England. In addition, Dickens details the limits on both employers and reformers.
Another novel, Little Dorrit, depicts the conditions of England and what Dickens perceived as the conflict between the harshness of the world and human values. Some regard this novel as Dickens's greatest novel because of its impressive artistry.
References
Why was Charles Dickens important during the Victorian age?
Dickens was a major player in Victorian social reform, as lots of his stories told tales of impoverished people and criticized the exploitation of the lower classes by members of the upper class. In literature and in popular cultural narrative, poorer people often go unnoticed. Their lives have historically been undocumented and left out of writing because they were not considered interesting or worthy of attention. Dickens had a rough childhood; his father spent time in a debtors prison and young Charles worked among impoverished people in a shoeblacking warehouse.
Charles Dickens believed the novel could be used as a catalyst for change by spreading awareness about social and moral ills. He was unafraid to shine a light on child abuse, unsanitary living conditions, the dangers of factory work, poor conditions for education, and the tangled Victorian legal system. Dickens not only held up the metaphorical mirror to Victorian society, he pointed out the very real flaws he saw.