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Bleak House (New Oxford Illustrated Dickens)
 

Bleak House

by Charles Dickens

Bleak House, Dickens's most daring experiment in the narration of a complex plot, challenges the reader to make connections--between the fashionable and the outcast, the beautiful and the ugly, the powerful and their victims. Nowhere in Dickens's later novels is his attack on an uncaring society more imaginatively embodied, and nowhere is the mixture of comedy and angry satire more deftly managed. (read review)

Top tags: fiction,  classic,  19th century,  classic literature,  england (all tags)

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  • Brilliant Babes (And Dudes) Who Read Selectively Discussion Group
  • Dickens of a Group Discussion Group
  • Victorian Literature Discussion Group
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Other Reviews

Amazon Reviews
 

Most Helpful Reviews

Liked It

3 of 3 members found this review helpful.
Lord Manleigh
  • Rated 5 stars

““Bleak House’ is generally agreed to be Dickens’ greatest work, and I constantly go back and forth with myself as to whether or not to agree or to champion “Our Mutual Friend” instead. I think it's ultimately a draw. Both novels are akin in their darkness of vision; each offers a truly fallen cosmos, although with “Bleak House” Dickens truly does seem to capture Victorian England in its Self, from the dazzling glass halls of its aristocracy to the Kafkaesque corridors of Chancery to the...”

Lord Manleigh’s full review »
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Didn’t Like It

1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
Joshua M
  • Rated 1 stars

“Now, I like Victorian literature. Look at some of my other selections. But this is just horrible. It was put out in pieces, and it feels it. The novel switches point of views between 3rd person and 1st, in what no doubt Dickens thought was a very clever movc. He was wrong. I had no empathy for any character whatsoever. I would have been happy for them to all die.”

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Community:
  • Rated 4.11236 stars
Amazon:
  • Rated 4.5 stars
  

Newest Comments

  • Carrie

    carrie said:

    “I saw the BBC production of it first and it was great. Then I read the book, and that was better. It's one of those books where you have to either read it twice or see the book and the movie. It's amazing!”

    posted Thursday, July 3 2008
  • oasis268

    oasis268 said:

    “Anyone who enjoyed Bleak House, and anyone who is looking to get motivated to read it, should check out the BBC TV miniseries that they made in 2005. I thought it was very well done.”

    posted Sunday, June 22 2008
  • Gina M

    gina m said:

    “I watched the BBC presentation of this a couple of weeks ago and it spurred me on to buy and read the book, despite my forebodings of unreadable text. To my surprise it's very readable and in fact I have trouble putting it down. I will definitely try more Dickens. ”

    posted Saturday, October 20 2007
  • cantre1

    cantre1 said:

    “I bought a beautiful hardback edition of B. H. almost a year and it taunts me from the shelf. I have a habit of reading multiple books at once, and I want to give this my full attention...soooon! I keep promising.”

    posted Tuesday, October 9 2007
  • skoolmom

    skoolmom said:

    “Finally gave up on reading Bleak House and threw away book! Then went to book store and bought a new copy of Bleak House which had bigger print and more pages. What a difference! Decided stuggles with the first book were more to print size and eye fatigue. Lesson learned. Book much easier to read! Hope to finish bleak house in next couple of days.”

    posted Tuesday, October 9 2007 ( | view 1 reply )
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