The importance of understanding Dickens's religion to obtain a full
appreciation of his achievement has long been admitted; but this is
the first critical study of the interaction between Dickens's
religious beliefs and his creative imagination throughout his
career.
The novelist's religious beliefs are a pervasive and deeply felt
presence in his works even if they are not always clearly thought
out or expressed. Too discreet and humane to be as explicit, or as
dull, as most of the professedly religious novelists of his time,
Dickens nevertheless suggests in his own way a liberal Protestant
belief, shot through with Romantic, transcendental yearnings, which
undoubtedly appealed to a very wide range of readers. Dickens's
religion is shown to be that of a great popular writer, who created
a unique kind of fiction, and a unique relationship with his
readers, by the absorption and transformation of less respectable
contemporary forms, from fairy-tale and German romance to tract and
print.
Professor Walder's thoroughly researched and lively book
provides students of Dickens and the Victorian period with an
original perspective on the novelist's methods and attitudes. He
offers a judicious and informed exploration of Dickens's obsessive
themes, from the 'fall' of innocence in Pickwick Papers, to the
search for a religious 'answer' in Little Dorrit. Each chapter
focuses upon the striking congruences revealed between individual
novels, or groups of novels, and particular religious themes. The
views expressed in Dickens's lesser fiction and non-fiction are
drawn on throughout, as are those in the influential contemporary
press.
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