The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account) was published in twenty monthly parts by Bradbury & Evans from May 1849 to November 1850, and in a single volume in November 1850. Dickens called it “of all my books” the one he liked best — his “favourite child.” It is the most autobiographical of his novels, drawing on his own experiences of childhood abandonment (the blacking factory), early love (Maria Beadnell, fictionalized as Dora Spenlow), and the struggle to become a writer.
The Novel
David Copperfield narrates his own life: born to a young widow in Suffolk, terrorized by his stepfather Mr. Murdstone, sent to Salem House school, orphaned, dispatched to work in a London warehouse (Dickens’s blacking factory), rescued by his eccentric aunt Betsey Trotwood, educated at Canterbury (where he lodges with the unctuous Uriah Heep), articled to a proctor, married to the childlike Dora (who dies), and finally married to the steadfast Agnes Wickfield.
The novel’s power lies in its characters. Mr. Micawber — always waiting for something to turn up, always in debt, always grandiloquent — is one of the great comic creations in English. Uriah Heep — “‘umble” and serpentine — is one of the great villains. Steerforth — handsome, charming, and finally destructive — is one of the great tragic figures. And David himself, with his capacity for love, his emotional blindness, and his eventual self-knowledge, is the most fully realized of Dickens’s narrators.
Themes
Memory — the novel is structured as an act of remembering, and Dickens captures with extraordinary precision the texture of childhood memory: the intensity of early impressions, the confusion of understanding, the way emotion colors everything.
Class — David moves through every level of English society: the genteel poverty of his mother, the working-class degradation of the warehouse, the lower-middle-class respectability of the Micawbers, the professional world of Canterbury, and the literary establishment of London.
The “undisciplined heart” — David’s central flaw is his tendency to love unwisely: Steerforth, who does not deserve his admiration; Dora, who cannot be a real partner; Emily, whom he idealizes. His growth is the growth from passionate but undisciplined feeling to mature and disciplined love.
Collecting David Copperfield
First edition in parts (Bradbury & Evans, London, 1849–1850): Twenty monthly parts in green printed wrappers. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne (“Phiz”) with 40 etched plates.
Market values:
- Complete in original parts, fine: $15,000–$40,000
- Very good: $5,000–$15,000
- First edition in book form (1 vol.): $3,000–$10,000
Identification points for the parts issue:
- Green wrappers with Bradbury & Evans imprint
- All 40 Phiz plates present
- Original advertisements bound in
The novel’s status as Dickens’s own favorite, combined with its autobiographical significance and its extraordinary gallery of characters, makes it one of the most collected Dickens titles.