My adventures in reading Dickens have been a bit of a rollercoaster, to tell the truth. I loved, loved, loved David Copperfield, but I really struggled to get into Great Expectations. So, I figured Oliver Twist – another story about a young boy who comes-of-age and learns to make his way in a world that is sometimes cruel and sometimes wonderful – would be the tie-breaker.
(And in a twist that will shock absolutely no one: when you use an affiliate link to make a purchase, I’ll get a small commission at no extra cost to you.)
The story is set in England circa 1837, shortly after the introduction of the New Poor Law (1834). Dickens had some Thoughts about that legislation and the impact it had on the lives of impoverished Londoners, and he used Oliver Twist elucidate them. Basically, that law required anyone receiving state assistance during hardship to enter workhouses – called ‘Prisons for the Poor’ by critics – and undertake backbreaking labour to earn a daily ration of gruel and occasionally a crust of bread. Dickens had some experience with these workhouses, having been forced to enter one himself for a time at age 12, and it would seem he carried that axe to grind into his adulthood as a serial writer.
The titular character is born into a live of poverty, with an unknown father and a mother who died shortly after giving birth. He’s raised in a workhouse outside of London, subjected to horrific conditions, and is punished for the “crime” of asking for more gruel with beatings and expulsion. An undertaker is paid to take the troublemaker Oliver on as an apprentice, but Oliver faces bullying in this workplace, and does a runner.
When he makes it to London, he meets a young boy – the ‘Artful Dodger’ – who tells him that he can receive free board and food from a “respectable gentleman” (i.e., Fagin, an infamous criminal who marshals an army of pickpockets). On Oliver’s first time out “working” with the Dodger, he is falsely accused of pinching a handkerchief and hauled in front of a Magistrate. The victim insists that Oliver not be charged, and instead takes him home to offer him a decent meal and an actual bed. Fagin doesn’t like this turn of events at all – worried that Oliver will reveal their secret underground criminal network to his new wealthy gentleman friend – and conceives a plan to abduct him and bring him back into the fold.
This is pretty much the first half of the novel in a nutshell. Yes, it’s a bit grim, but it’s also quite funny, if you pay close attention. If you skim read, however, you’re likely to miss the laughs, as they take a bit of decoding.
The fact is, that there was considerable difficulty in inducing Oliver to take upon himself the office of respiration,–a troublesome practice, but one which custom has rendered necessary to our easy existence.
Oliver Twist (Page 2)
Unfortunately, in the second half of Oliver Twist, Dickens loses the battle against his better nature and is overcome by his tendency towards digression (he was paid by the word, remember?). He steers the story completely off course with a number of side-quests and supplemental plots, to the point where we lose track of Oliver entirely until the last few chapters.
That’s not the only issue I took with Oliver Twist. Throughout the novel, there is some very distressing cruelty (particularly towards animals and children), so even to a contemporary reader it warrants a big-time trigger warning. Also, there’s some pretty shocking antisemitism, even by the low standards we occasionally apply to classic books. Fagin is widely regarded as one of the most grotesque caricatures of Jewish people in all of English literature – and it’s not subtle or symbolic. Dickens literally refers to him as “the Jew” 274 times in the first 38 chapters (I didn’t count for myself, but other clever readers have done so and I trust their maths). Dickens eases off a bit in the second half of the novel, apparently because he was shamed into doing so, having received a letter from the man who bought his house accusing him of “encouraging a vile prejudice” in the early installations of the serial. Still, his change of heart isn’t enough to undo the damage.
Overall, I’m sorry to report that Oliver Twist, much like Great Expectations, failed to capture me. I’m starting to think maybe I spoiled Dickens for myself by reading David Copperfield first, and setting the bar way too high. Even though all three books are ostensibly the same (a young boy grows up in/around London, experiences hardship, relies upon the kindness of strangers, etc), David Copperfield just had an intriguing magic that neither of the others revealed to me. I’m not giving up on Dickens completely, but Oliver Twist definitely re-set my expectations.
Read Oliver Twist on audiobook via Libro.fm here.
My favourite Amazon reviews of Oliver Twist:
- “If I had the continence to read this melodrama to its conclusion my review could have turned out more favorable. In a nutshell… the cantankerous blather was monotonous.” – Leo Higgins
- “The characters of Fagin (though probably antisemitic), Sikes, the Dodger and Charley Bates, and especially Nancy are wonderfully rendered. The sections of the book that focus on them — WITHOUT that annoying little brat Oliver — are enjoyable, even in spite of Dickens’ verbosity.” – Jason
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