my books - Oliver Twist (1838) by Charles Dickens

I thought I was going to be able to say no one at my house read Oliver Twist, but when I inquired, youngest started it one year, got assigned another book for school, and never finished Oliver. She said she enjoyed what she read and was able to understand it.


Here is the Context section by SparkNotes.

It gives background information on Dickens as well as explaining the social commentary of Oliver Twist. These sections do not give away the plot of the book.


I did enjoy Oliver Twist.

I have mentioned in previous posts:  I love Dickens. He is a recent find for me. I never read any of his books in school.

However, Oliver is my least favorite of the Dickens I have read so far.

So, I liked it; I just liked Bleak House, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities better.

I did not find any of these books, including Oliver, predictable. I was never sure where the story might take me. I do not find the length of Dickens books to be daunting, because the stories keep me captivated.

However, I will say, my first Dickens was Bleak House. And truthfully, I had a hard time with all the characters. But I think that was because I happened to read one of his more complicated plots first.  Great Expectations is a simple book, not as many characters, more straight forward plot. That is the place to start (in my opinion).  Bleak House is 33 audible hours, Great Expectations/18 hours,  A Tale of Two Cities/14 hours, Oliver Twist/16 hours, so you can see that Bleak House was a daunting start. 

I found I caught/understood Dickens subtext better in Oliver than any of the titles. After reading the SparkNotes Context section (link above) it might be there is more subtext in Oliver than any of the other books. Many lines in Oliver were very funny, even in the midst of the extreme poverty, in an ironic humor kind of way. I am sure I did not catch all of it, but I noticed a lot.

I also think that Oliver might be the most important of Dickens' books based on the Context section (link above) of those I have read so far. Most important at the time, most important in capturing history for the ages.

If you ever have a chance to see Oliver! (the musical) it is very good. The play does not follow the book in full, there are whole sections missing, but does a good job of the essence of the novel. (What is in the musical is in the book, but not everything in the book is in the musical.) The music is very good.