David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

 

David Copperfield

by Charles Dickens

In David Copperfield, Dickens explores his favorite themes of the industrial Victorian era: the exploitation of the weak and poor by the wealthy, and the moral integrity of the exploited versus the evil and greed of their superiors.

The story follows the life of David Copperfield, who lives with his young mother and nursemaid as a young boy. As he grows he has to navigate an overbearing and abusive stepfather; an abusive schoolmaster; hunger and child labor; and the difficulties of making a life for himself out of those circumstances as he grows into adulthood.

Along the way he encounters a large cast of characters, all with their own Dickensian quirks who help and hinder him along the way. Some he comes to love who then betray his trust and confidence, some he despises who return the favor, and some who seem bad at the beginning but become his saving graces. David Copperfield, himself, is very likeable, almost too likeable. He is morally upright no matter what befalls him, which was kind of annoying. I wanted many times for him to strike out. He only really does so once. Dickens likes to differentiate between the good and evil characters strongly, making no secret of who we should be rooting for. However, their was one morally grey character that I really enjoyed, Miss Mowcher the beautician dwarf who has a keen eye and a quick wit. She seemed somewhat mischievous, but turned out to be forthright.

Copperfield lives and works with a variety of people throughout the book and seems to be loved by all of them, save his evil stepfather, Mr. Murdstone, his sister, Miss Murdstone, and the treacherous Uriah Heep. The particular quirks of these characters were funny and interesting, and Dickens loved to employ those quirks to excess, which often made them seem one-dimensional. And most of the story is about the lives and trials of those characters, where Copperfield plays a supporting role in their dramas. I think the story could have been half its size if we were only concerned with his own part in them.

I think that was my biggest issue with the book. It didn't need to be so long. I think there were only a handful of sentences that didn't contain any commas. Dickens loves a sentence that is qualified and divided by many, many commas.

All in all, the story was good and I liked the characters, settings, and arc. It is a happily ever after story, which is not my favorite thing, but for its time it did its job examining morality and the wealth divide. The commentary on marriage equality was interesting, with a few female characters taking equal partnership in their marriages, and having strong, independent minds. For these reasons I think David Copperfield deserves 4 stars.