Oliver Twist

            

                 Oliver Twist 

                                      Charles Dickens

                                        

                                   

                               Charles Dickens born on the 7th February 1812 was the most famous and most successful English writer of his day. He lived in the Victorian era under Queen Victoria ,who was crowned in 1837 -the same year he wrote his novel Oliver Twist, aged 25.His epic stories, vivid characters and terrifying descriptions of poverty in London are unforgettable. Dickens had a wider popularity and fame than had any previous writer during his lifetime, and he remains popular for some of the greatest novels and characters ever written.

         Oliver is born in a workhouse in the first half of the nineteenth century. His mother dies during his birth, and he is sent to an orphanage (where he is poorly treated). Along with the other orphans, Oliver is regularly beaten and poorly fed. In a famous episode, he walks up to the the stern authoritarian, Mr. Bumble, and asks for more. For this impertinence, he is put out of the workhouse. He then runs away from the family who take him in. He wants to find his fortune in London. Instead, he falls in with a boy called Jack Dawkins, who is part of a child gang of thieves–run by Fagin.
Oliver is brought into the gang and trained as a pickpocket. When he goes out on his first job, he runs away and is nearly sent to prison. However, the kindness of the person who was robbed, saves him from the terrors of the city gaol, and instead he is taken into the philanthropic gentleman’s home. However, as soon as he thinks he is settled, Bill Sikes and Nancy (two members of the gang) takes him back. Oliver is once more sent out on a job–this time assisting Sikes on a burglary.
The job goes wrong and Oliver is shot and left behind. Once more he is taken in (this time by the Maylies, the family he was sent to rob), and he spends a wonderful time with them. However, once more Fagin’s gang comes after him. Nancy, who is worried about Oliver, tells the Maylies what is happening. When the gang find out about Nancy’s treachery, they murder her.
                              Meanwhile, the Maylies reunite Oliver with the gentleman who helped him out earlier and who (in true Victorian-novel style) turns out to be Oliver’s uncle. Fagin has been arrested and hanged for his crimes; and Oliver settles down to a pampered life (re-united–happily–with his family).