Description

Four of Charles Dickens’s most enduring and popular works in one volume.

Oliver Twist. Pip. The ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future. The characters of Charles Dickens live on in our imaginations long after we’ve read his renowned works of social commentary and vivid storytelling. Although these novels were written more than a hundred years ago, no home library today would be complete without them.

This Canterbury Classics edition collects some of Dickens’s most famous and beloved works—The Adventures of Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol, A Tale of Two Cities, and Great Expectations—in an elegant, leather-bound, keepsake edition. For those who’ve never read Dickens, it’s the perfect opportunity to experience his unique and compelling writing. And for those who are already Dickens devotees, an introduction by a renowned scholar will provide additional context and food for thought.

More about Charles Dickens’ Work:

The Adventures of Oliver Twist – originally named “Oliver Twist, or, The Parish Boy’s Progress” was first published as a monthly serial in Bentley’s Miscellany magazine from February 1837 to April 1839 and is Dickens second book. It is a social novel that catalogs the trials of Oliver Twist, an orphan born in a workhouse and sold to an undertaker to be his involuntary apprentice. Eventually Oliver ends up in London where he meets a young member of a gang of pickpockets named The Artful Dodger, as well as the gang’s elderly leader, Fagin.

A Christmas Carol – officially titled “A Christmas Carol in Prose, Being a Ghost-Story of Christmas”, is a Christmas classic published in 1843 that details the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, an old stingy grump. Seven years after Scrooge’s business partner Jacob Marley died, the ghost of Jacob Marley visits Scrooge on Christmas Eve to teach him the error of his heartless ways.

A Tale of Two Cities – is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published in 1859 as a monthly serial magazine like other work by Dickens. The tale is set in London and Paris during the time that lead up to the French Revolution, and the story recounts the tumultuous time from the perspective of three different, but connected, parties; a man in prison, his daughter, and two winemakers.

Great Expectations – is a novel first published in 1860 and placed in the early to mid 1800’s between both the English cities Kent and London. It’s centered around a young oprhan, like another one of Dicken’s more famous novels, and starts with him being assaulted in a graveyard by an escaped prisoner. This is a fitting start for a story full of dark slums, prisons, and struggles with death. As with most of the work by Charles Dickens, Great Expectations is no stranger to themes of the rich versus poor, love and heartbreak, and justice over the wicked.