The Selected Letters of Charles Dickens - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0199686831 ISBN 13: 9780199686834

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2015

Synopsis

What was it like to be Charles Dickens? His letters are the nearest we can get to a Dickens autobiography: vivid close-up snapshots of a life lived at maximum intensity. This is the first selection to be made from the magisterial twelve-volume British Academy Pilgrim Edition of his letters. From over fourteen thousand, four hundred and fifty have been cherry-picked to give readers the best essence of 'the Sparkler of Albion'.

Dickens was a man with ten times the energy of ordinary mortals. There seem to have been twice the number of hours in his day, and he threw himself into letter-writing as he did into everything else. This eagerly awaited selection takes us straight to the heart of his life, to show us Dickens at first hand. Here he is writing out of the heat of the moment: as a novelist, journalist, and magazine editor; as a social campaigner and traveller in Europe and America, and as friend, lover, husband, and father.

Reading and writing letters punctuated the rhythms of Dickens's day. 'I walk about brimful of letters', he told a friend. He claimed to write 'at the least, a dozen a day'. Sometimes it was a chore but more often a pleasure: an outlet for high spirits, sparkling wit, and caustic commentary - always as seen through his highly individual and acutely observing eye.

Whether you dip in or read straight through, this selection of his letters creates afresh the brilliance of being Dickens, and the sheer pleasure of being in his company.

About this title

About the Author

Jenny Hartley, Professor of English Literature, Roehampton University

Jenny Hartley is Professor of English Literature at Roehampton University. She is the author of two books on British women's writing from the Second World War, and The Reading Groups Book, a pioneering survey of reading groups. Her most recent book, Charles Dickens and the House of Fallen Women, published by Methuen in 2008, was picked Guardian 'Book of the Week' and described as 'brilliant' by Claire Tomalin. For the last ten years she has been a leading member of the Prison Reading Groups project.

Review

Review from previous edition: "Glorious. This is a book for which readers have been waiting for a very long time. It takes you directly, in Dickens's own words, and with incomparable vividness, into his extraordinary life and mind. The notes and editorial matter deftly paint in the background
to provide a detailed and constantly astonishing portrait of one of the most interesting men who ever lived."

--Simon Callow

"Among the dozens of Dickens publications connected with the bicentenary of the author's birth ... it is hard to imagine one more necessary than this"

--Times Literary Supplement 10/02/2012

"glorious letters reflecting every facet of Dickens's life; should not be missed"

--The Sunday Times 12/02/2012

"This is Dickens by Dickens. Whatever comes out in this bicentenary year, do not miss it."

--The Sunday Times 05/02/2012

"(Hartley's) selection is a miracle of compression and editorial tact"

--New Statesman 06/02/2012

"Dickens lovers will all be grateful to Hartley for her skill and judgement."

--Literary Review 01/02/2012

"Edited with unobtrusive intelligence and insight by Jenny Hartley"

--The Independent 03/02/2012

"a marvellous volume"

--The Scotsman 18/02/2012

"It's a thrilling, surprisingly fresh book."

--The Evening Standard 02/02/2012

"An absolute gem ... reads better than any actual novel Dickens ever wrote ... Hartley would please a great many readers by producing a second volume from the same dragon-hoard ... A typically classy Oxford affair"

--Open Letters 05/2012

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0199686831
• ISBN 13: 9780199686834
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 496
• Editor: Hartley Jenny