Charles Dickens And Critical Realism

Round about the 1830s, in the advanced capitalist countries like France and Britain, a new literary trend occurred. Later, it mushroomed into the most splendid and most meaningful literary trend all over Europe in 19th century. It is called the critical realism due to its distinct and forceful exposure and criticism of the reality. Dickens, Charles Huffam (1812-1870) is the representative of the critical realist literature. In British literary history, he is the most important classic writer except William Shakespeare, and is also one of the most famous writers in the world whose position can' t be replaced. Living in the British capitalist society, from his own hardship, together with the deep observation of the British and American social situation, Dickens created numerous works with various styles; among which the most famous are the novels. Dickens' s core idea is the capitalist humanitarianism. His heart is full of love and sympathy towards the oppressed, although he cannot think of the effective measures to solve the social problems except that he hopes that people can change the situation by reform. He advocates freedom, equality, and charity, thinking that the human nature decides the human value. In his works, Dickens maintains "an unbroken faith in people with an entire pessimism as to capitalist society" [1] . He is intent on criticizing and attacking the social evils, the poverty, injustice, hypocrisy, corruption, money-worship and so on. In his enormous body ofworks, he combined masterly storytelling, humor, pathos, and irony with sharp social criticism and acute observation of people and places, both real and imagined. This essay tells the rise, development and the characteristics of this genre, focusing on Charles Dickens' s outstanding novel Great Expectations to illustrate his notion and writing characteristics including the corresponding illustrations on Dickens' s limitations from the viewpoint of the present situation and modern literature. The following is the structure of the essay: Introduction, stating the main idea of the essay' s contents; Chapter I. The rise of the critical realism, introducing the historical, social and philosophical background of critical realism both in Europe and in England in 19th century and the important influential aspect of the traditional realism. Chapter II. The features of the critical realism, which is the main body of this essay, including 4 parts: part one is to expose and criticize the evil reality in the capitalist society. First is the brief introduction of the critical realists' attitude to the ugliness of the society. Then is Dickens' s criticizing with the key points in Great Expectations; part two is to depict the representative character in typical circumstance. Critical realism succeeded the literary method of traditional realism to enhance the critical effect, which was characterized by the verisimilitude of details derived from observation and objective description of the representative character in a typical circumstance. Next is Dickens' s depiction to the representative characters in typical circumstance focusing on the image of Pip in Great Expectations; part three is the democratic and humanistic viewpoints of the critical realists. This part illustrates the reason, presentation and limitation of democratic and humanistic viewpoints of the critical realists and states Dickens' s humanistic viewpoints with the focal analysis of his idea in Great Expectations; part four is the superb writing methods of the critical realist literature. The critical realists accumulated rich experiences based on the literary practice and owned highart techniques such as the verisimilitude of details, the vivid environmental description, the exquisite psychological depiction and the characterization of the speech, actions and facial expressions. Next is Dickens' s excellent art technique in his works with the stress on Great Expectations. The last part is a conclusion of the essay.