Essay on Charles Dickens Picture Of Childhood in...

Charles Dickens Picture Of Childhood in Victorian Times Great Expectations is set in early Victorian England, a time when great social changes were sweeping the nation. The Industrial Revolution of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries had transformed the social landscape, enabling capitalists and manufacturers to amass huge fortunes. Although social class was no longer entirely dependent on the circumstances of ones birth, the divisions between rich and poor remained nearly as wide as ever. London, a teeming mass of humanity, lit by gas lamps at night and darkened by black clouds from smokestacks during the day, formed a sharp contrast with the nations sparsely populated rural†¦show more content†¦Another noticeable fact when we are told this is that there are no buildings and subsequently no people in this marsh, meaning that Pip must be out in this wilderness alone. Loneliness seems to be a major part of Pips life at this point in the book. We are then told that Pip is an orphan and that he his mum and dad are buried here, that is in his private cemetery. All of this information given to us in the first few pages already make us pity this poor little boy. We pity him because his childhood seems to be full of sadness, and indeed he does have a sad and hard childhood and so did many Victorian children as life was much harder and crueller in those days. Childhood was hard in those days because during the first five years of life you were at your weakest, and at this time medicine was not as developed as it is now. Only one in five children born lived to see past five years of age and the rate of death whilst giving birth was two thousand per cent higher than it is nowadays-meaning that many children were born motherless. Pip lost is mother and father early on in his life, as he only knows their names on the authority of the tombstone, which means that he did not and still does notShow MoreRelatedCharles Dickens: A Brief Biography Essay1315 Words   |  6 Pages Charles Dickens Ruth Glancy, a world-renowned Dickens scholar, believed that Charles Dickens blended the Romanticism era, the Industrial age, and the Victorian era into unforgettable novels that still had the whimsical, imaginative part of life. Ruth conceded, â€Å" Dickens increasingly saw the need for finding and nurturing the imaginative core of life that can prevail even in the middle of the modern industrial city (Glancy 17).† Charles used his own experiences and imagination to evoke storiesRead MoreThe Victorian Er A Important Part Of Our History1688 Words   |  7 PagesThe Victorian Era was a very important part of our history. That is why I want to familiarize you with it before we get directly to Mr. Dickens. 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InRead MoreCharles Dickens Hard Times1494 Words   |  6 PagesMr. Johnson Literature Dickens Calls for Desperate Measures in Hard Times â€Å"I want to change the world.† How many times is that line heard from small children, aspiring to be someone who achieves their maximum potential? If a child is asked how they might go about doing so they might respond with an answer that involves a superhero or princess who helps people for the greater good. As one grows and adapts to their surrounding society, the art of seeing the big picture including its flaws is often