Charles Dickens 
Dickens’ Stories About Children Every Child Can Read 

This collection of excerpts from Dickens’ novels, first published in 1909, includes: Trotty Veck and Meg, Tiny Tim, The Runaway Couple, Little Dorritt, The Toy-Maker and His Blind Daughter, Little Nell, Little David Copperfield, Jenny Wren, Pip’s Adventure, Todgers, Dick Sweviller and the Marchioness, Mr. Wadle’s Servant Joe, and The Bravve and Honest Boy Oliver Twist.Charles Dickens was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world’s best-known fictional characters and is regarded as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the twentieth century critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories enjoy lasting popularity.Born in Portsmouth, Dickens left school to work in a factory when his father was incarcerated in a debtors’ prison. Despite his lack of formal education, he edited a weekly journal for 20 years, wrote 15 novels, five novellas, hundreds of short stories and non-fiction articles, lectured and performed extensively, was an indefatigable letter writer, and campaigned vigorously for children’s rights, education, and other social reforms.A prolific 19th Century author of short stories, plays, novellas, novels, fiction and non-fiction; during his lifetime Dickens became known the world over for his remarkable characters, his mastery of prose in the telling of their lives, and his depictions of the social classes, morals and values of his times. Some considered him the spokesman for the poor, for he definitely brought much awareness to their plight, the downtrodden and the have-nots. He had his share of critics, like Virginia Woolf and Henry James, but also many admirers, even into the 21st Century.