How does Dickens portray his attitude to charity in the
How does Dickens portray his attitude to charity in the
Opening chapters of Oliver Twist
The novel Oliver Twist was written by Charles Dickens in the mid 1930's. Society in the mid 1800's had a huge gulf between the rich and the poor, This was because before 1834, the cost of looking after the poor was growing more expensive every year. This cost was paid by the middle and upper classes in each town through their local taxes. There was a real suspicion amongst the middle class and upper classes that they were paying the poor to be lazy and avoid work. This made a divide between the rich and the poor, this was because the middle and upper class people did not want to be paying for the lower class people with there hard earned money to sit around all day and just be given a home and food for nothing, while they have to work all day and pay out for the lower class people,when they would mush rather be using their money on their own families.
The poor law was a burden of the parishes top care for the poor through alms and taxes. The poor was the main form of charity around at the time. After 1834 these laws where supposedly changed so that the poor law provided aid and assistance to impoverished people. However the system had serious flaws.The New Poor Law was really a series of measures enacted in 1834. It was deisgned that the workhouses would not be pleasant places. This was thought that it would provide added incentive for people to be self sufficient. Charles Dickens used Oliver Twist to point out truths about Victorian England that polite society tried to ignore.
Parishes were bounded together into unions by the new poor law. Each unoin had a workhouse, and all those seeking relief were required to become inmates in the work house. The new law made seeking relief as undesirable as possible. These workhouses were little more than a prison for the poor. Charles Dickens showed his own attitude on the poor law in sarcasm and personification.
"Although I am not disposed to maintain that the being born in a workhouse, is in itself the most fortunate and enviable circumstance that can possibly befall a human being."
Here Dickens is being sarcastic he saying that it couldn't be considered good being born into a work house. Dickens thought on the charity were that it was not a fair process the poor were human to and did not deserve to be treated in such ways, as a whole Dickens thought the poor law was a good idea but was never used correctly, the poor were treated as if they had done something wrong, they were never treated properly.
"Oliver had been surrounded by careful Grandmothers, anxious aunts, experienced nurses, and Doctors of profound wisdom, he would have most inevitably and indubitably have been killed in no time"
Again Dickens is using sarcasm to get the point across that the, Doctors, nurses, Grandmothers and aunts, didn't care about the people they were helping this was just a job they were getting paid and that was all that mattered to them.
The Charity's were said to be,
"a kindly generosity and helpfulness, especially aid given to those in need an institution which gives help to those in need."
Although this was not the case. The workhouses made to look uninviting. The unions paid for the cheapest labour o help the poor, these people did not care about the welfares of the people in the workhouses.
"A benevolent goodwill towards, or a love of humanity"
The nurses, the Doctors and others who worked to help the people in the workhouses would not have been helping them at all if they was not getting paid for it.
"A gift for public benevolent purposes"
They never worked there to help the poor, the parishes paid them for there work, there was no good will involved on there side. The parishes had set up the workhouses to help the poor but it made them lose all dignity they may have had.
There is four main issues Dickens covers in in the first few chapters of Oliver Twist.
"For a long time it was ushered into this world of sorrow and trouble, by the parish surgeon, it remained a matter of considerable doubt whether the child could survive to bear and name at all"
Charles Dickens refers to Oliver as it, this was what he would have been just another mouth to feed, he is not cared for, Children born in workhouses were left to fend for themselves. Many didn't even make it to be named. This is one of the main issues Dickens refers to in the first chapter. A baby needs to be looked after and kept warm, this never happened here.
Another issue he brings up is the big divide between the rich and the poor, the rich begrudge the poor as there taxes are being spent on ...
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Charles Dickens refers to Oliver as it, this was what he would have been just another mouth to feed, he is not cared for, Children born in workhouses were left to fend for themselves. Many didn't even make it to be named. This is one of the main issues Dickens refers to in the first chapter. A baby needs to be looked after and kept warm, this never happened here.
Another issue he brings up is the big divide between the rich and the poor, the rich begrudge the poor as there taxes are being spent on them. The poor are not treated like fairly in the workhouses.
"Give it a little gruel"
These were words spoken by the surgeon in the first chapter refering to what they should feed Oliver. The food in the workhouses was meagre. The meager diet instituted in the workhouse prompted Dickens to quip that the poor were offered the choice of
"Being starved by a gradual process in the house, or by a quick one out of it"
Basically he is sayin they were so poorly fed that if they stayed they would gradually starve to death or they take a quicker exit and kill themselves.
"The workhouse was little more than a prison a prison for the poor"
Civil liberties were denied, families were separated, and human dignity was destroyed, this was a big issue that Dickens refers to in the first few chapter the poor were treated unfairly and the poor law had many flaws that needed to change.
In the first paragraph of novel, Dickens writes about a "Workhouse"
The workhouses were very large and unattractive buildings. They were built like this to score people away from going into them. They were designed to look very uninviting. Workhouses were for lower class people who could not afford to live out of them anymore and assist help from the parishes.
"A workhouse, and in this workhouse was born: on a day and date which I need not trouble myself to repeat, inasmuch as it can be of no possible consequence to the reader"
Dickens is saying he does not want to remember the day when the workhouses where opened as they a horrible place and no human being should have to endure it.
"This world of sorrow and trouble"
Dickens is saying Oliver was born into this world straight away it was his fortune. Dickens had witnessed the society in the 1800's and new Oliver was not going to get much of a good life being born into a workhouse. He feels that the children born into this have no chance of making something of themselves he feels it is a unfair life to have to be born into.
Dickens says he does not envy those born into a workhouse. The conditions in workhouses were not good, they were made to be unpleasant. The food was meagre and meals were to be eaten in silence. Upon entering the workhouse families were separated and assigned to same-sex quarters. Also the children were separated from adults. Infants were sent to "baby farms".
Rather than finding this treatment motivational it broke the spirit of many people forced to live there. The workhouse was little more than a prison for the poor. Dickens tells you that he does not envy them to get across the point that the workhouses were not a place for a child to be brought into they had no future. He attempts to show the reader his view on the workhouses and that he thought very little of them. Dickens attitude is people should be nicer as that's what a charity is, where people help people more in need than themselves. In this institution they treat poor people like nothing, as if they are just another scrounger born into this world to take the taxes. Poor people are seen as nothing. He feels if you are born into a workhouse you are not being given a fair chance in life. He made this point because he wants people to no this was no life to be born into.
Dickens wants people to see what the health service was like in the 1800's, to do this he uses character studies. This gives you a clear view of what the nurses and doctors were like in those days.
"A pauper woman, who was rendered rather misty by an unwonted allowance of beer; and a parish surgeon who did such matters by contract"
Here Dickens is trying to express that the parish surgeon was only there because he was being paid, and the same for the nurse. Her drinking shows she has no care for the patients welfare and she just gives them what they need and she doesn't care what happens to them afterwards. He is ridiculing the poor law, he feels that the people who are supposed to be taking care of others and only there for the money.
"A benevolent goodwill towards, or a love of humanity"
Dickens is saying that the workers of the workhouses are only there for the money not to help others, or out of goodwill.
In chapter one Dickens refers to Oliver as,
"a new burden having been imposed upon the parish"
This is not his own personal view. He is referring to the points of view of those who manage the workhouses, because to them he is just another mouth to feed and take count of, and of society in general they think of him as just another person who there hard earned taxes is going to be used for.
Again in chapter one Dickens mentions the nurses drinking, he explains that the nurse has been drinking from,
"a green glass bottle, the contents of which she had been tasting in a corner with evident satisfaction"
He thinks that she is one of the people they rely on to help them, and she couldn't even care. The parish hired the cheapest people to manage the workhouses, who's jobs were therefore never done to the best ability. All they were concerned about was being paid to them the patient was just another number to there pay slip, as they got paid for how many patients they took care of. They didn't care what happened to the patient after they and given them all they had to give them, to them this was just a way of making money it wasn't about helping people.
"She imprinted her cold white lips passionately on its forehead"
Dickens is trying to show you the mothers love for her child, she is passionate about him. He uses this to compare the differences between how the doctors and nurses treat the child. This is the first positive image used, she is passionate about her son. In comparison to the manager of the workhouse the coldness they give a child born into the workhouse. This is the first moment anyone engenders any emotion in anyone. This is quickly followed by his mothers death, Dickens is trying to show you that the only good thing in the babies lives can be taken away as quick as that. This is compared in the same way that she is an unmarried woman, the love of her family would have been taken away when found she was pregnant. The workhouse is a better place for her to do die, anonymously, but with the love of her child, instead of with the family who are supposed to love her, but because of her error have taken that love away from her. Dickens is trying to widen the view of charity, charity starts at home, if this does not exist their how can a charity that doesn't give you the love and support a home does help you through the bad times ahead, if not even your family will.
"Its very likely it will be troublesome. Give it a little gruel if it is"
This line spoken by the doctor, to the nurse is shocking, because a doctors role in the babies life could be critical, Doctors are supposed to care for their patient and make sure they get everything a new born baby needs. A baby relies on the people who are supposed to care for the baby to give exactly what it needs to helps it survive to adulthood. A baby needs milk, gruel is not healthy for a new born. He is showing no care for the babies welfare, he is treating him as if he just another number to the workhouse. He has no intension of helping this baby.
He also says in chapter one.
"you needn't mind sending up to me, if the child cries, nurse"
Here the doctor is saying don't bother sending him up to me he hasn't got much of a chance anyway, so why bother. This is also very shocking to the reader as, surly everyone deserves a chance to fight for their life, he's the doctor he should be helping this new born baby.
"A parish child- to be cuffed and buffeted through the world- despised by all, and pitied by none"
Once Oliver is dressed, he is labelled as poor. He would get treated differently, to the rest of society. Orphans in the mid 1880's were just fought of as another worker, they were labelled and sent off to work.
"if he could have known that he was an orphan, left to the tender mercies of church wardens and overseers, perhaps he would have cried louder"
Here Dickens is showing if Oliver had known what he was being born into, he would have been even more upset, like so many other children.
At the end of chapter one Dickens is, ironic, and sarcastic about the way Oliver is treated by the church wardens,
"left to the tender mercies of church wardens"
All babies come out the same, this is the point that Charles Dickens is trying to get across. Church wardens are supposed to care for all and treat all people the same, as they would like to be treated themselves. Charles Dickens is trying to say, this is not what happens in the workhouses. You are labelled, and to that label depends on how you will be treated.
"Oliver was the victim of a systematic course of treachery and deception"
The message Charles Dickens is trying to give across, is that, Oliver could not choose what happened to him. He was treated like another parcel, passed around, he was not wanted Oliver was left to fend for himself.
In chapter to Charles Dickens refers to the parish babies as,
"juveineille offenders against the poor laws"
Here he is showing you the view of society and the parish. They think of the babies born, as just another mouth to feed, that will be paid out through our taxes. He is also showing that, the babies are labelled before they are even born.
Dickens then explains that Mrs Mann,
"Was a woman of wisdom and experience; she knew what was good for children: and she had a very accurate perception of what was good for herself"
Charles Dickens is saying, that Mrs Mann, and women in her position, new what they were doing.
seven pence-halfpenny per small head per week. Seven pence-halfpenny's worth per week is a good round diet for a child"
This was the amount, women like Mrs Mann would have been given per child to feed them, like many other women in her situation, not all this money went on the child.
"She appropriated the greater part of the weekly stipend to her own use"
Mrs Mann like others, would cut down the money she was supposed to spend on food for the children, and spent it on herself. He is trying to tell you that they also put themselves first and made sure that through what they were doing, they were getting something out of it for themselves.
In chapter two Charles Dickens wants to put a clear picture int eh readers mind about the neglect these children were going through.
"For at the very moment when a child had contrived to exist upon the smallest possible portion of the weakest possible food, it did perversely happen in eight and a half cases out of ten, either that it sickened from want and cold, or fell into the fire from neglect, or got half-smothered by accident."
This creates a greater initial response from the reader, as it puts a picture of the sufferin these children went through, in the mid 1800's. This works better than of Charles Dickens had just wrote, the children were being neglected. He is showing the neglected children were, just existing.
"Perhaps to this circumstance may be attributed his having any ninth birth-day at all."
Oliver's birthday treatment, would be found shocking by the reader, because here it is saying Oliver is lucky to have made it to his ninth birthday. They just put this happening down to a particular reason or circumstance. Oliver's birthday, meant he moved into a workhouse, were he would learn a trade, it wasn't celebrated. This now meant he could work for them.
"Oliver was about to say that he would go along with anybody with great readiness, when, glancing upwards, he caught sight of Mrs Mann, who had got behind Mr Beadle's chair, and was shaking her fist at him with a furious countenance."
This shows Mrs Mann knows she has Treated Oliver badly but doesn't want, Mr Beadle to know of this, so she makes sure that Oliver does not show Mr Beadle how horrible she has been. This shows the reader, the children who where in the care, of, Mrs Mann, were not being looked after.
In chapter two, Charles Dickens wrote,
"where, on a rough hard bed, he sobbed himself to sleep, what a noble illustration of the tender laws of England"
This relates back to the saying,
"you've made your bed: now you'll have to lie on it"
At no point did Oliver choose were he lay, his future has been mapped out for him he cant change the inevitable. Charles Dickens wrote this to show, create a picture of the world they where living in at the time and the unfair justice of Oliver's future, he used sarcasm to show this. Oliver is a victim of society.
In chapter two Charles Dickens, mocks the poor law, he does this because he does not agree, that the poor law Amendment act of 1834.
"So they established the rule, that all poor people should have the alternative (for they would compel nobody not they) of being starved by a gradual process in the house, or by a quick one out of it."
Here he is showing you the unfairness of the poor laws, how they treated the people, in the workhouses. The poor law had serious flaws, he mocks it because of this, and they way that the law is not a charity, for the poor it is more like a prison, where they are punished, for being orphans, ill, insane, or out of work.
In chapter two Charles Dickens, physically compares Oliver Twist to the "master"
"Child as he was, he was desperate with hunger, and reckless with misery."
He shows what Oliver Twist is like then he tells you what the "Master" is like.
"The master was a fat, healthy man"
Here he has compared the physical appearance of the two , Oliver being a very thin, unhealthy boy. The Master being a very fat, and healthy man. Just because he is the master of the workhouse means he gets more food than the workers. If the amount of food they give the people in the workhouse is healthy, surely he should eat the same?
He is trying to show the huge gap in society, how people of different wealth, are treated so different.
"the assistance parlysde with wonder, the boy with fear"
At that moment both equal in thought there not that different.
In Oliver Twist, When Oliver asks for more food, Charles Dickens wants you to see the response of the master,
"The master aimed a blow at Oliver's head with the ladle; pinioned him is his arms; and shrieked aloud for the beadle"
The image that Charles Dickens has portrayed here, is that, Oliver got punished for wanting a little more food, he makes it seem as though you are a bad person for asking for more, you get what your given. The "masters" response to this is very violent, he should not have you've such an intense punishment on a young boy.
Charity's have changed dramatically since the 1800's, but still today, the novel of Oliver Twist is still socially relevant today. There is still people in the 21st century that think they are better than others and therefore can control them, obviously not to the extent, that is portrayed in Oliver Twist, there is a message to the modern reader in Oliver Twist, and that is, we all do come into this world the same way, but we may have different back grounds and lifestyles, but we all deserve to be treated the same.
Charles Dickens wrote the novel of Oliver Twist to put across his views on the charity, and the way it worked. He wants to show his reader, his feelings on how people, where treated in relation to their backgrounds. He basically wanted to tell people how he felt about the charity's and the way they were run. I think Charles Dickens, did not think of the poor law as a charity, more of a prison, for people who were not as well off as others. You follow the life of a young boy Called Oliver, through his life in the workhouse and out of it, and how badly mistreated he was because of what he was.
Even the people who were said to be helping the poor, were just there for the money, they didn't care what happened to any of these people.
Charles Dickens is attempting to say that, the poor law was no such charity, charity starts at home and those less fortunate to not have one were taken to workhouses were they were treated like they had done something wrong.