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Ideal Childhood According to Charles Dickens

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Submitted By eloz
Words 1364
Pages 6
Kholi Eloziini

Dr.Usha Mudiganti
Literatures of childhood
M.a English(3rd sem.)
Date: 2-9-13

Ideal Childhood according to Charles Dickens.

"Great Expectations by Charles Dickens was Published in 1860. The novel is almost an autobiographical novel for Charles Dickens since many of his early life's experiences are echoed in the novel. Like Dickens, Pip the main protagonist who lived in Kent, the marsh country,works at a job he hated and believes himself to be too good for his surroundings and expeirences material success at a very early age. Infact it portrays the conditions of the early nineteenth century.
Great Expectations depicts a process, a journey of growing, maturation and self-discovery through experience and perceptions as the protagonist transcends from childhood to adulthood as experienced by Pip. Dickens' childhood experience, which included such episodes as the time he spent in the blacking factory, his life alone while his father was in debtor's prison and the neglect of his education, made him very aware of the vulnerability of childhood.Dickens has dramatized the importance of childhood perception within the social world of the early nineteenth century.
As we look into the novel, Dicken has portrayed that the child is being wronged by the adult around him and ends with the child doing penance in the end according to the novel we have studied. It begins with Pip as the victim of adults and the societys' corruption and ignorance at large.
Though the novel like "Great Expectations and "David Copperfield" are mostly a recollections by the narator in adulthood, Dicken has placed much importance on the perception of children and as well as accepts his characters' childhood perceptions. As we see Dickens characters are mostly orphans who are at the mercy of the cruel adults.
Dickens seems to have depicted the evils of his time

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