CHARLES DICKENS

(1812 - 1870)

David Copperfield

Main Characters
David Copperfield-The youthful narrator, who experiences many vicissitudes before he becomes a successful novelist.
Betsey Trotwood-David's eccentric but kind-hearted great-aunt.
Mr. Murdstone-David's cruel and saturnine stepfather.
Jane Murdstone-Mr. Murdstone's grim sister. Peggotty-David's fat, jolly nurse.
Barkis-A quiet, reserved carrier.
Daniel Peggotty-Peggotty's staunch, simple brother.
Little Emily-Peggotty's innocent orphan niece.
Ham.-Peggotty's sturdy and good-matured orphan nephew.
Mr. Creakle-The brutal headmaster of Salem House school.
James Steerforth-David's passionately romantic but deeply selfish boyhood friend.
Tommy Traddles-Another school friend, good-matured and open-hearted.
Wilkins Micawber-Eternally optimistic, certain "something will turn up" to pay his huge debts.
Mr. Wickfield-Betsey Trotwood's Canterbury solicitor. Agnes-His daughter, a beautiful, sensible girl.
Mr. Spenlow-Senior partner of the law firm of Spenlow and Jorkins, who takes David on as an apprentice.
Dora-Mr. Spenlow's pretty, loving, and silly daughter. Uriah Heep-Mr. Wickfield's unctuous clerk.

The Story

Shortly before David Copperfield is born at Blunderstone, in Suffolk, his father dies, leaving his young widow Clara with an annual income of £ 105 and a devoted servant, Peggotty. The night David is boin, his great-aunt, the eccentric Betsey Trotwood, is present, but she leaves in a huff because she had hoped for a girl to be named after her.

David's early years are happy ones. His pretty, young mother dotes on him. Once Peggotty takes him on a wonderful excursion to the port of Yarmouth where her brother, Daniel, a simple fisherman, lives in a cozy boat beached on the shore. Daniel has an orphan nephew, Ham, and an orphan niece, Emily, who become David's friends.

On his return from Yarmouth David discovers that his mother has married Edward Murdstone, a darkly handsome, tight-fisted tyrant. Mr. Murdstone brings his pious, gloomy sister Jane to live with them, and together the Murdstones try to break the spirits of David and his mother. When David can stand the bullying no longer, he bites Mr. Murdstone on the hand and is instantly dispatched to the Salem House school, where he is put under the care of Mr. Creakle, the inept and sadistic headmaster.

David's one comfort at Mr. CreakWs ill-run school is the friends he makes there: handsome, aristocratic James Steer-forth and the always cheerful Tommy Traddles. But his school-days end abruptly with his mother's death in childbirth. Even the devoted Peggotty leaves to marry a taciturn carrier named Barkis. David is left alone, neglected by his stepfather.

When he is ten years old, David is sent to London to earn his living in the counting house of Murdstone and Grinby where he is almost starved to death. His job is to wash and label wine bottles in a rat-infested warehouse. His colleagues are the raffish Mick Walker and Mealy Potatoes. David lodges in London with Mr. Wilkins Micawber, an improvident hus-band and father, who tries to keep his brood of four children alive in spite of the creditors who constantly hound him. Mr. Micawber, an incurable optimist, keeps reassuring David that "something will turn up." But eventually Mr. Micawber is thrown into debtors' prison and David finds himself without a home.

Sick of his soul-destroying job and refusing to seek other lodgings because he has come to love the happy-go-lucky Micawbers, David leaves London for Dover, where his great-aunt Betsey Trotwood lives. Beaten and robbed on the way, David arrives dirty and penniless. Miss Betsey, who has al-ways disapproved of him for not being a girl, nevertheless washes and feeds him. On the advice of her gently mad boarder, Mr. Dick, she decides to give David a permanent home, a decision which is enforced when the odious Murd-stones arrive and highhandedly try to take David away.
This time, David is sent to a much better school than Mr. Creakle's, the good Mr. Strong's school in Canterbury. He lodges with his great-aunt's lawyer, Mr. Wicldeld, and meets Mr. Wickfield's unctuous clerk, Uriah Heep, to whom David takes an instant dislike. David becomes very fond of Mr. Wick-field's pretty daughter, Agnes, who treats him as if she were his sister.

When David graduates with honors from Mr. Strong's school, he decides to become a lawyer, but first he goes to Yarmouth to visit the Peggotty family. On his way he meets his old school comrade, Steerforth, now an elegant, charming young man. David takes Steerforth with him, and in the two weeks they spend at Yarmouth, Steerforth and little Emily fall in love. Emily, however, is engaged to Ham.

David then returns to become apprenticed to the law firm of Spenlow and Jorkins. He falls in love with Mr. Spenlow's charming, silly daughter, Dora. Soon he receives the bad news that his aunt has lost all her money, and that Uriah Heep has wheedled his way into a partnership with Mr. Wickfield. On another visit to Yarmouth-for word has come that Barkis is dying-David is shocked to learn that Emily, despite her engagement, has run off with Steerforth. Broken-hearted, old Daniel Peggotty has gone in search of his niece.

David begins studying shorthand reporting in order to help out his aunt, who is no longer able to pay for his apprentice-ship to Mr. Spenlow. Despite his change in fortune, David continues to see Dora. When Mr. Spenlow learns they wish to marry, he strongly disapproves. Before very long Mr. Spenlow dies, penniless. David and Dora marry on his meager income from reporting. David tries to get his adoring but inefficient young wife to manage the household care-fully, but Dora is incapable of any economy, and the couple find themselves hard pressed. They are still able, though, to prepare cheerful meals for their jolly bachelor friend, Tommy Traddles.

On a trip back to Canterbury, David finds his old friend Mr. Micawber now working for Uriah Heep who has gained complete control over him by giving him advances on his salary. Worse yet, Mr. Wickfield, too, seems strangely under his former clerk's greasy thumb. David is further appalled to learn that the odious Mr. Heep plans to marry Mr. Wick-field's lovely daughter, Agnes.

Eventually Mr. Micawber's basic honesty compels him to tell David that Uriah Heep has been embezzling money from Mr. Wickfield. His thefts have been responsible for the de-cline in Betsey Trotwood's fortunes. With the clerk exposed, some restitution is made, and Miss Trotwood finances Mr. Micawber's emigration to Australia where, he is sure, some-thing good is bound to tam up. Traveling with him on the ship are Emily and her uncle. Emily, who had returned in disgrace when Steerforih callously abandoned her, is forgiven by the magnanimous Daniel Peggotty, and together they hope to find a new life in the colonies.

Gradually Dora's health-always precarious-begins to fail. David sorrowfully watches his child wife declining. During these sad days, Agnes is a constant solace to him. When Dora dies, Agnes suggests that David seek consola-tion abroad. He first visits Yarmouth, however, where a great storm is in progress. A ship is foundering offshore. Ham Peggotty swims out to save a man caught in the wreckage. He cli-owns trying to save Steerforth, who has gone under in the storm.

For three years David wanders about Europe. On his re-turn to England, he learns from Miss Trotwood that Agnes is about to be married. Although he has always considered Agnes a sister, he is pained by the news. Under his aunt's matchmaking instigation, he goes to pay Agnes a visit. When they are together Agnes confesses she has never loved anyone but him. They marry, to Miss Trotwood's great delight, and have a large family. David becomes a highly successful author.

Critical Opinion
Among the best-loved novels of Dickens, David Copperfield is a huge, sprawling autobiographical work filled with characteristic Dickensian touches. Out of his unhappy career in a London blacking factory , Dickens shaped David's nightmare apprenticeship to the firm of Murdstone and Grinby. Mr. Micawber is a half-critical, half-affectionate portrait of Dickens' own improvident father. Superimposed on the autobiographical elements is a portrait gallery of a vast range of eccentrics, from the cryptic Barkis to the oily villian, Uriah Heep. These could have come only from Dickens' incredibly fertile imagination.

But the real strength of the book is the passionate honesty and indignation with which Dickens comes to grips with his early childhood. His six months in the blacking factory had been such a ghastly nightmare to him that in later life he completely suppressed the memory, never even telling his immediate family about it. Only through the medium of art was he able to cope with that nightmare. In David Copperfield, he shows us his early childhood-idyllic and innocent; his expulsion from this Eden by the cruel Mr. Murdstone; and his plunge, at an early age, into the grime of lower-class London.

Another early memory which haunts the pages of David Copperfield is that of Dickens' love for Maria Beadnell, whom he knew before his marriage. She is the Dora of the novel. Dickens vividly imagines what marriage would have been like with a weak, silly but affectionate girl rather than with the stolid woman he actually married. The section describing David's young married career is immensely touching; but as he gradually becomes successful, the emotional impetus behind the first half of the novel begins to subside. Dickens' concern with tying the numerous plot threads together now becomes stronger than his interest in confession and self-analysis.

The plot becomes incredibly involved as Dickens introduces a wealth of characters, combining them in all sorts of fortuitous ways. As David, having passed through his childhood crises, becomes less interesting, the novel is largely given over to the galaxy of minor characters. When they are imaginatively conceived, like Micawber or Uriah Heep, the novel is lively. When they are romantic stereotypes of Byronic passion, like Steerforth, or Victorian stereotypes of saintly, betrayed womanhood, like Emily, the novel flags.

David Copperfield is typical of middle-period Dickens. The high humor and fierce indignation, the almost uncontrolled complexity of plot, the sheer number of characters, and the concentration on eccentrics are all Dickensian hallmarks, never combined to better effect than in this interpretation of the novelist's own youth.