Summary
Charles Dickens published his first story in a London monthly at age 22. He wasn't paid and it appeared without his name, but he was so overcome with joy and pride it took him half an hour to recover. When he died of a stroke 36 years later, he had earned a fortune many times over and had been hailed as the greatest novelist of the 19th century.
The story of how Dickens rose to such heights from a modest background, forced to leave school at 15 by his parents, who could no longer afford the fees, is no less epic than his sprawling novels. Now, a splendid history by the noted English biographer and journalist Claire Tomalin has been published, just months before the bicentennial of Dickens' Feb. 7, 1812, birth.See the full content of this document
Extract
New Dickens Biography Timed for His Bicentennial
It is a tale of two Dickens: the tenderhearted social critic with a soft spot...
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