Society's Social Slip-Up: Oliver Twist, written by Charles Dickens

Social class systems in the nineteenth century were comprised of the upper class, the middle class, the working class, and the underclass. The different social classes can be “distinguished by inequalities in such areas as power, authority, wealth, working and living conditions, life-styles, life-span, education, religion, and culture” (Cody). The poor, also known as peasants, were usually mistreated and segregated from the wealthy, or those of higher class. During his time, Charles Dickens “seen as a champion of “the poor” by some of the poor themselves” (“What was”). It is said that one of his greatest achievements “was to bring the problem of poverty to the attention of his readers through introducing varieties of poor persons into almost all of his novels, and showing the “deserving” majority of the poor, bravely struggling against the forces arrayed against them” (“What was”). This is clearly evident in A Tale of Two Cities. During the nineteenth century Victorian era, social class systems were a common excuse for the division and mistreatment of many individuals, as evidenced in Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

From the moment of his birth, Oliver Twist is besieged by pure evil, and while he grows up without knowledge of what being good is like, having never seen it, having never experienced it, he is able to maintain a level of morality that most of the adults around him cannot. His disposal into the workhouse, an institution original designed to help the poor but has been transformed into a house of punishment by the New Poor Law which callous

In large communities, one’s social status reflects both how an individual is treated and how they are represented throughout the community. In Great Expectations by Charles Dickens and the Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Pip and Holden, respectively, increasingly acknowledge the upper class for attaining more money while sympathizing with the lower class for being uneducated and receiving no rights as citizens. Charles Dickens describes the importance of wealth and popularity in the 1800’s as an essential part of life. He portrays the luxuries and level of comfort the rich receive through Pip, and makes the reader realize that society will always judge one on how much money they possess rather than how good hearted one may be. Additionally,

Oliver twist is one of the well known novel during the Victorian era. Charles Dickens, a nineteenth century writer mentions the the story of the young boy named Oliver twist in England and the advantures that happen to him.the novel theme up with many interrelated ideas.it is concentrated with the miseries of poverty and the spread of its degrading effects through society,Many evils are awaken in the society because of poverty for instance hunger, homelessness illiteracy etc.which was shown clearly in the novel.one of the worst consequences of poverty and being deprived of life’s essential is crime,with all of its corrosive effects on human nature.in the Victorian era,poverty experienced was extreme in case of the working classes.the

We see that Charles Dickens recognizes the poverty in the people. He describes the people as “… men with bare arms, matted locks, and cadaverous

Charles Dickens, author of Great Expectations, provides a perfect example of the hope of class mobility. The novel portrays very diverse and varied social classes which spread from a diligent, hardworking peasant (Joe) to a good-natured middle class man (Mr. Wemmick) to a rich, beautiful young girl (Estella). Pip, in particular, elevates in the social pyramid from a common boy to a gentleman with great expectations. With his rise in society, he also alters his attitude, from being a caring child to an apathetic gentleman. During this process, Pip learns how he should act and how to become a real gentleman. Social mobility and wealth, furthermore, carves a disposition and how a character is looked upon.

The novel, “Great Expectations,” by Charles Dickens is a story renowned for it’s vivid descriptive qualities and unexpected plot twists. When Dickens was writing the novel, his view on society was very dark. Dickens felt that money makes people generally more harsh and cruel, while the lower class is more kind .This is shown in Great Expectations with the kindness of Joe, the changes Pip underwent, and the cruelty of Drummle.

Have you ever thought about how it would be to live in a time of poverty? How

One great example of this is the way Mrs. Pocket handles her baby. Usually the nurses or her other daughter Jane take care of the baby, so when Mrs. Pocket takes care of the baby, it is humorous to the reader. When society first sees her handle the baby, “Mrs. Pocket took it the other way, and got its head upon the table; which was announced to all resent by a prodigious concussion” (Dickens 179). It is clear that Mrs. Pocket doesn’t know how to care for her baby, and while laughable, this is also a very sad situation. It was her baby that she gave birth to, and she doesn’t even know how to hold it! Dickens is clearly making fun of the higher class and how heavily they rely on hired help to take care of their children. This is seen again later in the chapter. At this point, she is helpless in her attempts of taking care of the baby. Dickens writes, “Into Mrs. Pocket’s lap, and gave it the nutcrackers to play with...forgetting all about the baby on her lap: who did most appalling things with the nutcrackers” (Dickens 179-180). This is an obvious lack of parental nurturing in the Pocket home, and this is an effect of their wealth and heavy reliance on servants. Dickens makes another point against the upper class when he shows Pip’s lack of control after receiving his sum. Dickens writes, “We spent as much money as we could, and got as little for it as people could make up their minds to give us” (Dickens 256). Pip is clearly in panic when he receives such a large sum of money. Due to this, he loses control and does what he has always wished to do: spend it all! He doesn’t know anything else. As an effect of receiving so much money, Pip spends it impulsively on silly things, such as the gentlemen’s society. In summary, Dickens poked fun at the upper class’s mannerisms throughout the entire

The two novels “Great Expectations” and “To Kill a Mockingbird” relate us about discrimination during two different periods in history, even though their characters have similar characteristics. The society represented in these books is unequal, because powerful people tended to be more dominant over the poor ones. Certainly, it reflects the disadvantages of not having an education, and remarks that without it, people have no principles. Of course, these characters seek success like Pip, who was always persistent and fought to reach his goals. “Yet, having already made his fortune in his own mind, he was so unassuming with it that I felt quite graceful to him for not being puffed up.” (Dickens 185). Pip went through many harsh moments to reach his goals, because he wasn´t used to that environment. This environment of envy and a society in which being rich was more important than the values in life and humility. In “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Great Expectations”, the social inequality is represented through children in different status´s development that visualize the injustice among the hierarchy.

In Oliver Twist, Dickens wrote “The deep remembrance …………. of the misery it was to my young heart to believe that day by day, what I had learned and thought and delighted in and raised my fancy and emulation up by was passing away from me……… cannot be written.” As a child labour, he would dine on a slice of pudding and for his twelve hour daily labour, receive a meager wage of six shillings a week” (Oliver Twist).

Victorian England was notorious for, along with top hats, its outdated “justice” system. Fraught with corruption, expired methods, and disorganization, the Victorian judiciary system was a severe flaw in the royal kingdom that was partially fed by the crime-fearing public and indifferent servants of the law. Growing up in an oppressive environment reminiscent of Victorian England’s own corrupt justice system, Pip’s journey from childhood to adulthood illustrates a gradual realization of the willful blindness of his fellow man to the injustice served to the convicted criminal, and indicates the cyclical nature of how poverty and fear feed the public consensus on crime. As explored by John H. Hagan Jr.’s article entitled “The Poor Labyrinth: The Theme of Social Injustice in Dickens's “Great Expectations”", in which Pip’s own life, as well as the lives of those around him illustrate how socioeconomic differences played a significant role in how individuals perceived the law and one another.

This measured acknowledgment that all is not wrong in the workhouse contrasts with the way Dickens introduces Twist's workhouse experience.  If this he writes that the "parish authorities magnanimously and humanely resolved that Oliver should be 'farmed', or, in other words, that he should be dispatched to a branch-workhouse some three miles off, where twenty or thirty other juvenile offenders against the poor-laws rolled about the floor all day, without the inconvenience of too much food or too much clothing, under the parental supervision of an elderly female who received the culprits at and for the consideration of sevenpence-halfpenny per small head per week" (Oliver Twist 48).  The tone of this workhouse description here is, of course,

It was a topic best swept under the rug during this time and the upper classes really had no clue as to the horrible state of living these people had to go through to survive. Oliver Twist was an alarming call for the upper class. He creates an amalgamation of grim realism with merciless satires He describes the issues like the failure of the charity, purity of corrupt city, the countryside idealized , disguised or mistaken identities etc . The society and class concept which is made by the upper class of the society that gave birth to class consciousness; similarly poverty to criminals. There was so much development that people hired poor kids to work. The building of criminals cannot be totally blamed to them it was the circumstance who made them chose this path. Poverty is a prominent theme in this novel. Although the text, he describes the theme, describing slums so decrepit that whole row of houses are on the point of ruin. The use of symbolism is widely seen. Also, the ending of the characters are differentiated, the people who were good and suffered had happy ending and apparently the other people who were bad had sad

People tend naively see orphans and those without caring families as hopeless and loveless creatures. However, the goodness of strangers can easily prove these thoughts nonsensical as people can provide an abundance of support and love to those with no blood relation to them and can embrace strangers as family. In Charles Dickens’ two novels Great Expectations and Oliver Twist, Dickens challenges the typical idea of parentage and suggests the through love and generosity anyone can become a guardian or mentor figure. Therefore, people should not place as much faith in blood relations and look to others for sources of guidance and compassion.