Charles Dickens and the Form of the Novel

Charles Dickens constantly eludes critical interpretation. While there have been commentaries on his humor, his seriousness, his social concerns, and other specific aspects of his work, such accounts have tended only to divide our understanding of the novels, to lead us to see them as failures of artistic unity. It is this question of unity that provides the keynote of Dr. Daldry's book. The author seeks a language that can treat the diverse aspects of reader, writer and text as a unityóit thus extends Robert Newsom's analysis of ^IBleak House to the oeuvre as a whole. The thesis is worked out in detail with reference to several of the novels, and represents a challenging re-evaluation of Dickens' achievement as a novelist.^R