‘Let him feel that he is one of us; once fill his mind with the idea that he has been a thief, and he’s ours, – ours for his life!’
The story of the orphan Oliver, who runs away from the workhouse only to be taken in by a den of thieves, shocked readers when it was first published. Dickens’s tale of childhood innocence beset by evil depicts the dark criminal underworld of a London peopled by vivid and memorable characters — the arch-villain Fagin, the artful Dodger, the menacing Bill Sikes and the prostitute Nancy. Combining elements of Gothic Romance, the Newgate Novel and popular melodrama, in Oliver Twist Dickens created an entirely new kind of fiction, scathing in its indictment of a cruel society, and pervaded by an unforgettable sense of threat and mystery.
This is the first critical edition to use the serial text of 1837-9, presenting Oliver Twist as it appeared to its earliest readers. It includes Dickens’s 1841 introduction and 1850 preface, the original illustrations and a glossary of contemporary slang
Charles John Huffam Dickens (Landport, Portsmouth, 7 de fevereiro de 1812 — Gravesham, Kent, 9 de junho de 1870) foi o mais popular dos romancistas ingleses da era vitoriana.[1]. No início de sua atividade literária também adotou o apelido Boz. A fama dos seus romances e contos, tanto durante a sua vida como depois, até aos dias de hoje, só aumentou. Apesar de os seus romances não serem considerados, pelos parâmetros atuais, muito realistas, Dickens contribuiu em grande parte para a introdução da crítica social na literatura de ficção inglesa.
Entre os seus maiores clássicos estão David Copperfield e Oliver Twist.