Oliver Twist: The Nauseatingly Good, The Abominably Bad, and the Just Plain Ugly

Warranted or no, it was a subject of some embarrassment to me that I had never, not once in my life, read Dickens. Not in high school, not in college, not ever. The following was the summation of all of my knowledge of Charles Dickens' wide corpus:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."
"Please Sir, I want some more."

That, sadly, was all. Both of which have probably appeared in dozens of credit card and/or soup commercials which really eradicates, in full, any possible modicum of respect I might derive from knowing those two lines. Now at least I can say that I've read one novel in its entirety, modest an accomplishment as that may be. Oliver Twist is much more than an overdone scene about an absence of slop, it's a surprisingly biting comment on British society in the 19th century. The characters sway from the cavity-inducing saintliness of Rose Maylie and Oliver himself, to the out-and-out vicious stylings of Sikes and Co., who all help to convince the reader that there was something seriously wrong in the city of London in the late 1830's. Perhaps this is obvious to all of you Dickensian experts, but hey, I thought it was going to be boring. 500 pages later, I see the error of my ways.

I think what I loved most about Dickensian style is his underwriting. He says one thing, but his cleverly crafted diction says another. It's that current of sarcasm, flowing just under the surface of his ever-polite and respectable voice, that really kept me in this novel. Without that, it merely would have been another Cinderella story.

So yes, I can finally understand all the references to the Artful Dodger; finally, I can offer up my own opinions of the queer Mr. Bumble and the dastardly murderer Bill Sikes. Thank goodness. However, I do have one point of contention with this hearty literary dish. As noted in an article by Norman Lebrecht, the villain Fagin is referred to as "the Jew" over 250 times in the first 38 chapters of the book. He is properly conniving, money-grubbing, and back-stabbing, as anti-Semitic characters are wont to be. This only bothered me on the surface as I was reading, like a bug crawling across my arm every hundred pages or so. Mostly, I ignored it. It wasn't until after I had finished that it began to bug me. After doing a bit of research, I discovered that some people do consider Dickens to have been an anti-Semite because of this novel, but most people just think that he was either commenting on religion in general or simply made a bad satirical decision. Apparently when confronted with the accusation of being a Jew-hater, Dickens said something like, "What? I thought all boy-thief gang leaders were Jewish." Huh. So, a jewess named Eliza Davies wrote to Dickens and scolded him for this affront. I mean, jeez. Kick a people while they're down why don't you. Dickens' response was this:

"I must take leave to say that if there be any general feeling on the part of the intelligent Jewish people that I have done to them what you describe as a great wrong, they are a far less sensible, a far less just and a far less good tempered people than I have always supposed them to be."

To which the Jewish people responded, "Um....thanks....I guess." Oh Dickens, what a smooth talker you are.

Tastiness: Hearty! Like a mug of ale and a shepherd's pie. Followed by a nap.
Special Sauce: A hint of sarcasm. Spicy.
Recommend? Indeed, my dear chap! Indeed!