How does Dickens show the social injustices of Victorian England in the opening of Oliver Twist?

During Charles Dickens’ life he wrote many books, although they are different, but they reflect each other in many ways. I believe the biggest similarity in his collection of books is with ‘Oliver Twist’ - a story of a young boy who lives in an orphanage and ‘Great Expectations’ which is a story of a young orphan named Phillip Pirrip, or Pip as he is more commonly known.

Both books are semi-autobiographical as they hint upon Dickens’ life as he grew up in a workhouse and was horrified by the social conditions of Victorian Britain. He used his work to help reform the class system. Few among the social classes recognised or cared about the conditions suffered by children in the workhouses. Some children turned to crime or, worse, died of starvation.

Dickens had gone through the anguish of being pulled out of school and put to work in a shoe-polish factory. His father had been sent to a well known debtors’ prison called Marshalsea and there was no money for Dickens’ education. To his embarrassment, Dickens was moved to a window at the front of the factory for bystanders to see him as he glued labels on to tubs of shoe polish. The encounter that would leave a lifelong mark on him and played a major part in his inspiration for writing Oliver Twist.

Oliver Twist, which was serialised monthly between 1837 and 1839, caused a sensation when it highlighted the troubles of the deprived young and their often horrendous experiences in the foul workhouses, and it begins with a ‘narrator’ instantly saying things like ‘which I need not trouble myself to repeat’ and ‘for a long time after it was ushered into this world of sorrow and trouble, it remained a matter of considerable doubt whether the child would survive to bear any name at all’. This is showing that Oliver is immediately unimportant to everyone and this is shown especially well when Oliver’s mum has just given birth to him and the line reads ‘the surgeon deposited it in her arms’. I think the choice of words are very good here because the use of the word deposited shows the baby is not very well handled and the choice of the word it shows that the baby isn’t considered important because she didn’t say him or her. Oliver’s mum looks up and instantly talks about dying and straight away the surgeon says ‘oh, you must not talk about dying yet’ with fears of being left with the baby, and while the mother has been giving birth the ‘nurse’ has been drinking in the corner to an ‘evident satisfaction’ and just after the mother dies the surgeon says ‘don’t send up for me if the baby cries, nurse’ and with great deliberation he adds ‘It’s likely it will be troublesome, give it a little gruel if it is’. This shows that the surgeon is only bothered about his own job and his own happiness, we also have the repetition of it again.

After Oliver’s mum dies he is immediately branded as the poorest of the poor based on his mum’s clothes and the fact that she wasn’t married so he was dressed in old yellow calico robes, badged and ticketed after the surgeon says ‘ahh the old story, no wedding ring’. This shows that he thinks he has got her figured out just by the fact that she has no wedding ring, even though the list is endless as to why she might not be married. I think there is a quote in this chapter, which really sums up the first ...

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Oliver is covered for under the Poor Law, and spends the first eight years of his life at a "baby farm" in the 'care' of a woman named Mrs. Mann - the boss of the infantile workhouse where Oliver is raised. Along with other offenders against this law,they are also abused and half-starved in her care. Mrs Mann is two-faced as she abuses people lower than her and sucks up to the people above her e.g. she abuses Oliver and sucks up to Mr Bumble.

Mr Bumble (also know as The Beadle) likes power, and he uses it to its full. Mr Bumble has a few abiding qualities. Oliver tells Mr Bumble everything on the way to Mr. Sowerberry’s, and says, "‘I feel as if I had been cut here, sir, and it was all bleeding away;’ and Oliver puts his hand to his heart, and looked into Mr Bumble’s face with tears of real agony. When Oliver does this Mr Bumble is moved but the problem is that he doesn’t act on the fact that he feels sorry for Oliver – He does is so he doesn’t look like he is a weak man. He seems to think that he won’t be respected if he shows pity to anyone. This is one of the examples in which Dickens wants us to see Mr. Bumble as a nice character, and not just a one-sided man. Mr Bumble also gets to wear a special cocked hat that is his pride and joy - the hat has three tiers, which I believe represent the class system in place in the Victorian era, Lower class, Middle class, and Upper class. I think this is ironic that Mr Bumble treasures it because he isn’t that far up in the class system.

After nine years with Mrs Mann, Oliver is moved to the workhouse to undergo even more pain and suffering where the boys are so hungry that one boy says he is scared that he will eat the boy that sleeps next to him. Eventually the starving boys decide that one of them will ask for more at the next meal and they come up with a way of deciding it and, as it turns out, Oliver gets the short straw and ends up saying ‘Please sir, I want some more’. Mr Bumble almost can’t believe what Oliver has said and his face turns pale and he stumbles and clings for support. This is one of the most important parts of Oliver’s life because it changes the path of his life completely. Straight away he is marched down to the market by Mr Bumble - offering Oliver together with five pounds. Eventually they come across Mr Gamfield, a vicious chimney-sweep who offers to take Oliver on as an apprentice for 5 pounds which is later lowered to 3. Mr. Bumble, Mr. Gamfield, and Oliver appear before a magistrate to sign the documents for Oliver to be taken. At the last minute, when he was looking for his inkbottle to sign the document, the magistrate notices Oliver's pale face. He asks the boy why he looks so petrified. Oliver tells the magistrate that he would rather be beaten or killed rather than being an apprentice to Mr. Gamfield. The magistrate refuses to allow Oliver to be an apprentice. This is also a big turning point in Oliver’s life as a hint of fate comes in that if the ink bottle had been in the right place he would have been a chimney-sweep but he is put back for sale again and a kind undertaker called Mr Sowerberry takes him on trial for one week. His wife, Mrs Sowerberry, is not a very nice person and as soon as Oliver enters the shop she remarks that he is very small, only for Mr Bumble to assure her that he will grow but she isn’t happy and says ‘I dare say he will on our bittles and our drink’ and complaining that the workhouse boys always cost more than they are worth.

Mr Sowerberry points out that Oliver is a good-looking boy and would make a good mute in proportion. This is the only time we get told about Oliver’s facial features - this links back to the beginning of the book where Oliver is branded and described as it.

Noah Claypole works under the Sowerberrys - he is slightly higher in the hierarchy of the lower class yet he still has a go at Oliver just because he has some little form of power. He keeps saying to Oliver ‘How’s your mother, Workhouse’ - Oliver tries to be nonchalant about this and gets on with his job even though it is bothering him. Eventually Noah gets on his nerves so much by saying ‘your mother, she was a nice one, a regular right down bad one. It’s a good thing she died when she did otherwise she’d be in prison doing hard labour’ - even though Noah doesn’t have a clue who Oliver’s mum is. Eventually Oliver lashes out at him and jumps on him and starts punching him. Noah is a coward because he starts screaming to get people in the room and when two people have Oliver pinned Noah takes two cowardly cheap shots from behind. Then Noah runs to get Mr Bumble from the Workhouse and they lock Oliver in the cellar until they can decide what to do with him. In the cellar Oliver escapes and decides to walk to London and there he finds Jack Dawkins, more commonly known as The Artful Dodger. Oliver tells him that he has come to London to make his fortune. At this The Dodger says ‘I suppose you’ll want some place to sleep tonight’ and this takes Oliver’s fancy since he has no lodgings and no money and so he agrees. The Dodger says ‘as it happens I know a rather kind and respectable gentleman who’ll give you lodgings for nothing’. Oliver follows him to Fagins ‘hideout’ where the children are sat around playing cards, smoking and drinking gin. Fagin is a good man that bad things have happened to and Oliver is very grateful because he would have probably died of starvation if Fagin had refused to take him in. Fagin then tells Oliver to make The Artful Dodger his role model because he’s going to be a right little Bill Sykes. During Oliver’s first night he wakes up and sees Fagin looking at all his stolen treasure. Fagin then gets really concious that Oliver will tell the authorities and so he threatens him with a knife to the throat. The next day Oliver wants to go on his first job with The Dodger, so Fagin thinks it over and agrees. During the job The Dodger steals an elderly man’s wallet who we later know as Mr Brownlow and he mistakes Oliver for The Dodger as Oliver wasn’t ready to run away. Mr Brownlow gets the police to chase after him and eventually the police catch him and take him to the magistrates, or the ‘beaks’ as The Dodger refers to them. Then Fagin starts yelling at The Dodger saying, “why didn’t you look after him, why didn’t you bring him back” This shows that Fagin is very worried because Oliver could tell the police everything about Fagin and his associates so Fagin and Bill Sykes decide to send Nancy to the court hearing.

In the hearing the magistrate is drinking behind his desk and doesn’t care what anybody says – which mirrors the surgeon and the drunk nurse at the begging of the novel. Eventually the shop owner from outside where the robbery took place comes in and says it wasn’t Oliver but another boy - all the charges are dropped. Mr Brownlow decides to adopt Oliver and all the parts of Olivers life are falling right into place. It then gets even better when Mr Brownlow comes across a necklace that he gave to his niece for her 18th birthday – one that was taken off her by a drunk nurse at her death when she gave birth to young Oliver.

Fagin is still not convinced that Oliver won’t tell the police of his wearabouts so they decide to kidnapp Oliver, which completley rips his troubled life apart, just as it was beginning to come-together.

Unlike other characters throughout the book Nancy is not entirely good. She has battles between her inner conscience and her devotion to

Bill Sykes. Nancy cares for Oliver so overwhelmingly she tries to take Oliver back to Mr Brownlow and it results in her death. Eventually Bill Sykes is killed trying to escape after everybody comes to try to save Oliver.

This book changed peoples opinion towards the poor and the rich people loved reading it and couldn’t wait for the next issue to come out every month.