This was Charles Dickens first ever novel and one that I was inspired to read because I come from Corsham. Among people of Corsham, there’s a lot of talk about how this book was partially written while Charles Dickens was in the town and how it was partially inspired by it. While this may be true, anybody reading it in the hopes of seeing a fictional representation of Corsham will be disappointed as it does not feature at all – though it does include chapters set in Bath, Bristol, and Ipswich, which are all other towns that I know well.
This is one of those old novels that you can tell was written for serialisation. The storyline essentially just follows the Pickwick Club (a group of eccentric, bumbling rich men) who travel around the country looking to meet new people and have new experiences. In that sense, it’s really just a random string of events which have been strung together – they range from comedic escapades, to really bleak anecdotes relayed by side characters. One chapter might be a man having a silly conversation with a ghost that lives in a chair, another chapter might be about a man’s slow descent into insanity as he keeps thinking he is going to murder his wife.
The overall effect of this is that some chapters are really, really good, while others are pretty dull and you never know what you’re going to get. I did find the Pickwick Club members themselves quite endearing, especially Mr. Pickwick himself, and the scrapes and misunderstandings they get themselves into were usually pretty funny. Though sometimes the story focused on romance plots which didn’t seem quite as compelling, as well as long court cases which I wish could have been wrapped up sooner.
It’s a really unique reading experience, and not strictly in a good way. I am glad that I read it, and things like someone asking a ghost “Why do you continue to stay in the room you died when you could go out and see the whole world?” really amused me. It’s disappointing that it didn’t really seem to tackle social injustices in the same way that some of his later work does, and I wouldn’t recommend this to modern readers who haven’t tried other Dickens novels, but if you’ve read a lot of other classics, including some of his other works, I think you might enjoy it.
Rating: 6.3/10
