The The Author CharlesAuthor Dickens Charles Dickens was born in 1812 near Portsmouth, in Great Britain. His father went to prison for debt1 when Dickens was only a young boy. So he had to leave school and to start working in a factory2. This experience was traumatic3 for him and influenced many of his future works. Some years later he was able to go back to school. Then he became a reporter and journalist, and collaborated with magazines and newspapers of the time. Some of his stories were published in serial4 form from 1836 with the title The Pickwick Papers. Between 1837 and 1857 he published fourteen novels, all in the form of serial publications. They were adventure stories like Nicholas Nickleby (1838/9) and Oliver Twist (1838); or more autobiographical, like David Copperfield (1849/50). Their protagonists became symbols of exploited5 childhood in the dark hard reality of factories and slums6. He was middle-aged when his novels became more critical of the Victorian society of his time. Hard Times (1854), Great Expectations (1860/61) and Bleak House (1853) are three of his masterpieces7. In these books he combines his ability to tell stories and his condemnation8 of the negative effects of industrial society. 1. debt: money that you have to give back to a person who lent it to you. 2. factory: building where products are made in large quantities with the help of machines. 3. traumatic: quality of an event which causes a great shock or sadness. 4. serial: story that is told in a number of parts over a period of time. 5. exploited: used for someone else s advantage. 6. slums: areas of a city where living conditions are extremely bad. 7. masterpieces: best works. 8. condemnation: act of saying strongly that you think something is bad or wrong. 4