Oliver Twist: Centenary Cover 1 Paperback - 2012

Name: Oliver Twist: Centenary Cover 1
Price: 47.51 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: Dickens, Charles
ISBN: 9780099561422

by Charles Dickens

Browse more copies for sale ↓

About this book

Oliver Twist, published in 1838, became one of English writer Charles Dickens's better-known stories and was the first Victorian novel with a child protagonist.

Oliver Twist (Parish Boy's Progress) focuses on orphan Oliver Twist, born in a workhouse and sold into an apprenticeship with an undertaker. After escaping, Oliver travels to London, where he meets the "Artful Dodger", a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by an elderly criminal Fagin. The book shows an unromantic portrayal of criminals and the treatment of the many orphans in London in the mid-19th century.

From the publisher

CHARLES DICKENS was born on February 7, 1812 in Landport in Portsmouth. His father was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office who often ended up in financial trouble. When Dickens was twelve years' old he was sent to work in a shoe polish factory because his father had been imprisoned for debt. In 1833 he began to publish short stories and essays in newspapers and magazines. The Pickwick Papers, his first commercial success, was published in 1836, the same year that he married Catherine Hogarth. The serialisation of Oliver Twist began in 1837 while The Pickwick Papers was still running. Many other novels followed and Dickens became a celebrity in America as well as Britain. He also set up and edited the journals Household Words (1850-9) and All the Year Round (1859-70). Charles Dickens died on June 9, 1870 leaving his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, unfinished. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.

First Edition Identification

Oliver Twist was first published as a serial from 1837 to 1839 and released as a three-volume book in 1838 before the serialization ended.

The first edition was published by Richard Bentley in London, 1838. Octavo, three volumes, original reddish-brown cloth, gilt titles to the spine, front and rear panels marked with a stamp. Features 24 illustrated plates by George Cruikshank.

The first issue has the "Fireside" plate in volume 3 and "Boz" listed as the author on all title pages. It was issued on November 9, 1838. At Dicken's insistence, the Fireside plate was replaced with the "Church" plate, and Dickens's name replaced "Boz". The book was then reissued in three volumes 7 days after the first issue, on November 16.

The First US Edition of Oliver Twist was published in New York by Jemima M. Lewer in 1838, as two volumes, bound in modern brown quarter-leather bindings, with marbled paper boards.

Details

Title Oliver Twist: Centenary Cover 1
Author Charles Dickens
Binding Paperback
Pages 480
Volumes 1
Language ENG
Publisher Vintage Classics
Date 2012-02-20
ISBN 9780099561422 / 0099561425
Reading level 530
Dewey Decimal Code FIC

Media reviews

"The image of little Oliver Twist victimised by poverty, almost seduced by the specious excitement of crime, and then offered the possibility of a lucrative career in authorship is always compelling."
—Guardian

"We leave him most reluctantly, and so will every reader who has any capacity to see and feel whatsoever is most loveable, hateful, or laughable, in the character of the everyday life about him."
—Examiner

"He deals truly with human nature, which never can degrade; he takes up everything, good, bad, or indifferent, which he works up into a rich alluvial deposit. He is natural, and that never can be ridiculous."
—Quarterly Review

About the author

CHARLES DICKENS was born on February 7, 1812 in Landport in Portsmouth. His father was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office who often ended up in financial trouble. When Dickens was twelve years' old he was sent to work in a shoe polish factory because his father had been imprisoned for debt. In 1833 he began to publish short stories and essays in newspapers and magazines." "The Pickwick Papers, his first commercial success, was published in 1836, the same year that he married Catherine Hogarth. The serialisation of Oliver Twist""began in 1837 while The Pickwick Papers""was still running. Many other novels followed and Dickens became a celebrity in America as well as Britain. He also set up and edited the journals "Household Words "(1850-9) and "All the Year Round "(1859-70). Charles Dickens died on June 9, 1870 leaving his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, unfinished. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.