Claire Tomalin on Charles Dickens

Even to his contemporaries, Charles Dickens was a phenomenon: demonically hard-working, endlessly fertile and a fascinating, complex man. His characters have entered our culture - the Artful Dodger, Mr Pickwick, David Copperfield, Oliver Twist - and his amazing success was achieved from humble beginnings. His parents sent him to work in a factory at the age of 12, but he broke out of that set of expectations and made his own life. A maze of contradictions, Dickens was a man who extolled the virtues of family but had a long-term mistress, was a republican who disliked America, had a generous nature but cut off his children. In Charles Dickens: A Life one of Britain’s greatest biographers brings this extraordinary man to life.

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