The Old Curiosity Shop
We give also a specimen of the typical Dickensian style. The reader should observe in it the qualities of ease, perspicuity, and humor:
The particular picture on which Sam Weller’s eyes were fixed, as he said this, was a highly coloured representation of a couple of human hearts skewered together with an arrow, cooking before a cheerful fire, while a male and female cannibal in modern attire: the gentleman being clad in a blue coat and white trousers, and the lady in a deep red pelisse with a parasol of the same: were approaching the meal with hungry eyes, up a serpentine gravel path leading thereunto. A decidedly indelicate young gentleman, in a pair of wings and nothing else, was depicted as superintending the cooking; a representation of the spire of the church in Langham Place, London, appeared in the distance; and the whole formed a “valentine,” of which, as a written inscription in the window testified, there was a large assortment within, which the shopkeeper pledged himself to dispose of, to his countrymen generally, at the reduced rate of one and sixpence each.
The Pickwick Papers
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY (1811–63)
1. His Life. Thackeray was born at Calcutta, and was descended from an ancient Yorkshire family. His father having died in 1816, the boy was sent to England for his education; and on the voyage home he had a glimpse of Napoleon, then a prisoner on St. Helena. His school was the Charterhouse, and his college was Trinity College, Cambridge, which he entered in 1829. Both at school and college he struck his contemporaries as an idle and rather cynical youth, whose main diversions were sketching and lampooning his friends and enemies. For a time Thackeray had some intention of becoming an artist, and studied art in Paris. Then the loss of his entire fortune drove him into journalism for a living. He contributed both prose and light verse to several periodicals, including Punch and Fraser’s Magazine, winning his way slowly and with much difficulty, for his were gifts that do not gain ready recognition. It was not till nearly the middle of the century that Vanity Fair (1847) brought him some credit, though at first the book was grudgingly received. Thenceforward he wrote steadily and with increasing favor until his death, which occurred with great suddenness. Before his death he had enjoined his executors not to publish any biography, so that of all the major Victorian writers we have of him the scantiest biographical materials.
2. His Novels. For a considerable number of years Thackeray was groping for a means of expression, and wavered between verse, prose, and sketching. His earliest literary work consisted of light and popular contributions to periodicals. The most considerable of these are The Yellowplush Papers (1837), contributed to Fraser’s Magazine and dealing with the philosophy and experiences of Jeames, an imaginary footman, and The Book of Snobs (1846), which originally appeared in Punch as The Snob Papers. Snobs, who continued to be Thackeray’s pet abhorrence, are defined by him as those “who meanly admire mean things,” and in this early book their widespread activities are closely pursued and harried. The History of Samuel Titmarsh (1841), The Great Hoggarty Diamond (1841), and The Fitzboodle Papers (1842) appeared first in Fraser’s Magazine. They are deeply marked with his biting humor and merciless observation of human weaknesses, but they found little acceptance. The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon (1842) is a distinct advance. It is a species of picaresque novel, telling of the adventures of a gambling rascal, an amiable scapegrace who prowls over Europe. In range the book is wider, and the grasp of incident and character is more sure. In Vanity Fair (1847) the genius of Thackeray reaches high-water mark. In theme it is concerned chiefly with the fortunes of Becky Sharp, an adventuress. In dexterity of treatment, in an imaginative power that both reveals and transforms, and in a clear and mournful vision of the vanities of mankind the novel is among the greatest in the language. Pendennis (1848) continues the method of Vanity Fair. Partly autobiographical, it portrays life as it appears to the author. Thackeray refuses to bow to convention and precedent, except when these conform to his ideals of literature. In this book Thackeray openly avows his debt to Fielding, the master whom he equals and in places excels. Henry Esmond (1852) is a historical novel of great length and complexity, showing the previous excellences of Thackeray in almost undiminished force, as well as immense care and forethought, a minute and accurate knowledge of the times of Queen Anne, and an extraordinary faculty for reproducing both the style and the atmosphere of the period. By some judges this book is considered to be his best. His novel The Newcomes (1854) is supposed to be edited by Pendennis. In tone it is more genial than its predecessors, but it ends tragically with the death of the aged Colonel Newcome. With The Virginians (1857) the list of the great novels is closed. This book, a sequel to Henry Esmond, is a record of the experiences of two lads called Warrington, the grandsons of Henry Esmond himself. In the story, a pale shadow of her former self, appears Beatrix Esmond, the fickle heroine of the earlier book.
In 1860 Thackeray was appointed first editor of The Cornhill Magazine, and for this he wrote Lovel the Widower (1860), The Adventures of Philip (1861), and a series of essays, charming and witty trifles, which were reissued as The Roundabout Papers (1862). Both in size and in merit these last novels are inferior to their predecessors. At his death he left an unfinished novel, Denis Duval.
Like Dickens, Thackeray had much success as a lecturer on both sides of the Atlantic, though in his methods he did not follow his fellow-novelist. Two courses of lectures were published as The English Humourists (1852) and The Four Georges (1857). All his life he delighted in writing burlesques, the best of which are Rebecca and Rowena (1850), a comic continuation of Ivanhoe, and The Legend of the Rhine (1851), a burlesque tale of medieval chivalry.
3. His Poetry. On the surface Thackeray’s verse appears to be frivolous stuff, but behind the frivolity there is always sense, often a barb of reproof, and sometimes a note of sorrow. The Ballads of Policeman X is an early work contributed in numbers to Punch. Others, such as The White Squall and The Ballad of Bouillabaisse, have more claim to rank as poetry, for they show much metrical dexterity and in places a touch of real pathos.