Includes bibliographical references and index.

A sketch of the life / Michael Allen -- Dickens's use of the autobiographical fragment / Nicola Bradbury -- "Faithfully yours, Charles Dickens" : the epistolary art of the inimitable / David Paroissien -- Three major biographies / Catherine Peters -- The eighteenth-century legacy / Monika Fludernik -- Dickens and the gothic / Robert Mighall -- Illustrations / Malcolm Andrews -- The language of Dickens / Patricia Ingham -- The novels and popular culture / Juliet John -- Dickens as a reformer / Hugh Cunningham -- Dickens's evolution as a journalist / John M.L. Drew -- Dickens and gender / Natalie McKnight -- Dickens and technology / Trey Philpotts -- Dickens and America (1842) / Nancy Aycock Metz -- Dickens and government ineptitude abroad, 1854-1865 / Leslie Mitchell -- Dickens and the uses of history / John Gardiner -- Dickens and Christianity / Valentine Cunningham -- Dickens and the law / Jan-Melissa Schramm -- The Pickwick papers / David Parker -- Oliver Twist / Brian Cheadle -- Nicholas Nickleby / Stanley Friedman -- The old curiosity shop / Gill Ballinger -- Barnaby Rudge / Jon Mee -- Martin Chuzzlewit / Goldie Morgentaler -- Dombey and Son / Brigid Lowe -- David Copperfield / Gareth Cordery -- Bleak house / Robert Tracy -- Hard times / Anne Humpherys -- Little Dorrit / Philip Davis -- A tale of two cities / Paul Davis -- Great expectations / Andrew Sanders -- Our mutual friend / Leon Litvack -- The mystery of Edwin Drood / Simon J. James -- Dickens and the literary culture of the period / Michael Hollington -- Dickens and criticism / Lyn Pykett -- Postcolonial Dickens / John O. Jordan.