1. Show the stages of Mr. Pickwick’s moral development. 2. What part does Jingle play in Mr. Pickwick’s maturity? Mrs. Bardell? Dodson and Fogg? Fleet Prison? Nathaniel Winkle? 3. What part does Sam Weller play in Mr. Pickwick’s growth as a character? Describe the stages of their relationship. 4. How […]
Read more Study Help Essay QuestionsCritical Essays Locale in Pickwick Papers
Dickens does something very interesting with the various locales the Pickwickians visit. Each is given a distinct emotional coloring according to the action that takes place there, but the action is a reflection of Mr. Pickwick’s education. By this we mean that what happens to Mr. Pickwick in the places […]
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Pickwick Papers is set in southern England in the years of 1827 to 1831. Among other things this novel gave an enduring literary expression to the “coaching days” period of English life. As Dickens was writing his novel, that period was rapidly being destroyed by the new railroads. An air […]
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From the full title of the novel, The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, one might expect a collection of notes, letters, diaries, and minutes. Yet from the first the narrative takes a different form. The narrator, “Boz,” is purportedly reworking the club papers into a coherent, unified story. However, […]
Read more Critical Essays Style in Pickwick PapersCritical Essays The Pickwick Club
The idea of the Pickwick Club is the nucleus from which the novel grows. Once the action is under way the club is more or less discarded. In Chapter 1 we see the club in session. In Chapter 11 we are reminded of its existence, and then we forget about […]
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Contrast is the most important literary device in the novel. It is more important than comedy, sentiment, and nightmare because it includes each of these modes. We have seen how Dickens plays each of these methods against the others in a complementary way. Dickens defines his characters through dramatic contrasts, […]
Read more Critical Essays Contrast in Pickwick PapersCritical Essays The Interpolated Tales
The interpolated tales are of little account from a literary standpoint. In general, they are badly written and out of keeping with the comic tone of the novel. But they do bear a relation to the large themes of the novel, presenting those themes in an opposite manner from which […]
Read more Critical Essays The Interpolated TalesCritical Essays Sentiment in Pickwick Papers
Sentiment is a way of viewing the world complementary to that of comedy. It is based on the recognition that certain situations are not reducible to comedy; the frustration and imprisonment of a good man, for example. It then tries to make literary capital of poignant situations. As comedy tries […]
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The comedy of Pickwick Papers is more than the use of humorous techniques, although it includes these elements. Comedy is essentially an attitude toward the world, a way of selecting and viewing human behavior. The funniness of comedy lies as much in the author’s point of view as it does […]
Read more Critical Essays Comedy in Pickwick PapersCharles Dickens Biography
The attention that has been paid to the life of Charles Dickens is due mainly to his stature as the greatest novelist of Victorian England. Even though the biographical accounts of Dickens frequently try to unravel the mystery of his creative genius, there is something about Dickens’ imaginative power that […]
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