by Charles Dickens
Product details
Publisher: Blind Persons’ Association, Kolkata –
January 24, 2019
Language: English
Book Review
We are proud to announce the release in Braille of David Copperfield, the eighth novel by Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870). Though Dickens has drawn a lot on his own life in his novels, particularly in depicting childhood experiences, he never succeeded in writing an autobiography. David Copperfield, written in first person, is the biography of the hero from his neglected and struggling childhood to his successful career as a writer. Like some of his other novels, it contains descriptions of child exploitation and abuse, some based both on his own childhood experiences, and other published reports. Many elements of the novel follow events in Dickens’s own life.
The novel’s full title is The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger. It is accepted as the most biographical of his works. It may explain his admission to the readers in his Preface to 1869 edition of David Copperfield:
Of all my books, I like this the best. It will be easily believed that I am a fond parent to every child of my fancy, and that no one can ever love that family as dearly as I love them. But, like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child. And his name is DAVID COPPERFIELD.
The novel begins with an unconcealed statement of his anxiety: “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” Published in serial form during 1849-50, Dickens obviously succeeded. He brought into the novel a number of characters, particularly women characters who win the attention of the readers like the hero of the novel. We cannot forget the famous message, “Barkis is willing”, Mr. Micawber’s cheerful demeanour and Uriah Heep’s crookedness. Dickens introduced some of his most remembered female characters in this novel too.
This is a huge novel in seventeen Braille volumes. As usual, institutions may purchase it at paper cost, that is, INR 1,588 only. Students may collect it for just INR 170. For details on purchase process and a list of other books available, keep checking our online catalogue.