Everyone in Dickens 3V - Hardcover

Newlin, George

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0313295808 ISBN 13: 9780313295805

Publisher: Greenwood, 1995

Synopsis

Until now, there has never been a work on Charles Dickens which has reflected absolutely everything he published, including his journalism and collaborative efforts. And never before has his oeuvre been arranged in the strictest practicable chronological order. Five hundred twenty-eight titles are dealt with in Everyone in Dickens, a three-volume reference set including: 5,200 individual character entries in Volumes I and II; 13,000 different figures reflected in Volume III; 293 illustrations associated with the earliest issuances of the works; and a series of 12 one-of-a-kind indexes covering characters by name, characters by family relationship, all historical persons mentioned, and much more. The set was created for people-students, scholars, and just readers-who would like to be able to find beloved Dickens characters quickly, discover new ones, and have a trove of accessible data on the man and his creations from which to embark on their own explorations and develop their own conclusions. Everyone in Dickens organizes the characters and nonfictional figures created or mentioned by Charles Dickens by work and within each work by importance. There are Principal Characters, Supporting Roles, Other Characters, Walk-ons, and Spear-carriers. Only Dickens' words are used, so the reader can enjoy each character in the round. Also provided are a plot or subject summary of each work, an abbreviation key, and publication information. Volume I covers all of Dickens' works from 1833-49, Volume II covers 1850-70, and Volume III includes indexes, tabulations, and original essays. Everyone in Dickens has had the benefit of input from some of the world's most eminent Dickensian scholars, and every effort has been made to make it the state of the art within its parameters. The collection has been endorsed by the Dickens Project at the University of California and has been praised by many experts. America's distinguished Dickens biographer, Fred Kaplan, has written the foreword, and the Curator of the Dickens House in London, David Parker, has written the preface.

About this title

Review:

"Newlin is the 'onlie begetter' of this extraordinary guide to Dickens' teeming world....Volumes I and II of Everyone divid Dickens' works into two periods, Volume I 1833-1849 and Volume I 1850-1870. Within these periods the works are taken chronologically and each work entry follows a similar pattern....The list of Pickwick characters (excluding the 'spear-carriers') takes up four full pages. The equivalent list for Oliver Twist takes up one and a half pages. This kind of at-a-glance literary statistic is one of the great values of the reference work. It distills and organises the whole vast corpus of Dicken's writings so that one can run simple quantitative comparisons of this kind....one imagines the editor of these volumes found endless refreshment in the materials of his task....The readers of Everyone and Every Thing will surely relish just this combination of compendious referencing and delicious browsing that these volumes uniquely offer."-The Dickensian

"A truly comprehensive reference to everyone and everything in Dickens, arranged in the strictest practicable chronological order for amateur as well as professional Dickensians who want to find Dickens characters quickly, discover new ones, and have a trove of accessible data on the man and his creations."-Reference & Research Book News

"A new guide supplants every other work attempting to catalog Dickens' staggering literary legacy and is invaluable in developing an appreciation of his genius. It's actually four books compiled and edited by George Newlin. No amount of space will be sufficient to cover the number of features or to explain the complexities of this book. There's something new every time the books are opened. Suffice it to say you can delve as deeply into Dickens as you like and the books will still be your best source."-Big Reel

"Everyone in the title, already italicized in English convention, ought to be underlined and printed in bold, for this definitive compilation truly covers everyone in the complete Dickens corpus. Newlin's guide to Dickens's characters distinguished itself from efforts not only in its comprehensiveness, but also in its use of passages from the works themselves to describe the character....true Dickensians, whether scholars or fellow enthusiasts like Newlin, will always want to turn first to Everyone."-Rettig on Reference

"In this work...a sixty-four-year-old white-bearded pianist-singer-soldier-lawyer-banker-bibliophile named George Newlin lists thirteen thousand one hundred and forty-three names of characters, fictional and nonfictional, that appear somewhere in the vast Charles Dickens oeuvre...He undertook the task as a consequence of becoming obsessed with Dickens seven years ago...he set out, as an amateur scholar, to devote himself to a project that many Dickens academic scholars had dreamed of but had assumed to be unthinkably difficult."-Brendan Gill The New Yorker

?A truly comprehensive reference to everyone and everything in Dickens, arranged in the strictest practicable chronological order for amateur as well as professional Dickensians who want to find Dickens characters quickly, discover new ones, and have a trove of accessible data on the man and his creations.?-Reference & Research Book News

?A new guide supplants every other work attempting to catalog Dickens' staggering literary legacy and is invaluable in developing an appreciation of his genius. It's actually four books compiled and edited by George Newlin. No amount of space will be sufficient to cover the number of features or to explain the complexities of this book. There's something new every time the books are opened. Suffice it to say you can delve as deeply into Dickens as you like and the books will still be your best source.?-Big Reel

?Everyone in the title, already italicized in English convention, ought to be underlined and printed in bold, for this definitive compilation truly covers everyone in the complete Dickens corpus. Newlin's guide to Dickens's characters distinguished itself from efforts not only in its comprehensiveness, but also in its use of passages from the works themselves to describe the character....true Dickensians, whether scholars or fellow enthusiasts like Newlin, will always want to turn first to Everyone.?-Rettig on Reference

?In this work...a sixty-four-year-old white-bearded pianist-singer-soldier-lawyer-banker-bibliophile named George Newlin lists thirteen thousand one hundred and forty-three names of characters, fictional and nonfictional, that appear somewhere in the vast Charles Dickens oeuvre...He undertook the task as a consequence of becoming obsessed with Dickens seven years ago...he set out, as an amateur scholar, to devote himself to a project that many Dickens academic scholars had dreamed of but had assumed to be unthinkably difficult.?-Brendan Gill The New Yorker

?Scholars have compiled Dickens encyclopedias and indexes before, but nothing as grand and final in scope as this. Surely there is some tiny character in some tiny fictional fragment that Newlin has failed to include, list, cross-refer and expound upon? Well it would be a sad person who'd look for it...Reading [this book] is easy, because you start from the front of Volume One and turn pages slowly, chuckling for about a year and a half...[Newlin] is, in fact, a hero...Everyone in Dickens is an exciting, engaging and deeply impressive reference work which renews one's awe for the immensity of Dickens' creative imagination.?-Lynne Truss Times Education Supplement

About the Author:

Until 1988, GEORGE NEWLIN spent his professional career combining activities in law and finance with volunteer service in the arts and serious avocational musical performance. At that time, he withdrew from most of his activities in venture capital and assets management and began developing his concept for a new kind of literary anthology, beginning with the works of Charles Dickens. He continues his pro bono services in the music field.

About this edition

• Publisher: Greenwood
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0313295808
• ISBN 13: 9780313295805
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 2578