Showing results by author "Charles Dickens" in All Categories

Charles Dickens' absolutely wonderful celebration of holiday spirit and Christmas cheer presents a grand glimpse of Christmas dinner and the jovial characters that reside within every family, everywhere.

Here is the story of Pip and his mysterious rise from abused orphan to gentleman. Magwitch, the brutal convict, withered Miss Havisham, still wearing her yellowed wedding gown, and the heartless and beautiful Estella, are vibrant characters. Listen in to this superb story told with typical Dickensian warmth and humor and woven around unforgettable characters.

Sour and stingy Ebenezer Scrooge's emotional transformation after the supernatural visits of Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come. The novella met with instant success and critical acclaim. A Christmas Carol has never been out of print and has been adapted to film, opera, and other media.

Published in twenty monthly installments between March 1852 and September 1853. It is held to be one of Dickens's finest novels. A complex plot, it challenges the reader to make connections--between the fashionable and the outcast, the beautiful and the ugly, the powerful and the victims.

The story is told from the point of view of Pip, an orphan of humble origins who dreams of being a gentleman. From a chilling encounter with a convict when he was seven, through his coming of age and early adulthood, he tells of his "memorable days" and the "great changes" they wrought in him. Pip is apprenticed to kind-hearted Joe Gargery, the blacksmith, husband to his ill-tempered sister. On meeting the eccentric and reclusive Miss Havisham and her proud and haughty ward, the beautiful Estella, Pip becomes ashamed of his origins and hopes to one day better himself.

"The Chimes" is Charles Dickens 1844 novella that concerns the disillusionment of Toby "Trotty" Veck, a poor working-class man. When Trotty has lost his faith in Humanity and believes that his poverty is the result of his unworthiness he is visited on New Year's Eve by spirits to help restore his faith and show him that nobody is born evil, but rather that crime and poverty are things created by man.

Relish the wonders of Classic Literature in B.J. Harrison’s second season of The Classic Tales Podcast. Experience more of the greatest fiction ever written, as it comes to life in this unprecedented audiobook. Adventure from Jack London and Edgar Rice Burroughs, gothic suspense from Wilkie Collins and Edgar Allan Poe, humor from Mark Twain and P.G. Wodehouse - this collection has it all, complete and unabridged.

On Christmas Eve, a party of friends descends on a purportedly haunted country retreat, charged with the task of discovering evidence of the supernatural. Sequestered in their rooms for the holiday, the friends reconvene on Twelfth Night at a great feast and share their stories of spectral encounters.

Charles Dickens' brilliant comic adventure of a lamplighter, Tom Grig, who is called into the house of an eccentric astronomer who is searching for the philosopher's stone. He declares that the stars have foretold that Tom will marry the astronomer's niece and inherit the secret of the philosopher's stone, which will make him the richest man on earth.

Am Weihnachtsabend erscheinen dem habgierigen und herzlosen Geizhals Ebenezer Scrooge die Geister der vergangenen, gegenwärtigen und künftigen Weihnachten, die ihm das Glück vor Augen führen, das er bislang durch seine beispiellose Selbstsucht versäumt hat. Zutiefst betroffen, wandelt er sich über Nacht vom boshaften Egoisten zum gütigen, hilfsbereiten Wohltäter, einem Muster an Nächstenliebe und Hochherzigkeit.

Pictures from Italy is a travelogue by Charles Dickens, written in 1846. The book reveals the concerns of its author as he presents, according to Kate Flint, the country "like a chaotic magic-lantern show, fascinated both by the spectacle it offers, and by himself as spectator".

The Perrybingles, Caleb Plummer, his blind daughter, and a cricket, find truth, beauty and the true spirit of Christmas through each other.

On New Year’s Eve, Trotty becomes disheartened with life and feels that the working classes are wicked by nature after so many report of crime and mortality. His daughter, Meg, announces her plans to marry her fiancé on New Year's Day, something that Trotty is not particularly happy about. After meeting Will and his niece Lilian, the group return to Trotty's house. During the night, Trotty feels the church bells are calling him, so heads to the tower and climbs up to the bell chamber.

"Oliver Twist" (1839) by Charles Dickens is a novel about an orphan boy, who starts his life in a workhouse and is then sold into apprenticeship with an undertaker. He escapes and travels to London, where he meets the Artful Dodger, a member of a gang of juvenile pickpockets led by the elderly criminal, Fagin. Oliver Twist is notable for its unromantic portrayal by Dickens of criminals and their sordid lives, as well as for exposing the cruel treatment of the many orphans in London in the mid-19th century.

This is a SoundCraft Audiobooks production - enhanced with music and sound effects - of perhaps the most beloved Christmas book of all time, Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. It tells the story of the miserly and miserable Ebenezer Scrooge, who is given one, final chance at redemption on Christmas Eve when he is visited by the ghost of his deceased business partner, Jacob Marley. Scrooge is guided by three Spirits - of Christmas Past, Present and Future - who show the old miser the error of his ways.

Ebenezer Scrooge, described as "a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner," is certainly no lover of the Christmas season.

The Old Curiosity Shop is one of two novels (the other being Barnaby Rudge) which Charles Dickens published along with short stories in his weekly serial Master Humphrey's Clock, from 1840 to 1841. It was so popular that New York readers stormed the wharf when the ship bearing the final installment arrived in 1841. The plot follows the life of Nell Trent and her grandfather, both residents of The Old Curiosity Shop in London.

The Cricket on The Hearth was first published in 1845. A cricket constantly chirps on the hearth and acts as a guardian angel to the Peerybingle family. The arrival of a mysterious stranger threatens to shatter this harmony. Does the cricket have supernatural powers? The Seven Poor Travellers was first published in 1854. On Christmas Eve, a traveling gentleman happens upon a house in a quaint little village, which houses up to six travelers each evening. He decides to treat them all to a Christmas dinner and tells them a story around the fireplace about a soldier....

One of Dickens' most famous novels, this classic is set amid the turbulent times of the French Revolution. The main theme is the rescue of young Charles Darney, a French aristocrat sentenced to the guillotine by the "citizens" of the revolution. Out of the gloomy pall of the guillotine dungeons comes one of literature’s greatest heroes, Sidney Carton, the rescuer of Darney.

A master of language, moral lessons, and capturing the beauty of the everyday, Charles Dickens also brings elements of magic and wonder to this tale along with, of course, the meaning and joy of the Christmas season. Expecting to be able to bask in the nostalgia of the holiday, the character of Ebenezer Scrooge exists in stark contrast and is instantly despised. Dickens chooses Scrooge as his protagonist to take his audience through the selfish distractions of this world. A cautionary tale with a heartwarming twist, A Christmas Carol was and is a beloved classic for good reason.