 | DICKENS AND BARNABY RUDGE
Anti-Catholicism and Chartism
by Denis Paz
Denis Paz proposes a re-evaluation of Dickens's 'Barnaby Rudge'. He integrates Dickens's literary output with his personality, his class identity, and his relationships with individual Chartists.
This book is the first extended treatment of Dickens's views of the Chartist Movement. It is a revisionist account that challenges present-day literary critics' interpretation. Dickens wrote as part of his ongoing project to warn his readers of the dangers of Evangelicalism, a religious movement that was anti-Catholic at its core for theological reasons, but that also sought to control people's behaviour in the name of godliness. He wrote to warn his readers of the dangers of false nostalgia for the 'good old days'. He wrote to out-do Scott at creating an historical novel.
Paz sets Dickens's conceptualisation and writing of the novel in the contexts of the novelist's personal life, of the rise of the Chartist Movement, and of the rise of organised anti-Catholicism - the Gordon Riots of 1780 in which 285 Londoners were killed. He examines theatrical adaptations of the novel. His research draws on printed correspondence and Victorian periodicals.
Dickens did not love disorder, but he was no reactionary. He neither pined for the 'good old days', nor thought that it was possible to return to them. Paz discusses the varied reactions of contemporary critics. He notes that Chartist critics of the 1840's and 1850's, who viewed him politically, believed that basically he was on the workers' side. His writings could be used to demonstrate the injustices suffered by the working classes.
CONTENTS: Acknowledgments, Glossary, Introduction, I The Historiographical, Background to Barnaby Rudge, II The Novel's Genesis, III Writing the Novel, IV The 'Lessons' of Barnaby Rudge, V Dickens and Chartism, 1842-1858, Concluding Remarks, Bibliography.
Denis Paz, F.R.Hist.S., is Professor of History at the University of North Texas. He has published several books and articles on various aspects of Victorian political, social, religious, and cultural history. He is interested in the relationship between history and literature and has been
studying and teaching Victorian history for thirty years.
ISBN. 9780850365757
2006 256 pages approx. Hardback
Published February 2007
Price: £30.00
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