Oliver Twist

by Charles Dickens

Paperback, 370 pages

English language

Published Aug. 18, 1990 by Random House Books for Young Readers.

ISBN:: 978-0-679-80391-1

(34 reviews)

Oliver Twist, OR: the Parish Boy's Progress, is Charles Dickens's second novel, and was first published as a serial from 1837 to 1839. The story centres on orphan Oliver Twist, born in a workhouse and sold into apprenticeship with an undertaker. After escaping, Oliver travels to London, where he meets the "Artful Dodger", a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the elderly criminal Fagin.

Oliver is an orphan living on the dangerous London streets with no one but himself to rely on. Fleeing from poverty and hardship, he falls in with a criminal street gang who will not let him go, however hard he tries to escape.

One of the most swiftly moving and unified of Charles Dickens’s great novels, Oliver Twist is also famous for its re-creation–through the splendidly realized figures of Fagin, Nancy, the Artful Dodger, and the evil Bill Sikes–of the vast London underworld of pickpockets, thieves, prostitutes, and abandoned children. Victorian critics took Dickens to task for rendering this world in such a compelling, believable way, but readers over the last 150 years have delivered an alternative judgment by making this story of the orphaned Oliver Twist one of its author’s most loved works.--Goodreads

The adventures of an orphan boy who lives in the squalid surroundings of a nineteenth century English workhouse until he becomes involved with a gang of thieves.

151 editions

Konstantin von Weberg reviewed Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist by Geoffrey Tillotson

Review of "Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist" on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Very classical. I read the original English version as native German speaker...

markm reviewed Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist by Geoffrey Tillotson

Review of "Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist" on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

I don't consider myself an especially sensitive person, I grew up in a Gentile neighborhood so I've heard it all forever, and I knew ahead of time about Dicken's bigotry and who Fagin was, but I was surprised to be so put off. After a while, I felt like things would be going along OK and then I would be slapped in the face. So here are two stars, don't spend them all in one place.
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I think I've selected the wrong edition. I read the Norton Critical Edition and the included essays are very good.

NightDrake reviewed Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist by Geoffrey Tillotson

Review of "Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist" on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Over all, I thought this was an alright book. I will say though that I've got to be in the mood for Dickens. There was a lot of conversation in the book, and at the beginning I thought Oliver cried a whole heck of a lot. The story was pretty good though, and it did have a happy ending.