Happy Birthday Charles Dickens

[charliesmum]

200 years ago Charles Dickens was born.

What's your favourite book/story of his? (Presuming you enjoy his works, that is.)

Mine is Our Mutual Friend. I think it's his masterpiece. The characters are amazing, and the story is fantastic. Complicated but great.

My favourite bit is the fact that he created a good Jewish character because a Jewish woman wrote to him and told him he wasn't doing them any favours by creating Fagin. He listened, and he created a character who voiced the woman's concerns.

Also he did an entire chapter that was a conversation between two characters. They are never named in the chapter, but becuase he'd created them so well, and gave them such distinctive voices, you knew exactly who was speaking. Brilliant.

My least favourite is probably Great Expectation, or maybe Tale of Two Cities. My 11th grade English teacher was SO funny when he riffed on Lucy - he complained that all she ever did was faint. And when we watched the movie, he said 'oh, there she goes' and the whole class disolved into laughter.

So...Thanks Charles Dickens. Oh, and thanks for helping the Doctor defeat the Gelfs.

Comments

[wolfgangmozart.livejournal.com]

But... Sidney Carton :( Tale of Two Cities always provides a much needed melodramatic fix for me, LOL.

I don't know that I've ever read Our Mutual Friend (how can this be?), but now I'll have to check it out.

[madeleinebella.livejournal.com]

I loved Tale of Two Cities, but it did take me an embarrassing eternity to get through. Certain parts grabbed me and I adored the cadence of particular lines, but somehow the writing style was so soporific for me that I could only read little bits at a time, with terribly long stretches in between.
I saw a theatre production before finishing the book, and fell in love with Sidney Carton immediately. :) Ah yes, the melodrama - what's not to love.