My Love-Hate Relationship with Dickens

           

           When telling a friend I was going to be reading Charles Dickens, she in turn shared her loathing of his works as he was supposedly paid by the word, therefore creating unnecessarily lengthy novels.  After hearing this and subsequently reading the novel for myself, I can definitely understand this criticism, so I did a bit of research on the matter.  It turns out, according to washingtonpost.com, Dickens was not in fact paid by the word, however, by the installments which he produced (Jonathan H. Grossman).  This eased my mind for a bit, but the question still rang in my head –why does Dickens utilize so many (seemingly gratuitous) repetitions? 

            In reading Our Mutual Friend, one can easily spot examples of repetition used in an extremely liberal manner.  I will delve into three I have spotted throughout my reading thus far.  The first two examples are quite blatant in their repetition.  The first occurs on page 254 when the Lammles attempt to befriend the Podsnaps, especially through Georgiana.  The narrator states, “So, Georgiana repairing to her friend, Mr. Podsnap went out to dinner, and to dinner, and yet to dinner, arm in arm with Mrs. Podsnap…(Dickens).

           Dickens makes it quite clear to the readers that Georgiana and Mrs. Podsnap are indeed going to dinner together, however the statement begs us to question whether or not this was absolutely needed.  The following example occurs on page 388 when Mr. Headstone professes his love to Lizzie.  He states, ““Yes! You are the ruin – the ruin – the ruin – of me”” (Dickens).  This repetition is arguably more obvious than the first example.  Perhaps, Dickens was attempting to show the direness of Headstone’s situation by repeating “the ruin” so many times, however this statement comes off as much more contrived than purposefully crafted.  The final example comes when Mrs. Wilfer is talking with her daughters at her and Mr. Wilfer’s anniversary about her own mother’s cautionary words.  She states, “‘Not a little man. Promise me, my child, not a little man.  Never, never, never, marry a little man!’ Papa also would remark to me (he possessed extraordinary humour), ‘that a family of whales must not ally themselves with sprats’” (Dickens 451).  This example provides us with both the more obvious repetition, but also the ways Dickens uses repetition in a more clever fashion.  When reading Mrs. Wilfer’s mother’s words, we clearly see the repetition of the cautioning against a “little man”.  After this transparent repetition, readers may understand Mrs. Wilfer’s father’s words as different than her mother’s, however it conveys the exact same idea as the obvious repetition, thus adding no varying function to the novel whatsoever. 

            After closely looking at each of these forms of repetition Dickens utilizes, I find no added meaning in their extra words.  Readers would have understood that Georgiana and Mrs. Podsnap went to dinner without the two extra ways of saying so.  The direness of both Mr. Headstone, and Mrs. Wilfer’s mother’s situations would come across just as strongly sans the repetition.  Which leads me to wonder, did the repetitions somehow play into the installments, or did Dickens simply believe these additions were of some literary value? 

            Perhaps, Dickens did embellish certain sentences in order to fill specific word quotas for his installments.  However, does this fact take away from my enjoyment of the novel any less?   I’m not sure.  Does an author’s need for money take away from the quality of his writing?  Do we, as readers somehow feel cheated, or betrayed by the author if they show signs of this trait?  Do we, as readers want to believe the novels we hold so dearly are given to us in a pure form, and forget there is in fact dollar incentive for the authors to provide us with stories we so desperately crave to read?  I suppose this post raises more questions than answers, but I believe it is a fascinating topic to consider.

I suppose we must keep the author’s livelihood in the back of our minds, but should it belittle the meaning we glean from their works?  No, I have reached the conclusion I do not think so.  So, whether or not Dickens’ profession is made clear to us through his writing, chastising this fact will only take away from the bountiful meaning we could be gaining from his novels.   

Works Cited

Grossman, Jonathan H. "Five Myths about Charles Dickens." Washington Post. N.p., 02 Feb. 2012. Web. 01 Feb. 2013.