Did anyone catch it? It was on this night… or last night i guess. i missed the first part and the beginning of the third part, but caught the rest. It focused on his childhood, his father’s debts, and especially London during the 1800s - the factories, the child labour, the poverty, prostitution - note that it was stated that in 1839, half of the funerals held in London were held for children under the age of ten. That was due to the working conditions in the factories. The programme depicted how he moved from being a parliamentary reporter to being an author, his financial worries, his personality, the motivations behind his books - like Pickwick Papers, Nicholas Nickleby, etc.
There was lots about him that i wasn’t aware of. Here’s the link on PBS incase anyone wants to check it out: Retired Site | PBS
Anyone catch it? Thoughts, opinions, criticisms regarding the programme and/or his work?
Yes Nadia, I was the fortunate ones to see the whole program, it was indeed a delight. I did read about his life couple of years ago, but never got to read what kinda family he belonged to in detail, but the PBS program was very informative, and helped me in brushiing up my literary skills/knowledge.
Golden_Scorpion, lolzzz :D Sorry about that, my fault... i should have written in the title, "Charles Dickens program on PBS". :D
Shap_Bee, aha you are right. You mean David Copperfield right? i think he wrote that after details of his childhood started to be made public. He wanted to tell the world what had happened (when the details started to come out, it caused bit of a scandal because of his father's incarceration, etc.).
Zulfi, i am glad you enjoyed it. So did i. Quite a bit about him i wasn't aware of.
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*Originally posted by shap_bee: *
Nadia if u ever happen to come across the novel (now i have forgotten the name sorry) do read that ... it's his autobiography...
(wish i could remeber the name-a movie is also based on this)
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[thumb=E]dickens18203_6421609.JPG[/thumb]
^^ Iss maiN daikh lo may be U will find the name ;)
I prefer his works rather than him, there's a real fascination with going into the persona these days.
I think we learn a lot about the time and the place of the Victorian era from such classics as The Pickwick Papers, Nicholas Nickelby, David Copperfield and my personal favourite Great Expectations.
Although he lived all over Europe I don't think anyone mindfully chronicled England of that period any better.
So I say forget the shoe size of the artist and enjoy his painting.
:p ohoyi yaar no one is talking about his shoe size. i understand the point regarding an emphasis upon persona as opposed to work. But how about focusing on both in moderation?
It's just his childhood experiences, it's interesting for me to learn how he was affected by what he experienced in childhood - and how that plays out in his work. The squalor, the poverty, the way of life in Victorian England, the effects of the industrialization - it's amazing that few British writers of that time described it as well, as painstakingly, as Dickens did. Why was that? Obviously his life had an effect upon his work. You cannot separate one from the other. For me, i read Nicholas Nickleby a long time ago and, while i did appreciate it back then, it was for me just another of his novels. When the programme explored that it was Dickens' coming across a gravesite of a 19 year old boy, who had died 'accidentally' in one of the child warehouses (William Shawcross Academy i think), that produced the inspiration for Nicholas Nickleby, then it takes on an added depth. You try by that process to get into the head of the writer - what was s/he thinking as he wrote that piece? Who inspired the characters? The story takes on a more personal meaning, for me anyways.
I suppose what I’m saying is that through his works you pretty much know what he’s been through already, I feel by dissecting a literary genius like him is to detract from the romanticism very much alive in his literature. So who cared what the real Dickens was all about, the Dickens cultured by him for us is enough for me.
To me it doesn’t really matter what the name of the boy was on which he based a book, I can believe people lived trapped then as they do now.
A lot of people can see a lot of their lives in Dickens’ work even today. His work is full of truisms that hold up to the seemingly invisible class structure in the present day UK for example.
He wrote about simple emotions and aspirations, don’t care what he went through to do it.
This is not just about Dickens it’s the whole “Isaac Newton uncovered” type of journalism.
when saw ur Subject… 
true…