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Oliver Twist (character)
Oliver Twist is the title character and protagonist of the 1838 novel ''Oliver Twist'' by Charles Dickens. He was the first child protagonist in an English novel.The full title was "Oliver Twist, or The Parish Boy's Progress." Background Based in the 1820s, the orphan, young Oliver is born in a parish workhouse in an unnamed town. His unmarried mother dies during labour. Old Sally, who was present at the birth, takes from the dying woman a locket and ring. Mr Bumble, the Beadle, names the boy Oliver Twist. Oliver is sent to an orphanage, run by Mrs Mann, until he is nine years old, when he is returned to the workhouse. The orphans at the workhouse are starving because of their cruel treatment. They cast lots to decide who will ask for more gruel for them all, and Oliver is chosen. At evening supper, once the gruel is dished out and eaten, Oliver goes to the master and famously says, ''"Please Sir. I want some more"''. He is then branded a troublemaker and offered as an appre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Cruikshank
George Cruikshank (27 September 1792 – 1 February 1878) was a British caricaturist and book illustrator, praised as the "modern Hogarth" during his life. His book illustrations for his friend Charles Dickens, and many other authors, reached an international audience. Early life Cruikshank was born in London. His father, Edinburgh-born Isaac Cruikshank, was one of the leading caricaturists of the late 1790s and Cruikshank started his career as his father's apprentice and assistant. His older brother, Isaac Robert, also followed in the family business as a caricaturist and illustrator. Cruikshank's early work was caricature; but in 1823, at the age of 31, he started to focus on book illustration. He illustrated the first, 1823 English translation (by Edgar Taylor and David Jardine) of ''Grimms' Fairy Tales'', published in two volumes as ''German Popular Stories''. On 16 October 1827, he married Mary Ann Walker (1807–1849). Two years after her death, on 7 March 1851, he m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monks (Oliver Twist)
Edward "Monks" Leeford is a character in the 1838 novel ''Oliver Twist'' by Charles Dickens. He is actually the criminally-inclined half-brother of Oliver Twist, but he hides his identity. Monks' parents separated when he was a child, and his father had a relationship with a young woman, Agnes Fleming. This resulted in Agnes' pregnancy. She died in childbirth after giving birth to the baby that would be named Oliver Twist. Character history Background Oliver Twist was a poor and an orphan boy. He was born in a workhouse . After escaping, Oliver travels to London, where he meets "The Artful Dodger", a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the elderly criminal, Fagin.The orphaned Oliver has no idea of Monks's existence, but Monks knows of the existence of Oliver, and sets out to ruin him. Monks was born from a loveless marriage and was goaded to hatred of the boy by his own mother. Monks accidentally sees him on the streets of London one day and tracks him to the den of F ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Undertaker
A funeral director, also known as an undertaker (British English) or mortician (American English), is a professional involved in the business of funeral rites. These tasks often entail the embalming and burial or cremation of the dead, as well as the arrangements for the funeral ceremony (although not the directing and conducting of the funeral itself unless clergy are not present). Funeral directors may at times be asked to perform tasks such as dressing (in garments usually suitable for daily wear), casketing (placing the corpse in the coffin), and cossetting (applying any sort of cosmetic or substance to the best viewable areas of the corpse for the purpose of enhancing its appearance). A funeral director may work at a funeral home or be an independent employee. Etymology The term mortician is derived from the Roman word ''mort-'' (“death”) + ''-ician''. In 1895, the trade magazine ''The Embalmers' Monthly'' put out a call for a new name for the profession in the US ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apprenticeship
Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a Tradesman, trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners to gain a license to practice in a regulated occupation. Most of their training is done while working for an employer who helps the apprentices learn their trade or profession, in exchange for their continued labor for an agreed period after they have achieved measurable competencies. Apprenticeship lengths vary significantly across sectors, professions, roles and cultures. In some cases, people who successfully complete an apprenticeship can reach the "journeyman" or professional certification level of competence. In other cases, they can be offered a permanent job at the company that provided the placement. Although the formal boundaries and terminology of the apprentice/journeyman/master system often do not extend outside guilds and tr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gruel
Gruel is a food consisting of some type of cereal—such as ground oats, wheat, rye, or rice—heated or boiled in water or milk. It is a thinner version of porridge that may be more often drunk rather than eaten. Historically, gruel has been a staple of the Western diet, especially for peasants. Gruel may be made from millet, hemp, barley, or, in hard times, from chestnut flour or even the less bitter acorns of some oaks. Gruel has historically been associated with feeding the sick and recently weaned children. ''Gruel'' is also a colloquial expression for any watery food of unknown character, e.g., pea soup. Gruel has often been associated with poverty, with negative associations attached to the term in popular culture, as in the Charles Dickens novel '' Oliver Twist''. History Gruel was the staple food of the ancient Greeks, for whom roasted meats were the extraordinary feast that followed sacrifice, even among heroes, and "In practice, bread was a luxury eaten only in towns" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Supper
Supper was originally a secondary lighter evening meal. The main meal of the day, called dinner, used to be served closer to what is known as lunchtime, around the middle of the day, but crept later over the centuries, mostly over the course of the 19th century. When dinner was still at the early time, eating a lighter supper in the evening was very common; it was not always the last meal of the day, as there might be a tea later. Reflecting the typical custom of 17th century elites, Louis XIV dined at noon, with a supper at 10p.m. Even when dinner was in the early evening, supper was served at a ball, or after returning from it, and might be after other evening excursions. At an English ball in 1791, supper was served to 140 guests at 1:00 a.m. They would all have had dinner at home many hours earlier, before coming out. Other, grander, balls served supper even later, up to 3:30 a.m., at a London ball given in 1811 by the Duchess of Bedford. The modern usage of "supper" varies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beadle
A beadle, sometimes spelled bedel, is an official of a church or synagogue who may usher, keep order, make reports, and assist in religious functions; or a minor official who carries out various civil, educational, or ceremonial duties on the manor. The term has pre-Conquest origins in Old English, deriving from the Old English ''bydel'' ("herald, messenger from an authority, preacher"), itself deriving from ''beodan'' ("to proclaim", which has a modern descendant in the English verb ''bid''). In Old English it was a title given to an Anglo-Saxon officer who summoned householders to council. It is also known in Medieval Latin as ''bedellus''. The Domesday Book refers to Beadles as ''bedelli'' or undersheriffs of manors. In religion In England, the word came to refer to a parish constable of the Anglican Church, one often charged with duties of charity. A famous fictional constabulary beadle is Mr. Bumble from Charles Dickens's classic novel '' Oliver Twist'', who overs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mudfog
''The Mudfog Papers'' are an anthology of stories written by Charles Dickens and published from 1837 to 1838 in the monthly literary journal ''Bentley's Miscellany'', which he was then editing. Topics ''The Mudfog Papers'' relates the proceedings of a fictional society, The Mudfog Society for the Advancement of Everything, a Pickwickian parody of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. The latter, founded in York in 1831, was one of numerous Victorian learned societies dedicated to the advancement of science. Like ''The Pickwick Papers'', ''The Mudfog Papers'' claims affinity with parliamentary reports, memoirs and posthumous papers. The serial was illustrated by George Cruikshank. The fictional town of Mudfog was based on Chatham in Kent, where Dickens spent part of his youth. When '' Oliver Twist'' first appeared in ''Bentley's Miscellany'' in February 1837, Mudfog was described by Dickens as the town where Oliver was born and spent his early years, making ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bentley's Miscellany
''Bentley's Miscellany'' was an English literary magazine started by Richard Bentley. It was published between 1836 and 1868. Contributors Already a successful publisher of novels, Bentley began the journal in 1836 and invited Charles Dickens to be its first editor. Dickens serialised his second novel '' Oliver Twist'', but soon fell out with Bentley over editorial control, calling him a "Burlington Street Brigand". He resigned as editor in 1839 and William Harrison Ainsworth took over. Ainsworth would also only stay in the job for three years, but bought the magazine from Bentley a decade later. In 1868 Ainsworth sold the magazine back to Bentley, who merged it with the ''Temple Bar Magazine''. Aside from the works of Dickens and Ainsworth other significant authors published in the magazine included: Wilkie Collins, Catharine Sedgwick, Richard Brinsley Peake, Thomas Moore, Thomas Love Peacock, William Mudford, Mrs Henry Wood, Charles Robert Forrester (sometimes under the pse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Workhouse
In Britain, a workhouse () was an institution where those unable to support themselves financially were offered accommodation and employment. (In Scotland, they were usually known as poorhouses.) The earliest known use of the term ''workhouse'' is from 1631, in an account by the mayor of Abingdon reporting that "we have erected wthn our borough a workhouse to set poorer people to work". The origins of the workhouse can be traced to the Statute of Cambridge 1388, which attempted to address the labour shortages following the Black Death in England by restricting the movement of labourers, and ultimately led to the state becoming responsible for the support of the poor. However, mass unemployment following the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, the introduction of new technology to replace agricultural workers in particular, and a series of bad harvests, meant that by the early 1830s the established system of poor relief was proving to be unsustainable. The New Poor Law of 1834 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oliver Twist
''Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress'', Charles Dickens's second novel, was published as a serial from 1837 to 1839, and as a three-volume book in 1838. Born in a workhouse, the orphan Oliver Twist is bound into apprenticeship with an undertaker. After escaping, Oliver travels to London, where he meets the "Artful Dodger", a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the elderly criminal Fagin. ''Oliver Twist'' unromantically portrays the sordid lives of criminals, and exposes the cruel treatment of the many orphans in London in the mid-19th century. The alternative title, ''The Parish Boy's Progress'', alludes to Bunyan's ''The Pilgrim's Progress'', as well as the 18th-century caricature series by painter William Hogarth, ''A Rake's Progress'' and ''A Harlot's Progress''. In an early example of the social novel, Dickens satirises child labour, domestic violence, the recruitment of children as criminals, and the presence of street children. The novel may have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the la, novella, a singular noun use of the neuter plural of ''novellus'', diminutive of ''novus'', meaning "new". Some novelists, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Ann Radcliffe, John Cowper Powys, preferred the term "romance" to describe their novels. According to Margaret Doody, the novel has "a continuous and comprehensive history of about two thousand years", with its origins in the Ancient Greek and Roman novel, in Chivalric romance, and in the tradition of the Italian renaissance novella.Margaret Anne Doody''The True Story of the Novel'' New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996, rept. 1997, p. 1. Retrieved 25 April 2014. The ancient romance form was revived by Romanticism, especially the histori ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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