Great Expectations : Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Contexts, Criticism

This Norton Critical Edition, edited by the pioneer of Great Expectations scholarship, presents the most thorough textual edition of the novel (1861) available.

The newly established text is based on all extant materials and is accompanied by several textual essays.

"Backgrounds" provides readers with an understanding of Great Expectations's inception and internal chronology.  A discussion of the public-reading version of the novel is also included.  A wonderfully rich "Contexts" section collects thirteen pieces, centering on the novel’s major themes: the link between author and hero and, relatedly, Victorian notions of gentility, snobbishness, and social mobility; the often brutal training, at home and at school, of children born around 1800; and the central issues of crime and punishment.

"Criticism" gathers twenty-two assessments of Great Expectations, both contemporary and modern, which offer a range of perspectives on Dickens and his novel.

Charles Dickens (1812-1870) is one of the most acclaimed and popular writers of all time. His many works include the classics The Old Curiosity Shop, Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, Barnaby Rudge, A Christmas Carol, A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Bleak House, Hard Times, Our Mutual Friend, The Pickwick Papers and many more.

A native of Germany, Edgar Rosenberg received his Ph.D. at Stanford University and since 1965 as been Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Cornell University. He is the author of From Shylock to Svengali and some fifty pieces of short fiction, translations, and articles in journals ranging from Esquire to Commentary to The Dickensian. He has taught at San Jose State College and Harvard University, has been Visiting Professor at Stanford University and the University of Haifa, and has received Guggenheim, Fulbright, Bread Loaf, and Stanford Fiction Fellowships as well as the Clark Distinguished Teaching Award at Cornell.