Wow! eBook
The Selected Letters of Charles Dickens First Edition
Author(s): Jenny Hartley
- Publisher: OUP Oxford
- Publication Date: 2 Feb. 2012
- Edition: First Edition
- Language: English
- Print length: 496 pages
- ISBN-10: 0199591415
- ISBN-13: 9780199591411
Book Description
Dickens was a man with ten times the energy of ordinary mortals. There seem to have been twice the number of hours in his day, and he threw himself into letter-writing as he did into everything else. This eagerly awaited selection takes us straight to the heart of his life, to show us Dickens at first hand. Here he is writing out of the heat of the moment: as a novelist, journalist, and magazine editor; as a social campaigner and traveller in Europe and America, and as friend, lover, husband, and father.
Reading and writing letters punctuated the rhythms of Dickens’s day. ‘I walk about brimful of letters’, he told a friend. He claimed to write ‘at the least, a dozen a day’. Sometimes it was a chore but more often a pleasure: an outlet for high spirits, sparkling wit, and caustic commentary – always as seen through his highly individual and acutely observing eye.
Whether you dip in or read straight through, this selection of his letters creates afresh the brilliance of being Dickens, and the sheer pleasure of being in his company.
Editorial Reviews
Review
Among the dozens of Dickens publications connected with the bicentenary of the author’s birth … it is hard to imagine one more necessary than this ―
Times Literary Supplementglorious letters reflecting every facet of Dickens’s life; should not be missed ―
Sunday TimesThis is Dickens by Dickens. Whatever comes out in this bicentenary year, do not miss it. ―
The Sunday Times(Hartley’s) selection is a miracle of compression and editorial tact ―
New StatesmanDickens lovers will all be grateful to Hartley for her skill and judgement. ―
Literary ReviewEdited with unobtrusive intelligence and insight by Jenny Hartley ―
The Independenta marvellous volume ―
The ScotsmanIt’s a thrilling, surprisingly fresh book. ―
The Evening StandardAn absolute gem … reads better than any actual novel Dickens ever wrote … Hartley would please a great many readers by producing a second volume from the same dragon-hoard … A typically classy Oxford affair ―
Open LettersThis is the book we have all been waiting for … Every reader has his or her favourite aspect of Dickens, and may miss a particular letter or letters – I am no exception. But I do not think anyone could have made a more balanced selection from the embrarrassment of riches in his letters, or justified her choices more persuasively. We are all in Professor Hartley’s debt for her magnificent edition. ―
Dickens QuarterlyThe 450 [letters] included in
The Selected Letters of Charles Dickens First Edition, edited by Jenny Hartley, are more revealing and more intimate than any biography. ― Joyce Carol Oates, New York Review of Books
