Charles Dickens

Finally, I have found the time to sit down and write again.  I am so sorry that it has been so long since I have updated, but I have been really busy :)
A friend told me that I should write on Charles Dickens, so here he is!
Here are a couple excerpts from some of his most famous books...

 A Tale of Two Cities:
"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."
"For you, and for any dear to you, I would do anything. If my career were of that better kind that there was any opportunity or capacity of sacrifice in it, I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those dear to you. Try to hold me in your mind, at some quiet times, as ardent and sincere in this one thing. The time will come, the time will not be long in coming, when new ties will be formed about you--ties that will bind you yet more tenderly and strongly to the home you so adorn--the dearest ties that will ever grace and gladden you. O Miss Manette, when the little picture of a happy father's face looks up in yours, when you see your own bright beauty springing up anew at your feet, think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you!"
"I see a beautiful city and a brilliant people rising from this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, in their triumphs and defeats, through long years to come, I see the evil of this time and of the previous time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making expiation for itself and wearing out..."
"Think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you."


A Christmas Carol
"There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor."
"For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself"
"No space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused"


Great Expectations
"suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but - I hope - into a better shape"
"That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day."

David Copperfield
"My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest."
"The most important thing in life is to stop saying 'I wish' and start saying 'I will.' Consider nothing impossible, then treat possiblities as probabilities."


Nichlas Nickleby
"Happiness is a gift and the trick is not to expect it,
but to delight in it when it comes"
"The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again."
"Dreams are the bright creatures of poem and legend, who sport on earth in the night season, and melt away in the first beam of the sun, which lights grim care and stern reality on their daily pilgrimage through the world."

Okay, I think I got a little carried away, but there are only a few of the many quotes from his books that I really like!
I thought that I would do a little research on his life, so here is a very condensed version...
Charles Dickens was born in England, February 7, 1812, the son of John and Elizabeth Dickens.  When he was only 12 years old, his father was put in prison for debts, and so Charles was forced to work at Warren's Blacking Factory in order to pay back the debt. His experience at the factory would emerge most prominently in David Copperfield and Great Expectations. After this, he went to school and then found a job as a free-lance reporter. In 1836 he published Sketches by Boz.  The he began to write The Pickwick Papers, which to every one's surprise became and enormous success. After this, he started a career as a novelist. His career took off and he toured Italy, Switzerland, and France, and wrote furiously.  He died in London in 1870 after suffering from a stroke after working on The Mystery of Edwin Drood for a whole day.  The work was never finished, but it was published that September after his death. 
If you want to read more on Dickens, go to: http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/dickensbio1.html