How did Charles Dickens expose hypocrisy in Victorian England?
Dickens’ novels were, among other things, works of social commentary. He was a fierce critic of the poverty and social stratification of Victorian society. Dickens’ second novel, Oliver Twist (1839), shocked readers with its images of poverty and crime and was responsible for the clearing of the actual London slum that was the basis of the story, Jacob’s Island. In addition, with the character of the tragic prostitute, Nancy, Dickens “humanised” such women for the reading public; women who were regarded as “unfortunates,” inherently immoral casualties of the Victorian class/economic system. Bleak House and Little Dorrit elaborated expansive critiques of the Victorian institutional apparatus: the interminable lawsuits of the Court of Chancery that destroyed people’s lives in Bleak House and a dual attack in Little Dorrit on inefficient, corrupt patent offices and unregulated market speculation. Dickens frequently focuses on characters who preach virtues they do not practice, such as Set
