Bleak House (with an Introduction by Edwin Percy Whipple)

by Charles Dickens, Edwin Percy Whipple (Introduction)

Overview

Widely considered as one of Dickens most superb and complete novels, “Bleak House” contains a more vastly complex and engaging array of characters and sub-plots than any of Dickens’s novels. As is commonplace in his works, Dickens satirically criticizes the social inequities of his time turning his attacks in this instance to the judicial system of 19th century England. At the center of the novel is the story of John Jarndyce who is tied up in a long-running litigation concerning an estate to which his wards Richard Carstone and Ada Clare are the beneficiaries. A series of events take the vast array of comic and tragic characters from the slums of London to the mansions of noblemen, involving some in treachery and others in discovery. Dickens blends the perfect balance of comedy and social satire in a story that contains mystery, tragedy, murder, redemption, and enduring love. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper and includes an introduction by Edwin Percy Whipple.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781420955071
Publisher:	Neeland Media
Publication date:	05/08/2017
Pages:	726
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 1.59(d)

About the Author

Born on February 7, 1812, Charles Dickens was the second of eight children in a family burdened with financial troubles. Despite difficult early years, he became the most successful British writer of the Victorian age.

In 1824, young Charles was withdrawn from school and forced to work at a boot-blacking factory when his improvident father, accompanied by his mother and siblings, was sentenced to three months in a debtor's prison. Once they were released, Charles attended a private school for three years. The young man then became a solicitor's clerk, mastered shorthand, and before long was employed as a Parliamentary reporter. When he was in his early twenties, Dickens began to publish stories and sketches of London life in a variety of periodicals.

It was the publication of Pickwick Papers (1836-1837) that catapulted the twenty-five-year-old author to national renown. Dickens wrote with unequaled speed and often worked on several novels at a time, publishing them first in monthly installments and then as books. His early novels Oliver Twist (1837-1838), Nicholas Nickleby (1838-1839), The Old Curiosity Shop (1840-1841), and A Christmas Carol (1843) solidified his enormous, ongoing popularity. As Dickens matured, his social criticism became increasingly biting, his humor dark, and his view of poverty darker still. David Copperfield (1849-1850), Bleak House (1852-1853), Hard Times (1854), A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Great Expectations (1860-1861), and Our Mutual Friend (1864-1865) are the great works of his masterful and prolific period.

In 1858 Dickens's twenty-three-year marriage to Catherine Hogarth dissolved when he fell in love with Ellen Ternan, a young actress. The last years of his life were filled with intense activity: writing, managing amateur theatricals, and undertaking several reading tours that reinforced the public's favorable view of his work but took an enormous toll on his health. Working feverishly to the last, Dickens collapsed and died on June 8, 1870, leaving The Mystery of Edwin Drood uncompleted.

Author biography from the Barnes & Noble Classics edition of David Copperfield.

Date of Birth:

February 7, 1812

Date of Death:

June 18, 1870

Place of Birth:

Portsmouth, England

Place of Death:

Gad's Hill, Kent, England

Education:

Home-schooling; attended Dame School at Chatham briefly and Wellington