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Oliver Twist (1838)

by Charles Dickens

Other authors: See the other authors section.

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24,013239142 (3.83)829
Classic Literature. Fiction. HTML:

Oliver Twist is born an orphan and grows up handed from bad position to worse. Eventually he ends up in the London street gang run by Fagin, who attempts to blacken the boy's pure soul in his service. Through chance and coincidence Oliver is restored to his mother's middle-class family, where he is shown love and comfort for the first time in his life. The villains' attempts to kidnap him back are foiled and all are transported or hanged.

Full of sharp irony and wit, Oliver Twist was Dickens' first social novel. He did not indulge in the romanticism of villains, popular at the time, but attempted to display areas and practices in London which were all but visible to his readership.

.
… (more)
  1. 86
    The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (Leishai)
  2. 31
    Jack Dawkins by Charlton Daines (Anonymous user)
    Anonymous user: Unauthorised sequel about the life of the Artful Dodger as an adult when he returns to England.
  3. 11
    The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti (derelicious)
  4. 11
    Tom Jones by Henry Fielding (swampygirl)
  5. 00
    The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton (Anonymous user)
    Anonymous user: Another look at Victorian corruption and crime. More comprehensive and more sinister.
AP Lit (152)
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» See also 829 mentions

English (210)  Spanish (8)  German (4)  Swedish (3)  Dutch (3)  Greek (1)  Portuguese (Brazil) (1)  Slovak (1)  Danish (1)  Italian (1)  French (1)  All languages (234)
Showing 1-5 of 210 (next | show all)
Dickens's second novel, clearly not his best but still nicely Dickensian. The first half is far stronger, when Dickens is attacking the Poor Laws, and the political stance that the poor are themselves to blame for their plight, with the most incisive satire. He could have been the Jon Stewart of his day. Here he is describing the bleak orphanage Oliver is sent to:
The parish authorities magnanimously and humanely resolved, that Oliver should be 'farmed', or, in other words, that he should be dispatched to a branch-workhouse some three miles off, where twenty or thirty other juvenile offenders against the poor-laws, rolled about the floor all day, without the inconvenience of too much food or too much clothing, under the parental superintendence of an elderly female, who received the culprits at and for the consideration of sevenpence-halfpenny per small head per week. Sevenpence-halfpenny's worth per week is a good round diet for a child; a great deal may be got for sevenpence-halfpenny, quite enough to overload its stomach, and make it uncomfortable. The elderly female was a woman of wisdom and experience; she knew what was good for children; and she had a very accurate perception of what was good for herself. So, she appropriated the greater part of the weekly stipend to her own use, and consigned the rising parochial generation to even a shorter allowance than was originally provided for them. Thereby finding in the lowest depth a deeper still; and proving herself a very great experimental philosopher.
And describing the theory of how to lessen the welfare rolls:
'Mrs. Corney,' said the beadle, smiling as men smile who are conscious of superior information, 'out-of-door relief, properly managed: properly managed, ma'am, is the porochial safeguard. The great principle of out-of-door relief is, to give the paupers exactly what they don't want; and then they get tired of coming.'
'Dear me!' exclaimed Mrs. Corney. 'Well, that is a good one, too!'
'Yes. Betwixt you and me, ma'am,' returned Mr. Bumble, 'that's the great principle; and that's the reason why, if you look at any cases that get into them owdacious newspapers, you'll always observe that sick families have been relieved with slices of cheese.'
Dickens is generally at his Dickensian best right away in these early parts, satirizing a cruel and hypocritically Christian society in which vast numbers of people live in extreme poverty. Oliver Twist himself is really but a generic entity around which to write, given a completely pure hearted and noble nature. He reminds me of Voltaire's Candide: an innocent to whom bad things continuously happen as a way for the author to make his philosophical and political point.

The second half of the novel... well, here things deteriorate into a series of outlandishly improbable events that result in Oliver's parentage being discovered and his inheritance and gentlemanly future becoming secured. Dickens writes scenes that might more likely belong in a hackneyed romance of the era. Oliver gains no depth, continuing to be an impossibly pure and noble child. Meanwhile several villains are given their comeuppance in what one assumes was a young Dickens's condescension for mass popularity. He's certainly better than this.
( )
  lelandleslie | Feb 24, 2024 |
Ky variant i përshtatur na njeh me fatin e një jetimi të varfër, që jeta do ta përplasë në mjediset më të dyshimta të Londrës. Fati i Oliver Tuistit tregon, se e rëndësishme është të luftosh për një jetë më të mirë dhe të jetosh me ndershmëri. Duke lexuar këtë libër, fëmijët do të njihen edhe me shumë ngjarje e personazhe të tjera mbresëlënëse.
  BibliotekaFeniks | Feb 5, 2024 |
Having now worked my way through most of the Dickens canon, feel confident stating that this isn’t one of his more masterly outings. The plot is transparent, over-reliant on deux ex machina (okay, his plots are *always* over-reliant on improbable coincidence, but this one even more so than most), and the protagonist Oliver is, frankly, a bit of a sop, possessing ample virtue and gratitude but little in the way of intelligence, personality, or gumption. (Not for nothing, this is one of Dickens' earliest works, penned a full 20 years before his brilliant Tale of Two Cities.) So what does it say that I still waited with baited breath to see what would happen in each new chapter? Dickens’ narration is so clever, his characters so original, his wit so biting that even a lesser outing still has the power to beguile.

To be fair, I think the reason Dickens doesn't bother to endow Oliver with any particular qualities is because the author is interested in telling an entirely different tale. Our milquetoast protagonist merely provides a narrative device for Dickens to whisk us off on an exploration of London’s repugnant underworld – the frauds, pickpockets, burglars, whores, fences, and murderers that prey not merely on the unwary, but particularly on the desperate, especially children. One reason people may be put off by this story is that the most fully realized characters are wholly odious, from Fagin, the physically and morally repellant leader of a gang of thieves comprised of children he has gleefully corrupted; to Bumble, the absurd parochial Beadle who uses the prestige of his office to mask his casual cruelty; to Sikes, the physically and mentally abusive villain who mistreats his dog and his girlfriend Nancy in equal measure, confident that – in a dark underworld in which they live, where filth is rampant, life is cheap, and exploitation inescapable - neither of them have a choice but to endure his violence.

In anyone else’s hands, this dark tale would be almost unreadable, but what Dickens does so well in all his tales, and certainly here, is to layer this darkness with so much absurdity, humor, wit, and empathy that you keep reading in spite of your revulsion. The scene in which Bumble woos his bride is truly hilarious; the moment that the Artful Dodger meets his fate with a dazzling display of proud insouciance, undeniably affecting; the scene in which Nancy turns her back on the hope of redemption, heartbreaking. And then, in between these scenes, a thousand other moments, some ridiculous, some shocking, some poignant, some ironic, some but all organized into a compelling story and related via Dickens’ deliciously penetrating prose.

Having just recently polished off a bunch of novels that received critical plaudits (Nobel Prize winners, Booker Prize winners, Pen/Faulkner prize winners), feel like I can honestly say that even this relatively weak effort by Dickens deserves to stand alongside the best of what’s being published now. Who else but Dickens is capable of combining the social commentary of Barbara Kingsolver, the grim brutality of Cormac McCarthy, the absurd wit of P.G. Wodehouse, and the unconditional empathy of Toni Morrison into a single affecting tale? ( )
  Dorritt | Feb 5, 2024 |
I really liked listening to Great Expectations and David Copperfield, so I expected to like this as well. And I did! Until I got about halfway through and completely lost interest. I made it as far as Oliver living with Mrs. Maylie. I knew Nancy's death was coming and it was bumming me out so I decided to just quit.

Perhaps I will come back to this someday, but I think I read enough to know that this is not Dickens' best. Oliver is a boring character. The best part is Dickens pointing out how completely unfair the world is for the poor. Fagin calling everyone "my dear" will haunt me, as well as him being constantly referred to as "the Jew." ( )
  LibrarianDest | Jan 3, 2024 |
This book would have been much better had it had less Oliver Twist in it. ( )
  boggischewsbooks | Dec 27, 2023 |
Showing 1-5 of 210 (next | show all)
Oliver Twist, a meek, mild young boy, is born in the workhouse and spends his early years there until, finding the audacity to ask for more food, he is made to leave. Apprenticed to an undertaker by Mr Bumble, Oliver runs away in desperation and falls in with Fagin and his gang of thieves where he begins his new life in the criminal underworld.

Under the tutelage of the satanic Fagin, the brutal Bill Sikes and the wily Artful Dodger, Oliver learns to survive, although he is destined not to stay with Fagin but to find his own place in the world.

With its terrifying evocation of the hypocrisy of the wealthy and the depths to which poverty pushes the human spirit, Oliver Twist is both a fascinating examination of evil and a poignant moving novel for all times.
added by letonia | editPenguin Popular Classics
 

» Add other authors (182 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Dickens, Charlesprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Allen, Walter ErnestPrefacesecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Cruikshank, GeorgeIllustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Fairclough, PeterEditorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Ghiuselev, IassenIllustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Hayens, KennethIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Heilig, Matthias R.abridged bysecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Hoppé, E.O.Cover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Horne, PhillipEditorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
House, HumphryIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Howe, IrvingIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Jarvis, MartinNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Johnson, EdgarIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Kelk, C.J.Translatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Kilbel, ReinhardTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Le Comte, EdwardAfterwordsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Lee, JohnNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Leopoldo de Verneuil, EnriqueTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Méndez Herrera, JoséTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Mahoneij, J.Illustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Margolyes, MiriamNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Marx, RudolfAfterwordsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
May, NadiaNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Muller, JillIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Nix, GarthIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Oddera, BrunoTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Sève, Peter deCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Slater, MichaelIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Smith, Lawrence BeallIllustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Tillotson, Kathleensecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Vance, SimonNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Wilson, AngusIntroductionsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Wilson, MeganCover designersecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed

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Among other public buildings in a certain town, which for many reasons it will be prudent to refrain from mentioning, and to which I will assign no fictitious name, there is one anciently common to most towns, great or small: to wit, a workhouse; and in this workhouse was born; on a day and date which I need not trouble myself to repeat, inasmuch as it can be of no possible consequence to the reader, in this stage of the business at all events; the item of mortality whose name is prefixed to the head of this chapter.
Quotations
Please, sir, I want some more.
If the law supposes that, the law is a ass-- a idiot.
What have paupers to do with soul or spirit? It's quite enough that we let 'em have live bodies.
"We have none of us long to wait for Death. Patience, patience! He'll be here soon enough for us all."
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Classic Literature. Fiction. HTML:

Oliver Twist is born an orphan and grows up handed from bad position to worse. Eventually he ends up in the London street gang run by Fagin, who attempts to blacken the boy's pure soul in his service. Through chance and coincidence Oliver is restored to his mother's middle-class family, where he is shown love and comfort for the first time in his life. The villains' attempts to kidnap him back are foiled and all are transported or hanged.

Full of sharp irony and wit, Oliver Twist was Dickens' first social novel. He did not indulge in the romanticism of villains, popular at the time, but attempted to display areas and practices in London which were all but visible to his readership.

.

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Penguin Australia

6 editions of this book were published by Penguin Australia.

Editions: 0141439742, 0451529715, 0141031719, 0141322438, 0141192496, 0141198885

Tantor Media

An edition of this book was published by Tantor Media.

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Urban Romantics

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