Chapter five of 'Charles Dickens, the last of the great men', deals with Dickens' popularity after his publication of 'The Pickwick Papers'. The first point Chesterton makes is that one should not assume that popular books are necessarily bad books: the public does not have a bad taste, it just has a taste for a certain type of book, and Charles Dickens was a master in writing that type of book. As Chesterton notes: 'Dickens did not write what the people wanted. Dickens wanted what the people wanted.' Dickens appeals to the common man, both for his humor and his horror.
After this introduction, various early books are discussed. 'Oliver Twist' is dismissed as 'coherently and consistently horrible' (as opposed to the 'Pickwick Papers', which are 'coherently comic and consistently rambling'). 'Nicholas Nickleby' is praised as a typical book from this period, with some delightful characters. 'The old curiosity shop' could have been accompanied by 'The oil shop' and several other Dickensian romances beginning in various shops. Chesterton does not appear to be overly fond of the character of 'Little Nell'. The last book from this period is 'Barnaby Rudge' (which I began last week), supposedly a more 'picturesque' book.
These books are discussed quite fast; specific book discussions is not Chesterton's objective in this book (I understand that he wrote separate introductions to every novel by Dickens, for the 'Everyman's Library'). He rather uses a basic chronology to discuss some general topics (ie the quality of popular books, or the saintly characters of some of Dickens' heroines). As before, Chesterton is most enthusiastic when discussing Dickensian characters.
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