Creator
Charles Dickens
Title
Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy's Progress. By "Boz"
Coverage
London
Publisher
Richard Bentley
Date
1838
Subject
3 vols
Description
First edition, mixed issue. This copy has the title-pages from the first issue with the author’s name as ‘Boz’ (it was changed to Dickens in the second issue) and the later ‘Church’ plate, which replaced the ‘Fireside’ plate of the first issue.
Oliver Twist exemplifies Dickens’s use of the novel as an instrument for social reform. Through the misadventures of the impoverished orphan Oliver, Dickens criticized the exploitation of child labor in early Industrial England.
Contributor
With 24 plates by George Cruikshank.