Charles Dickens

Charles Dickens (1812-1870) was an English novelist of the Victorian era whose books, from The Pickwick Papers (1836-37) to Great Expectations (1860-61), first reached readers in monthly or weekly instalments.

He was born in Portsmouth on 7 February 1812 and died at Higham, Kent, on 9 June 1870. His first book, Sketches by Boz (1836), gathered pieces written for periodicals. The Pickwick Papers, published by Chapman & Hall, followed and became a publishing phenomenon. Oliver Twist (1838) was begun while he was editing Bentley's Miscellany, and A Christmas Carol appeared in 1843. Later novels include Bleak House (1852-53), Hard Times (1854), A Tale of Two Cities (1859) and Great Expectations. Most of his novels came out first in monthly or weekly instalments.

For collectors. Because most of his novels came out in parts before book form, a Dickens first can mean the original serial numbers or the first book edition. The Pickwick Papers was issued by Chapman & Hall in 19 numbers (I to XX, the last two combined) over twenty months to November 1837, the last a double number priced at two shillings, and appeared as a book in 1837. Robert Seymour illustrated the first two parts before his death, Robert William Buss the third, and Hablot Knight Browne ("Phiz") the rest. A Tale of Two Cities ran weekly in All the Year Round from 30 April to 26 November 1859, was also issued in eight monthly parts in green wrappers, and was published as a book by Chapman & Hall in 1859. Great Expectations was serialised in All the Year Round from 1 December 1860 to 3 August 1861 and published by Chapman & Hall in three volumes in October 1861.