The Pickwick Club discussion

Fellow Pickwickians, place your observations here:

Again another of Dickens's improbabilities: The mysterious Monks, who is in some way connected to Oliver, happens to team up with Fagin, after he has noticed and recognized (!) the boy during his trial by Mr. Fang. This most wondrous twist of fate really makes me think that the Monks-subplot is something Dickens came up with in the course of writing the novel since it seems so alien to the overall story.

This is probably also why Roman Polanski in his film has discarded Monks completeley.

Here's a question: Do strange coincidences that insult your intelligence, leaving you incredulous upon stumbling across them in your reading, dampen your enjoyment of a novel? Do we want the book to be real? If not, do we want the novel to be believable?

Jonathan wrote: "Here's a question: Do strange coincidences that insult your intelligence, leaving you incredulous upon stumbling across them in your reading, dampen your enjoyment of a novel? Do we want the book t..."

I cannot say that they do as a rule. For a start, life itself is full of coincidences that most people would hardly forgive a writer. So these coincidences might be improbable, but after all they are not unrealistic. It is just the amount of coincidences that an author expects us to swallow and their importance to the story that may spoil the enjoyment a bit. If a major plot element is brought about by a coincidence, such as a deus ex machina or if there occur a great deal of these coincidences, you might start asking yourself if the writer could not had prepared his story more carefully.

In Dickens, there is so much more to make me enjoy reading him - e.g. his memorable characters, his style and his obvious claim to tell us something about life with his novels - that I do not really feel that his use of coincidences detracts from the enjoyment I feel reading Dickens. The great number of coincidences in Oliver Twist may also be a consequence of the fact that his earlier novels were not planned as much in advance as his latter ones. I really have the feeling here that Monks was added in order to make the story more interesting, and that in the first few chapters Dickens was not even thinking of somebody like Monks.

I'm in the middle. I know that some coincidences are almost necessary for any work of fiction to work. I like it best when what looks like coincidences are actually carefully worked out by the author so by the end they don't look like coincidences. Ross Macdonald, in his Lew Archer books, is a master of this.

I can accept plausible coincidences without any problem. But some coincidences are so implausible that I tend to roll my eyes and sigh. To me, they're a mark of an inadequate storyteller. Bumble just happening to go to London and just happening to pick up the paper that has the ad in it is, for me, such an eye-roll coincidence. Not that it stops me from enjoying the story if it's otherwise good. But it seems to me that it could have been handled more artfully. (Such as the a coachman who drives a coach to London daily seeing it mentioning it in the pub over a pint of beer that, wasn't that the name of that boy who ran away a few months ago? That would be more plausible, wouldn't it?) And even Jane Austen goes for the implausible coincidence, as when Darcy returns to Pemberton just as Lizzie and her aunt and uncle happen to be making a visit to it.

But we've noted before that, Dickens doesn't seem to be just telling a story, but is using a story line as a foil for social commentary. And as Tristram notes, there are more interesting things in Dickens than his plots.

Everyman wrote: "I'm in the middle. I know that some coincidences are almost necessary for any work of fiction to work. I like it best when what looks like coincidences are actually carefully worked out by the au..."

We have a 19th century writer in Germany called Karl May, who is probably unknown abroad as he is not really a top-notch author. In my youth, however, he was still widely read by boys, his stories taking place in the Wild West or the Middle East and being full of adventure. When he worked with coincidences, such as two friends meeting in the middle of nowhere and being able to help each other against some evil-doers, Karl May usually had his first-person-narrator put this down not to chance but to divine intervention. This is also a way of dealing with coincidences.

Everyman wrote: "And even Jane Austen goes for the implausible coincidence, as when Darcy returns to Pemberton just as Lizzie and her aunt and uncle happen to be making a visit to it. "

The author certainly did spend a lot of time guaranteeing the readers that Darcy would not be present. However, as this was Darcy's home, I don't find it hard to believe that he happened to show up.

As far as the coincidences that Dickens is asking us to swallow here, these are a lot more incredulous. We must remember that at least in the earlier parts of the book, Dickens is playing off of Cruikshank. A lot of these weird coincidences may have become necessary to synchronize the two parts of the work. For example, if the illustrator hands him a picture with a character in London, Dickens has to figure out how to get him there.

Notwithstanding, I totally agree that Boz should have come up with a better way of handling these situations. He drops everything on us in such a simple way. There could have been a much better planned plot here. This also teaches us something about creative writing. Having to write in installments, having to meet deadlines, and lacking the ability to go back and make changes really hamper a novelist.

I think this discussion takes us back to Everyman's observation of what Chesterton said: "Dickens was a mythologist rather than a novelist; he was the last of the mythologists, and perhaps the greatest. He did not always manage to make his characters men, but he always managed, at the least, to make them gods."

Going all the way back to Homer, the Greek Poets had a free and unadulterated Poetic License. No matter how incredible something seemed, they could work it into their epic poems, making use of the gods to make coincidences a reality. If, for example, they needed a hero to be stranded on a deserted island, Alas! all they had to do was piss off one of the gods.

Dickens makes free use of his Poetic License in Oliver Twist. I do think that this liberality challenges his classification as a realist. I think we can classify some of his works, this one for starters, as myths, rather than novels in the tradition of realism.

I do not, however, agree with Chesterton's comment as a fitting generalization. In his later works, the plots are worked out much better, in some cases. While I do find it ridiculous that Ham happened to be on the scene when Steerforth returned during the storm (David Copperfield), I do find it plausible that Magwich went to London to find Pip (Great Expectations).

The differences in quality between his early works and his later works will be a recrring theme here as we progress through these works in their chronological order. I am beginning to look forward to Nicholas Nickleby, because I have not read that one yet. This re-read, because it is my least favorite Dickens, is somewhat of a grind. Although, I am enjoying his style of writing, as usual.

Tristram wrote: "When he worked with coincidences, such as two friends meeting in the middle of nowhere and being able to help each other against some evil-doers, Karl May usually had his first-person-narrator put this down not to chance but to divine intervention."

For a person of faith, that could always be chalked up as the reason for something happening even in fiction. This, of course, takes us back to Greek Mythology and the liberal use of the gods behind the scenes, who made things happen and kept other things from occurring. I just like to see these things worked out in more detail. If the author spends a little more time with something, he can make it not only believable, but even seem likely.

Everyman made a suggestion, allow me to follow suit, and lend the Inimitable some advice. Dickens did not have to hone in so much on young Oliver, if he gave us some background info on these other characters, and showed us how they ended up where they did, we would not find it so difficult to digest. The fact that any and all explanations are given after the fact show a weakness in planning, and reveal that the author had no idea beforehand of what was going to happen. This is too great of an obstacle for any novelist to overcome. He or she has to know more about the story before he or she begins telling it. Furthermore, this "after the fact" style of explaining things, and justifying how circumstances came about, removes the author's opportunity to build suspense through foreshadowing. It would be more suspenseful and perhaps make us want to read quicker, if we knew beforehand that Oliver was going to London to meet some of his long lost relatives. I don't like how the author just drops these things on us, last minute.

Jonathan wrote: "Everyman made a suggestion, allow me to follow suit, and lend the Inimitable some advice. Dickens did not have to hone in so much on young Oliver, if he gave us some background info on these other characters, and showed us how they ended up where they did, we would not find it so difficult to digest. The fact that any and all explanations are given after the fact show a weakness in planning, and reveal that the author had no idea beforehand of what was going to happen."

I think your post already makes it quite clear that these faults we find with Oliver Twist are not in any way a sign of incompetence on the Inimitable's part, but rather of the conditions under which he was forced (or chose) to work. In November 1836 Dickens decided to give up his job as a parliamentary reporter and journalist and to become a freelance writer, because he was stunned by the success his Pickwick Papers received. While the novel was still being published in monthly instalments Boz had to come up with a second novel in order to capitalize on the success of our beloved Pickwickians. I am not a writer, but I can imagine that there is nothing worse for a concocter of stories than the knowledge that their first novel was a major success, something people absolutely loved to bits, and that people would probably have extremely high expectations as to the follow-up.

So probably Dickens hurled himself into this new project for two reasons: a) he had to earn a living in order to avoid being Bumbled about, and b) the longer he kept waiting, the more paralyzing an experience it would be. I don't actually know to what extent Cruikshank influenced the story with his illustrations, but that would also account for the slipshodness of the whole enterprise of Oliver Twist. As far as I know, Dickens for a while also had to keep two novels - i.e. PP and OT - going at the same time. He was reputed for being a workhorse, but that was doubtless a lot of pressure for a 24-year old.

I like your excursion into Greek Mythology, Jonathan, because it shows that public taste and the norms of art can go strange ways. Our writers, directors etc. must pander to our thirst for originality nowadays, which also strains their stories extremely (cf. all the films by Shyamala, for instance). If a society generally believes in Fate or Kismet, why then coincidences are no problem for them.

What I find especially important in your last contributions is that you pointed out that Dickens could not change decisions he had made earlier on and so he was doomed to go along with the decisions, and blunders, he had made. I cannot imagine any author willing to write under these circumstances today, although they also enabled Dickens to react to slackenings readers' interest by introducing new characters (Sam Weller) or plot elements.

Jonathan wrote: "Fellow Pickwickians, place your observations here:"

My copy of OT doesn't have Book divisions, it just has chapters from 1 to 53, so I'm not sure where we are in the progress of the book. I don't want to post spoilers. Can you either give us the starting and ending chapter titles (if your edition has them) in the first post of each section, or otherwise indicate where we are in a full chapter sequence (you can download the free Gutenberg edition into your browser if you aren't sure about the chapter sequencing.) Thanks!

Jonathan wrote: "Notwithstanding, I totally agree that Boz should have come up with a better way of handling these situations. He drops everything on us in such a simple way. There could have been a much better planned plot here. This also teaches us something about creative writing. Having to write in installments, having to meet deadlines, and lacking the ability to go back and make changes really hamper a novelist. "

True. But this is early Dickens. I think he learned as he went along; I believe that many of his later books were carefully planned out from the start. But while there are certainly drawbacks to installment writing, there are also advantages; if certain characters aren't resonating with your public, you can kill them off or otherwise send them away and try something else. Having to persuade your readers to keep buying installments keeps the author a lot closer to the reader and reader reactions than current publishing practices, where the reader has to buy the whole book and if he or she doesn't like it after the third or fourth chapter, tough, they've already paid for the whole thing.

Installment writing is much more like modern soap operas or TV serial dramas where the plot and characters are constantly tweaked based on audience feedback.

Everyman wrote: "Jonathan wrote: "Fellow Pickwickians, place your observations here:"

My copy of OT doesn't have Book divisions, it just has chapters from 1 to 53, so I'm not sure where we are in the progress of t..."

Several days ago, I noticed the same thing, viz. that my edition is not divided into books as Jonathan's. That's why I tried to transfer Jonathan's reading schedule into a schedule with consecutively numbered chapters. I put this into the main thread of the Oliver Twist section, although I must warn you that somehow I had lost my count and was differing from Jonathan with regard to one chapter.

Thanks. I'll go look there.

I'll include the chapter numbers from now on. I haven't done the math but it should be the same number of total chapters.

Thanks, Jonathan, for taking the trouble! By the way, from tomorrow on I will not be able to follow and take part in our discussion that regularly and enthusiastically for about 10 days. Just thought I'd mention it lest you think I have dropped out completely.

I'll remain loyal to this group, because I enjoy our exchanges a lot!

Thanks for the heads up Tristram. We'll all be looking forward to your return, I am sure.

Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney taking tea

Mr. Claypole as he appeared when his master was out

Oliver at Mrs. Maylie's door