Dickens & America
On January 3rd in 1842 Dickens set off for America aged thirty in order to visit the land which he thought was “a haven for the oppressed”. This trip was a chance to take a year off from writing; however one of his aims was to put forward the idea of international copyright because many of his works were pirated in both Europe and America meaning that Dickens often didn’t receive a penny for his writing. Dickens failed to succeed because there would be no international copyright law for fifty years.
Dickens was generally disappointed about his America trip; it really wasn’t the place he thought it would be and made several comments about it.
“this is not the republic I came to see; this is not the republic of my imagination”
Dickens even wrote a book called “American Notes” attacking the slavery he saw first hand and later a novel called “Martin Chuzzlewit” in which he comments further about America in a disparaging way.
The Second Time around…
Despite his earlier comments about America, Dickens decided to return in 1867 to do a series of readings of his work. However, it was during this trip that Dickens fell terribly ill and suffered greatly. His health was seriously declining and he had to return on doctors orders.
Dickens’s Writing
Dickens is often referred to a “social critic” meaning that many of his sketches, plays and novels make comments or points about society in general.
One of the most obvious one of these is “American Tales” which is his criticism and his grave disappoint whilst visiting America. He disliked the greed and brutality of American life.
Another book which contains some social criticism is…
A Tale of Two Cities
A Tale of Two Cities is a novel that was written by Charles Dickens and published in 1859. It is set in the times of the French Revolution which lasted from 1789 to 1799 and the “two cities” are London and Paris.
The French Revolution
In May 1789 Louis XVI called the Estates-General to a meeting to discuss the deepening financial crisis in France that was burdening the French Government. All three estates were present at this meeting:
- The First Estate - - the Church
- The Second Estate – The Nobles and
- The Third estate which basically was everybody else including peasants, worker and middle classes
In this meeting, Louis had to ask them to change the tax system so he could get more money and try and stop the collapse of the government and pay off the mountains of debt that they had built up. The Estates-General were infuriated, especially the Third Estate. They were the poorest in the country but still had to pay all the taxes, and they weren’t prepared to do so anymore.
Because the Estates-General refused to back down and help their King, Louis tried to shut them down however they were not to be beaten and this is where the chaos began.
The Estates continued to have meeting in private and met in Tennis Court at the royal palace of Versailles near Paris and promised not to stop meeting until Louis gave them some power - this is what became the Tennis Court Oath.
On the 14th of July, 1789 the people of Paris were beginning to become scared that the King was going to use soldiers to try and control the rebellion so they stormed the Bastille Prison to get access to guns and cause more chaos by letting the prisoners go. At the same time, peasants all over France began to burn down the nobles’ houses. It was complete and utter anarchy and only just the start of the revolution.
The next step in the revolution was that the Estates-General took control of the country claiming to represent all the people of France and that they had the right to rule the country. By the end of 1970 they had gotten rid of most of the old laws of France, abolished the feudal system, ended the legal power of the nobles, made everyone to pay taxes and taken away the land that the church owned which was 1/3 of France. It also declared that all French citizens were equal.
The revolution all became out of hand when they started to attack anyone who opposed them. With Maximillien Robespierre as there new leader they killed anyone against the, this time was known as the “Terror”. The Revolution almost until 1815 when the monarchy was restored and King Louis XVI’s younger brother became King Louis XVIII.
Dickens and the French Revolution
Charles Dickens often said that his inspiration for writing a Tale of Two Cities was because of the “wonderful” book by his close friend Thomas Carlyle about the French Revolution. He saw the French Revolution as an extremely important time in history and thinks it is also very important to learn from it. Dickens saw that history wasn’t just a timeline of events but often a cycle, from which we can learn about future events.
Dickens also claims that it was not just the French Revolution which inspired him to write but also a play on he collaborated on with Wilkie Collins called “The Frozen Deep”. A Tale of Two Cities for him was not just about the revolution, but also about the battle and fight for freedom out of pure passion.
