The Turning Point: A Year that Changed Dickens and the World

Description

A major new biography of Charles Dickens, by the award-winning author of Becoming Dickens and The Story of Alice A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR The year is 1851. It's a time of radical change in Britain, when industrial miracles and artistic innovations rub shoulders with political unrest, poverty and disease. It's also a turbulent time in the life of Charles Dickens, as he copes with a double bereavement and early signs that his marriage is falling apart. But this year will become the turning point in Dickens's career, as he embraces his calling as a chronicler of ordinary people's lives. The Turning Point transports us into the foggy streets of Dickens's London, closely following the twists and turns of a year that would come to define him, and forever alter Britain's relationship with the world. 'Sparklingly informative' Guardian 'Wonderfully entertaining' Observer 'It is hard to imagine a better book on Dickens' New Statesman

Robert Douglas-Fairhurst is a Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of Magdalen College. His books include The Turning Point- A Year that Changed Dickens and the World, Becoming Dickens- The Invention of a Novelist, which won the Duff Cooper Prize, and The Story of Alice- Lewis Carroll and The Secret History of Wonderland, which was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award and was a BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week. He writes regularly for publications including The Times, Guardian, TLS and Spectator. Radio and television appearances include Start the Week and The Culture Show, and he has also acted as the historical consultant on TV adaptations of Jane Eyre, Emma and Great Expectations, the BBC drama series Dickensian, and the feature film Enola Holmes. In 2015 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

This tremendous book dazzles and delights... it's full of discoveries. A glorious book; revealing and unravelling Charles Dickens before our very eyes, melding his life and his work, using scholarship, wit and passion - a triumph. * Miriam Margolyes * This immersive biography, by the author of the Costa-shortlisted The Story of Alice, had me hooked... published in a sumptuous package, with illustrations throughout. * The Bookseller, Editor's Choice * Clever and witty, packed with fiercely academic research and erudite analysis, but written in featherlight, elegant prose. -- Natalie Haynes The Turning Point...builds incrementally towards Bleak House... makes for a very satisfying finale... Robert Douglas-Fairhurst has taken pains of his own and this wonderfully entertaining book is the result. -- Anthony Quinn * Observer * Douglas-Fairhurst is a shrewd, amusing and original guide... [he] gives you fascinating facts... a brisk and brilliant analysis of Bleak House. -- Laura Freeman * The Times *