Product Description

Critical responses to "Martin Chuzzlewit" have varied. By examining the overlapping contexts within which Dickens wrote, this study makes original contributions to our understanding of the novel and its critical reception. The notes revise and expand the conventional wisdom regarding the sources for the American chapters, demonstrating that Dickens ddrew on a much wider field of writings about America than has been previously acknowledged. By reading the novel int he light of contemporary professional journals, Nancy Aycock Metz also exposes issues of that period which underlay Dickens's portrayal of Pecksniff, young Martin and the architectural scene. Finally the notes point to previously unidentified influences on theplot and characters, illuminating the impact on Dickens's thinking of a wide range of texts, from the Bridgewater Treatises to the Bible, from popular songs and newspaper advertisements to medical treatises and parliamentary reports.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1321603 in Books
• Published on: 2001-11-22
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 569 pages

Review
"The latest in this admirable series of Companions to Dickens's works maintains the high standards of its precursors and immediately becomes an indispensable guide to one of Dickens's funniest novels. Nancy Aycock Metz shows, beneath its exuberant facade, how deeply "Martin Chuzzlewit" is engaged with contemporary political, social and historical debate, in particular with the 'socially constructed nature of personality and behaviour', and how significant are its allusions to Rousseau and Paley, and to the wild children and orang-utangs that inhabited and tested the boundaries of human nature..." John Bowen, TLS 8th March 2002

About the Author
Dr Nancy Aycock Metz has written articles on Dickens, Trollope and Victorian urban culture. She is an Associate Professor of English at Virginia Tech, USA.