Charles Dickens: A Life

Charles Dickens: A Life by Claire Tomalin.
London: Penguin, 2012.

Lynn
Lynn chose the book because “she really has a thing about biographies” but she was generally disappointed in it.
The small print was unfortunate because of the effort required to keep reading. Too much detail made reading the text a challenge. It started off as quite interesting but then became tedious and even boring.
Claire Tomalin is obviously an excellent researcher but that doesn’t necessarily make for an interesting read.
The book is thorough and very detailed and she prides herself in her meticulous research.

Lynn has enjoyed the Dickens novels she has read. The profile has been raised by 2012 being the 200th anniversary of Dickens’ birth.
He appears to be a complex man who both worked and played hard: a prolific writer who was money driven. His commitment to social causes and his theatre work counterpoints his lack of commitment to his wife and family
Writing a novel-length story in serial form on a weekly basis would have been difficult to achieve.
An interesting point is his parents’ interest in fostering his sister Fanny’s musical career at the expense of Dickens’ education – highly unusual for the time to prefer a daughter over a son. 7/10
Jenny A
Commented that she felt the book needed a good editing to reduce the amount of detail and help emphasise important points.
Dickens is full of his own importance in spite of (or perhaps because of) receiving no support from his parents.
Agreed the research was meticulous but it the book is not readable. 2/10

Pam
Pam agreed it was well researched but difficult to read. She was grateful to discover the wide raft of talents which Dickens had. He appears to be a genius and dogged by the failings of genius. Dickens obviously had great failings.
All male writers of the time had a core group of male friends with whom to discuss ideas.
Claire Tomalin is highly thought of as a biographer in Britain.
Pam was glad she had read the book in spite of the difficulties. No score

Noriel
There was more information than she could cope with at present. No score as hadn’t read it. Same from Barbara.

Sheena
Not a book for over the summer holidays. Too much detail. Read reviews and selections of the text.
More than she ever wanted to know about Dickens. 3/10

Enid
Had read every 10th page or so. Agreed too much detail and information. Like a text book rather than a book to read for pleasure.
Will choose the Bible for Lynn to read next time. 1/10

Robyn
Dickens was very self-indulgent. She would finish the book but can’t yet. 7/10

Ros
Read ½ of it. Agreed that he was a very difficult man and on the difficulties involved in reading the book.
Astonished at the amount of travel done by people in the book.
The mesmerism episode with Mrs De La Rue is astonishing in that someone would allow a friend without medical training to treat his wife. 7/10

Wendy
The biography is a good insight into the man. He was certainly not socially inept but highly sociable.
The backtracking in the book is irritating and adds to the difficulty of reading it.
She enjoyed the accurate descriptions of areas around Rochester as this is where her family come from. 4/10

Lorita
Fantastic research. Will dip into it. 9/10

Jenny Mac
Couldn’t be read as a novel, more as a text book.
As a Book Club Book, gives it 0/10: For author’s efforts gives it 7/10.

General
The book can be judged on 2 levels:
As a popular book
As a contribution to the literary market.
Could be that the 200th anniversary meant that literary works were released into the popular market that wouldn’t normally have been.

Score
2 members did not score it.

Average score 4.5/10.

It's hard to say something new about an author like Dickens, especially if you limit yourself to 400 pages. Some occasional sparks of insight. I was impressed with the decision to start with Dickens' grandparents and go all the way to the end of the lives of his friends and family, though. ( )

Like young David Copperfield, Charles Dickens was forced to work at a tender age, after his father was imprisoned. There are other similarities to one of Dickens most beloved creations and the author himself, in this wonderful, stirring and impeccably researched biography. Dickens is an endlessly fascinating artist and an impressive humanitarian to boot.
Tomalin expertly follows Dickens through his life, his friends, his tumultuous marriage to Catherine, his many children, his connection with other artists of that period and of course his books, which she gives a detailed account. My only regret is that I had not read more of his work, so I could have made a better connection with her spot-on analysis of each title. My goal is to read one or two of this books a year until I catch up. Love him or hate him, this is a highly recommended bio! ( )

Not only is this great book a superlatively researched and constructed biography, but its account of what came to light about Dickens years after his death is of huge interest. After having ten children with his wife Dickens cast his wife aside and took up with an 18-year-old woman and in great secrecy had a child with her and saw her often in the years before he died. The account of Dickens rise to early fame is told well and one has to be amazed by how much he did in an eage where so mcuh time had to be spent just gettint arounf. His accomplishments are truly unbeleivable. So, though as a man he is often a deplorable person the hard work and industry he displayed all his life long makes for a fascainting story. ( )

This was a tremendously engagingly written biography. It puts across a great sense of Dickens's multiple interests, as author, editor, journalist, social reformer, public idol and many more. The receptions accorded him during his later public readings are like those now accorded to pop stars. At the same time, the author builds on her earlier work on the potentially scandalous secret relationship between Dickens and Ellen Ternan, which was denied for many decades after his death, though now it seems extremely difficult to gainsay the weight of evidence in its favour. The author varies in her coverage of the novels, with rather more description and analysis of the novels of the mid-period from Dombey and Son to Little Dorrit, but rather less for earlier and later ones, with the exception of Our Mutual Friend.

This is a much more readable biography than Peter Ackroyd's monumental 1144 page book that I read over a period of two and a half months in 2009. That was too detailed and both exhaustively and exhaustingly long winded, whereas Tomalin covers the many facets of Dickens's life and literary career very effectively in just over 400 pages. The book comes with useful lists of family members (a genealogy might have been useful) and associates, and places in London and Kent connected with his life. The hardback has lovely illustrations in the inside front and back covers and is an hardback with an illustrated cover but without a dust jacket, not often seen these days. In sum, for lots of reasons, a great reading experience. (Thanks for lending it to me, Ian!) ( )