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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
The Violent Effigy

The Violent Effigy

Carey, John

Paperback

Literary Criticism

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 0571247792
ISBN13: 9780571247790
Publisher: Faber Finds
Published: Dec 11 2008
Pages: 184
Weight: 0.53
Height: 0.42 Width: 5.50 Depth: 8.50
Language: English

An exploration of the strange poetry of Dickens's imagination by leading academic and critic John Carey.

Setting aside the usual interpretations of Dickens's work, A Violent Effigy delves into the wonderful, terrible fantasy world it inhabited. It shows Dickens torn between the appeal of violence and a fanatical orderliness: he was attracted by characters who commit murder or burst into flame or want to eat one another, but also required people soaped and regimented. The children he created were either the pious gnomes beloved of Victorian readers or callous, sharp-nosed children who pick out adults by the odd personal atmospheres they carry around. Among his females are mythic women whose insidious miniature weapons - needles, scissors - threaten the dominant male. He created a shadow-land between life and death, peopled by effigies, walking coffins, waxworks, stuffed creatures and disturbingly animated corpses.

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