Barnaby Rudge: The Classic Tale

Charles Dickens

Aug 2022 · Icon Audio Arts · Narrated by Cyril Taylor-Carr

About this audiobook

• “I hope I know my own unworthiness, and that I hate and despise myself and all my fellow creatures as every practicable Christian should.” ...
• “I have broken where I should have bent, and have mused and brooded, when my spirit should have mixed with all God's great creation.

Barnaby Rudge is a historical novel by British novelist Charles Dickens. Barnaby Rudge was one of two novels (the other was The Old Curiosity Shop) Dickens published in his short-lived (1840–1841) weekly serial Master Humphrey's Clock. This book is largely set during the Gordon Riots of 1780. Barnaby Rudge was the fifth of Dickens' novels to be published. It had initially been planned to appear as his first, but changes of publisher led to many delays, and it first appeared in serial form in the Clock from February to November 1841. This was Dickens' first historical novel.

Charles John Huffam Dickens FRSA was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era.

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About the author

Charles Dickens, perhaps the best British novelist of the Victorian era, was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, England on February 7, 1812. His happy early childhood was interrupted when his father was sent to debtors' prison, and young Dickens had to go to work in a factory at age twelve. Later, he took jobs as an office boy and journalist before publishing essays and stories in the 1830s. His first novel, The Pickwick Papers, made him a famous and popular author at the age of twenty-five. Subsequent works were published serially in periodicals and cemented his reputation as a master of colorful characterization, and as a harsh critic of social evils and corrupt institutions. His many books include Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, Bleak House, Great Expectations, Little Dorrit, A Christmas Carol, and A Tale of Two Cities. Dickens married Catherine Hogarth in 1836, and the couple had nine children before separating in 1858 when he began a long affair with Ellen Ternan, a young actress. Despite the scandal, Dickens remained a public figure, appearing often to read his fiction. He died in 1870, leaving his final novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, unfinished.