Charles Dickens Biography

Charles Dickens was born in 1812 in South England. He had seven brothers and sisters and was the son of John Dickens and Elizabeth Nee Barrow. He had a very painful childhood due to his beloved father's many arrests. His father, John, was arrested numerous times throughout Charles' childhood due to tax debt. He worked in a Naval Pay office when Charles was young. John Dickens was remembered as a very nice and generous man and had a hospitable nature.



Charles' bitter childhood experiences began when his father was arrested on charges of debt. As a punishment, his father and his entire family except for Charles, then twelve, were sent to prison. This resulted in Charles being sent to work at Warren's Shoe Blacking Factory pasting labels on boxes in order to support the family. He lived in a boarding house nearby and walked to work everyday. He generally visited his father on Sundays when he was not working. This is where Charles began his lifelong preoccupation with orphans. His experiences during early childhood living in a boarding house and having to fend for himself and his family resulted in his feeling abandoned. These experiences produced the feelings that wrote the many books about orphans and how they became something more of themselves.



I believe that the character Pip in Great expectations, was based on his own experiences in life. Pip is an orphan and is brought up by his terrible abusive sister. Pip's sister, Mrs. Joe, brought Pip up "by hand", or in other words, a very violent and heartless manner. He was brought up in a world of bad treatment and sadness, hopelessness, and in most cases, had to fend for himself and escape his sister's violent hand. I believe that Pip's sister and Charles' mother had a connection in this book. Pip's sister always had Pip doing chores and running hard errands and treated his badly in the house. Charles' mother always forced Charles to work in the terrible factory even after his father's release. This lead to Charles feeling resentment for his mother for most of his life for forcing him to continue his torture. I believe that Charles made this connection between the two women because Pip is an orphan and Mrs. Joe is his mother figure, or the woman who raised him. Mrs. Joe is also married to Joe, who is a very nice, large hearted, hospitable man much like his father.



Throughout the book, Joe is always a source of comfort to Pip and was his closest friend throughout his childhood. Joe was almost always right beside Pip when one of Mrs. Joe's rants was going on. They both endured Mrs. Joe's terrible punishments and violence, constantly pushing them around. In the book, an incident of Joe' s niceness and friendship for Pip shows when enduring a punishment. Pip was putting his bread away in his pocket for the convict and hiding it. Joe noticed and thought that Pip had "bolted" his food. When Mrs. Joe notices that Joe is distracted, she tells him that he will "perhaps mention what's the matter, you staring great stuck pig." Upon realization that they were in trouble, Joe tells Pip that "You and me is always friends, and I'd be the last to tell upon you." After this statement, both get tar water forced down their throats to cure their misbehavior by Mrs. Joe.



I believe that Charles made Joe a figure like his father because his father is who eventually saved him from the factory life and sent him to school to be educated. But when his family was evicted from their house due to unpaid rent, Charles had to leave school. He got a job working in a law firm as a clerk called Ellis and Blackmore. There he learned how to write shorthand and became a court reporter. Later, he wrote some stories that were published in various magazines and papers and picked up the pen-name "Boz". During this time, his father was arrested again for failure to pay debts and Charles bailed him out, becoming the financial backbone for the family.



Heartbreak also became something that Charles indicated in Great Expectations as a personal experience. Charles fell in love with a young girl named Maria Beadnell, who's father was a very wealthy man. After a few years however, her father sent her to school in Paris and he never saw her again. Charles expresses his pain in the book when young Pip falls in love with the rich Miss Havisham's step-daughter, Estella. She is haughty and rude, much like the other women in his book and is later sent off to live with another rich woman and attend school. Pip, heartbroken, does not see her until years later and the book ends with Estella and Pip talking. There is really no indication of whether or not they stay together.



Later, Charles became a very well known and successful writer and exceeded his expectations. This is where I think the story for Great expectations came from. Later in the book Pip inherits money from an anonymous benefactor and learns to become a gentleman. Later to find out that this benefactor was the convict that he helped a a child. Charles becomes successful with his writings and doesn't have to worry as much about money as he did as a child, exactly like Pip. Pip and Charles grow up from troubled childhoods and become gentlemen, without the financial worries compared to when they were children.