After reading A Christmas Carol, the notoriously reculsive Thomas Carlyle was 'seized with a perfect convulsion of hospitality' and threw not one but two Christmas dinner parties.
A graphic deluxe edition to mark the 150th anniversary of Dickens's most well-loved novel.
A terrifying encounter with an escaped convict in a graveyard on the wild Kent marshes; a summons to meet the bitter, decaying Miss Havisham and her beautiful, cold-hearted ward Estella; the sudden generosity of a mysterious benefactor-these form a series of events that change the orphan Pip's life forever, as he eagerly abandons his humble origins to begin a new life as a gentleman. Dickens's haunting novel depicts Pip's education and development through adversity as he discovers the true nature of his great expectations. Published nine years before Dickens's death, it remains one of his most celebrated works.
This text is a revised edition of Dickens' classic tale. After 18 years as a political prisoner in the Bastille, the ageing Dr Manette is finally released and reunited with his daughter in England. Two very different men become enmeshed through their love for Lucie Manette.
Paul Dombey is an ambitious, calculating London merchant. He pins all his hopes for the future of his shipping firm on his fragile son whilst his daughter, Florence, goes unnoticed and neglected. It is only when the firm faces ruin, and Dombey is staring at a life of desolate solitude that Florence may finally be valued.
Presents the story of the daughter of an imprisoned debtor, who works to free her family from their circumstances as she suffers the injustices of nineteenth-century English society.
This is the story of an inheritance, relating the destinies of two descendants of the brothers Chuzzlewit. Martin is a selfish young man, who lost his fortune in America. Jonas is a villain, committing murder, and eventually poisons himself.
Taking a complex pattern of theme, symbol, comic exuberance, sharp social comment and telling detail, this novel takes a satirical look at wealth and its corrupting power, symbolized by the inheritance of a dust-heap and represented by the changing fortunes of Boffin, the golden dustman.
Set against the backdrop of the Gordon Riots of 1780, this is a story of mystery and suspense which begins with an unsolved double murder and goes on to involve conspiracy, blackmail, abduction and retribution. As London erupts into riot, Barnaby Rudge struggles to escape the curse of his past.
Charles Dickens died half way through writing "The Mystery of Edwin Drood", and ever since speculation has been rife as to how the tale might have unfolded. This title indicates how the great author might have finished this masterpiece, drawing from those leads a modern story of obsessive love, betrayal and murder.
Around the central story of Nicholas Nickleby and the misfortunes of his family, Dickens created some of his most memorable characters: the muddle-headed Mrs Nickleby, the theatrical Crummles, their protege Miss Petowker, and the mindlessly cruel Squeers and his wife.
Charles Dickens describes in Night Walks his time as an insomniac, when he decided to cure himself by walking through London in the small hours, and discovered homelessness, drunkenness and vice on the streets. This collection of essays shows Dickens as one of the greatest visionaries of the city in all its variety and cruelty.
GREAT IDEAS. Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization and helped make us who we are.
An account of Charles Dickens's experiences in Italy in which he portrays a nation of great contrasts: between grandiose buildings and squalid poverty, and between past and present. Combining travelogue with social commentary, this book is depicts an exciting and disquieting journey.
Dickens's sense of comedy and concern with the human psyche are evident in tales of the supernatural, impressionistic sketches, and dramatic monologues
This is a selection of Dicken's non-fictional prose and essays, published in his magazine "Household Words", to which he contributed 200 pieces in nine years, and all the year round, where the "Uncommercial Traveller" series began.
'Desperate-minded villain!' Two of Dickens' hilarious early stories from Sketches by Boz: 'The Great Winglebury Duel' and 'Bloomsbury Christening' Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions. Charles Dickens (1812-1870). All Dickens' novels and other major works are available in Penguin Classics.
A richly varied collection of observation, fancy and fiction shows the London that Dickens' knew so intimately at its best and worst, in honest and visionary descriptions of everyday life and people. This work looks towards Dickens' novels in its profusion of characters, its glimpses of surreal modernity and its fund of pathos and comic invention.
