Based on the first edition, Hard Times is informatively annotated with a lively introduction and helpful notes on cultural references, social and political mores, literary allusions, and unfamiliar word usage. In addition to a chronology coordinating Dickens' life with key historical events, the editors explore the political, economical, educational, and social state of England in the 1830s and…
Part romance, part melodrama, part detective story, the novel spreads out among a web of relationships in every level of society, from the simpleminded Sir Leicester Dedlock to Jo the street sweeper. A savage but often comic indictment of a society that is rotten to the core, Bleak House is one of Dickens's most ambitious novels, with a range that extends from the drawing rooms of the aristocra…
David Copperfield is the story of a young man’s adventures on his journey from an unhappy and impoverished childhood to the discovery of his vocation as a successful novelist. Among the gloriously vivid cast of characters he encounters are his tyrannical stepfather, Mr. Murdstone; his formidable aunt, Betsey Trotwood; the eternally humble yet treacherous Uriah Heep; frivolous, enchanting Dora…