ABSTRACT
Charles Dickens was born on 7 February 1812. He spent a happy child-hood at Chatham, where his father was a clerk, but the boy's world collapsed when his father, whom he greatly admired, was imprisoned for debt. At the age of twelve, Dickens was forced to fend for himself, working for six shillings a week in a blacking factory. The misery of these months is reflected in the early part of David Copperfield. But there were also benefits, since it was then that he accumulated that knowledge of London street life which served him well in his later career. He returned to school after his father's release; then, aged fifteen, entered a solicitor's office as an underclerk. He made strenuous efforts to learn shorthand, and so gained a role as a reporter of parliamentary debates. Entry into newspaper publishing led to a series of contributions to the Evening Chronicle and Monthly Magazine, which developed into his earliest work, Sketches by 'Boz' (1836-37). These were sufficiently popular to encourage the publishers Chapman and Hall to commission him to write a series on the activities of a fictional gentleman's club. The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club appeared in episodes from April 1836 onwards, and were published in book form in the following year. The series achieved success with the introduction of Sam Weller into the story, so that, by the end of the year, Dickens had earned two thousand pounds. His literary career was established, and he pursued it through a series of novels, journalistic and editorial work, and in later times through readings of his works. He interested himself in philanthropic and radical causes, travelled extensively, and died unexpectedly of a stroke at his home in Rochester on 9 June 1870.
