8. Compare the style in "Tell" with that of Shakespeare and Goethe, making allowance for loss in translation. FOR REFERENCE "Life of Friedrich Schiller."--CARLYLE. "Biographical Essays."--DE QUINCEY. "Goethe and Schiller."--BOYESEN. CHARLES DICKENS (1812-1870) Charles Dickens was born at Portsmouth, England. His parents were poor and luckless. His early years were spent in moving from place to place, and as a boy he performed the services of a drudge and was rewarded with a mere pittance. Such education as he received was gained in the severe school of experience. Hence it is not surprising that, after having been connected with various newspapers in a subordinate capacity, when he finally tried his hand at serial fiction he astounded the world in "Pickwick Papers" by his wonderful descriptions of middle and lower class English life; a work also unexcelled in its good-natured merriment. "Pickwick Papers" and its successors were among the first of those social novels which form so marked a feature of modern literature. They waged open and successful warfare against many of the crying evils of the day, such as the work-houses, the barbarous school system in vogue, and the legal and prison systems. Dickens was too kind-hearted to sneer, but his mocking humor was quite as effective. He won the hearts of high and low alike, and the sale of his novels was phenomenal. In addition to rollicking humor, touches of satire and a pronounced tendency toward exaggerated pathos appear in his work, the latter quality especially in "The Old Curiosity Shop" and "Dombey and Son." His creative powers were immense, the numbers of his characters running into the hundreds. Though some of these serve the purpose of lay figures, yet they are redeemed from mere puppetry by some whimsical oddity that stamps the character indelibly on one's mind. "David Copperfield," "Bleak House," and "Pickwick Papers" are usually held to be the best of his work. THE MAN 1. Where did Dickens receive his education? Compare it with that of other novelists. 2. Give the sources of his intimate acquaintance with conditions among the lower class. 3. What moral characteristic of the man took the sting out of his satire? 4. What great quality will ever endear him to the public? 5. Where did Dickens make his home after his reputation had become established? V, 220. 6. What was his attitude toward the poor after he had become a man of substance? 7. Have social conditions in England improved since his day? In what lines and how? STYLE AND WORKS 1. In what is Dickens related to the period of Romanticism? Is he characteristically English? Compare him with Dumas, Daudet, and Harte. 2. What beneficial effect has the reading of his novels had on everyday life? 3. Explain his custom of running several stories at the same time in a novel. III, 254, 259. 4. What is the true secret of his popularity? III, 250.