A Study Of The Relationship Of Characters' Class Status And Their Moral Attributes In Bleak House

As Dickens' most important novel, Bleak House represents vividly and comprehensively the society of England in the early and middle Victorian Age. By portraying the characters of the three classes-the aristocracy, the middle class and the proletariat, Dickens aims to integrate social criticism and moral instruction. Based on a close reading of the text, and from a perspective of class, this thesis will argue that class is Dickens' central concern in Bleak House, that characters' class status determines their moral attributes, and that sometimes characters' moral attributes may transcend the class they belong to. In this way, the thesis attempts to exhibit the relationship of the character's class status and their moral attributes, thus expects to enrich and expand the study of Bleak House.This thesis comprises three chapters with one introduction and a conclusion. The introduction scans the previous studies of Bleak House at home and abroad and then proposes the central argument and eventual conclusions of the study of the thesis. Chapter One presents the theoretical foundation, which provides the definition of class, the categorization of the classes in the Victorian Age and the definition of morality adopted in this thesis. Chapter Two analyzes the class status and moral attributes of characters in Bleak House to explore the living situations of the three classes in the Victorian Age. Chapter Three studies the causes and significance of characters' class status transformation through reviewing the history of the time.The conclusion summarizes the views of this thesis and suggests that Bleak House should be taken as a textual history of the age, because of its vivid description of the history of the early and middle Victorian Age. Bleak House shows the reasons, process and state of the early and middle Victorian society's polyphonic advances. Besides, it also shows that Dickens in his Bleak House not only criticizes the social evils and inequality of the time, but also explores the moral culture of the society. This exploration reflects his deep concern about and pondering on the fate of the society and the living state of the humanity as a whole.