Description
Book SynopsisThe labyrinthine, ingenious plot of
Bleak House focuses on the seemingly endless lawsuit Jarndyce and Jarndyce, an inheritance dispute that has been moving through the courts for years. Dozens of characters, including the innocent young narrator Esther Summerson, her friends Richard Carstone and Ada Clare, and the jaded aristocrats Sir Leicester and Lady Honoria Dedlock, are directly or indirectly caught up in the case. Written in bold and inventive language,
Bleak House is Dickens’s epic vision of Victorian society.
The critical introduction and extensive appendices to this edition focus on the novel’s social context and reception, Dickens’s treatment of his women characters and the working class, and the inequalities of the Victorian legal system.
Trade Review“Patricia Ingham’s edition of
Bleak House is a model of clear thinking, scrupulous editing, and critical acumen. The contextual documents have been selected with a keen eye for what modern readers need to know if they are to appreciate this wonderful novel in all its complexity. The edition will be an invaluable resource for those studying or teaching Dickens, but in addition will stimulate new thinking even among established Dickens scholars. It is an excellent addition to the Broadview list.” - Penny Boumelha, Victoria University of Wellington
“In this splendid new edition of Charles Dickens's
Bleak House, Patricia Ingham brings her fine critical intelligence to bear on a novel that treats the city of London as a historical reality and as a haunting metaphor. Professor Ingham's wide-ranging erudition—her expertise as a linguist, social historian, editor, and literary theorist—allows her to provide a framework that does full justice to Dickens's multi-layered narrative. Her introduction contextualizes the novel in pertinent ways, the notes are helpful, and rich appendices provide a wide array of nineteenth-century documents necessary to grasp how the novel is both representative and highly original.” - Linda M. Shires, Yeshiva University
Table of Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Charles Dickens: A Brief Chronology
- A Note on the Text
- Bleak House
- Appendix A: Dickens’s Working Notes for Bleak House
- Appendix B: The Reception of Bleak House
- Appendix C: The Role and Status of Women
- Appendix D: The Court of Chancery
- Appendix E: Attitudes to Religious and Other Proselytizing
- Appendix F: Contemporary Attitudes to Class Inequality
- Appendix G: Conditions of the Working Class
- Select Bibliography
