Charles Dickens's autobiographical novel, David Copperfield, published in 1850, was the author's favorite and has remained a favorite for generations of readers. In fact, Dickens is arguably England's most beloved, read, and critically acclaimed novelist. Noted scholar Harold Bloom, in his study of Dickens, praises the author's "astonishing universality, in which he nearly rivals Shakespeare and the Bible." This universality is one of the novel's celebrated qualities.

The novel is a bildungsroman, a story of growing up, that takes the protagonist from early childhood to early middle age. It is a story of the development of a writer, but it is also a portrait of Victorian England at mid-century with a host of characters designed to show various social features, for example, class structure, the penal system, the education available for poorer children, and the sundry forms of child labor and abuse. A novel of social protest, David Copperfield examines social problems while in certain particulars it relates the story of Dickens's own development into adulthood and into his life's work as a writer. (Answers.com)

David Copperfield or The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (which he never meant to publish on any account) is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published in 1850. Like all except five of his works, it originally appeared in serial form (published in monthly installments). Many elements within the novel follow events in Dickens' own life, and it is probably the most autobiographical of all of his novels.[citation needed] In the preface to the 1867 Charles Dickens edition, he wrote, "...like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child. And his name is David Copperfield."  (Wikipedia.org)

Beginning in 1854 up through to his death in 1870, Charles Dickens abridged and adapted many of his more popular works and performed them as staged readings. This version, each page illustrated with lovely watercolor paintings, is a beautiful example of one of these adaptations.

Because it is quite seriously abridged, the story concentrates primarily on the extended family of Mr. Peggotty: his orphaned nephew, Ham; his adopted niece, Little Emily; and Mrs. Gummidge, self-described as "a lone lorn creetur and everythink went contrairy with her." When Little Emily runs away with Copperfield's former schoolmate, leaving Mr. Peggotty completely brokenhearted, the whole family is thrown into turmoil. But Dickens weaves some comic relief throughout the story with the introduction of Mr. and Mrs. Micawber, and David's love for his pretty, silly "child-wife," Dora. Dark nights, mysterious locations, and the final destructive storm provide classic Dickensian drama.

Although this is not David Copperfield in its entirety, it is a great introduction to the world and the language of Charles Dickens. (Amazon.com)

Download David Copperfield, Volume One, Containing chapters one through twenty-eight

PDF format, 1.03MB, 437Pages.

Download David Copperfield, Volume Two, Containing chapters twenty-nine through sixty-four

PDF format, 1.08MB, 466Pages.

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, the Pennsylvania State University, Electronic Classics Series, Jim Manis, Faculty Editor, Hazleton, PA 18201-1291 is a Portable Document File produced as part of an ongoing student publication project to bring classical works of literature, in English, to free and easy access of those wishing to make use of them.

Cover Design: Jim Manis
Copyright © 2007 The Pennsylvania State University
The Pennsylvania State University is an equal opportunity University.

PREFACE TO 1850 EDITION

I do not find it easy to get sufficiently far away from this Book, in the first sensations of having finished it, to refer to it with the composure which this formal heading would seem to require. My interest in it, is so recent and strong; and my mind is so divided between pleasure and regret - pleasure in the achievement of a long design, regret in the separation from many companions - that I am in danger of wearying the reader whom I love, with personal confidences, and private emotions.

Besides which, all that I could say of the Story, to any purpose, I have endeavoured to say in it.

It would concern the reader little, perhaps, to know, how sorrowfully the pen is laid down at the close of a two-years' imaginative task; or how an Author feels as if he were dismissing some portion of himself into the shadowy world, when a crowd of the creatures of his brain are going from him for ever. Yet, I have nothing else to tell; unless, indeed, I were to confess (which might be of less moment still) that no one can ever believe this Narrative, in the reading, more than I have believed it in the writing.

Instead of looking back, therefore, I will look forward. I cannot close this Volume more agreeably to myself, than with a hopeful glance towards the time when I shall again put forth my two green leaves once a month, and with a faithful remembrance of the genial sun and showers that have fallen on these leaves of David Copperfield, and made me happy.

London, October, 1850.

Preface to the Charles Dickens Edition:

I REMARKED in the original Preface to this Book, that I did not find it easy to get sufficiently far away from it, in the first sensations of having finished it, to refer to it with the composure which this formal heading would seem to require. My interest in it was so recent and strong, and my mind was so divided between pleasure and regret - pleasure in the achievement of a long design, regret in the separation from many companions - that I was in danger of wearying the reader with personal confidences and private emotions.

Besides which, all that I could have said of the Story to any purpose, I had endeavoured to say in it.

It would concern the reader little, perhaps, to know how sorrowfully the pen is laid down at the close of a two-years' imaginative task; or how an Author feels as if he were dismissing some portion of himself into the shadowy world, when a crowd of the creatures of his brain are going from him for ever. Yet, I had nothing else to tell; unless, indeed, I were to confess (which might be of less moment still), that no one can ever believe this Narrative, in the reading, more than I believed it in the writing.

So true are these avowals at the present day, that I can now only take the reader into one confidence more. Of all my books, I like this the best. It will be easily believed that I am a fond parent to every child of my fancy, and that no one can ever love that family as dearly as I love them. But, like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child. And his name is DAVID COPPERFIELD. 1869

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