Customer Reviews
This is not just a book - By: Justix, 14 Feb 2008 
This is not just a book, it's more of a whole of life experience. You will have to prepare yourself for the long haul & almost breathe your way through Mr Copperfield's life. But it is worth it because it is quite a life story & you will get to know & like or even dislike quite a few people along the way. I read it because I had enjoyed Oliver Twist & Great Expectations & love to understand & appreciate the simplicities & difficulties of the Victorian way of life & the great characters Dickens always invents.... & to be sure, he didn't let me down with this one either.
It's a long read & not for the faint hearted in any way. Some passages are long & by todays standards very cumbersome & long winded but if you like a good story, great characters & fancy a step out of the digital age for a while then this is for you.
My Favorite Dickens - By: Old Woden, 12 Mar 2007 This is a wonderful Book. If you have never read it please read as soon as possible. It is long & at times rambling, as there are many sub plots, so you will need some staminar, but it is funny, sad, whitty & most enjoyable. Dickens exels with his older chracters, MacAwber, Bettsy Trotwood & Mr Dick. His young female characters however seem a little unreal. Dora his childlike wife is sad & unworldly, Agnes Wickfield is an Angel (Can any woman be as perfect as Agnes)and Little Emily is too silly. The villans do not disappoint. This is my favorite Dickens Novel. Please read & enjoy
A dickens of a read - By: J. Davis, 17 Feb 2007 At 340,000 words (more or less), this work is a challlenge, but it's worth it. And how! The ornate style that is Dickens can slow you down, back you up for a re-read, but always delivers. His characters, & many of their utterances, are memorable, & will live with you long after you finish the book.
With an almost accidental ease Dickens treats us to detailed word-pictures of mid-nineteenth-century England & the customs of the day, down to a description of the Britannia-metal cutlery. His richly-layered style moves your emotions back & forth & it's hard not to laugh & cry in turns.
Typical of Dickens, he employs a number of contrivances which, in a lesser hand, would seem unconvincing. But he ties up alll his loose ends & doesn't seem to drop any details along the way. It's hard to imagine that he did alll this with pen & ink & often under candlelight.
Don't forget the dictionary & notepad -- there are words & terms in here that fell out of use long ago. Charles Dickens is an education, too. Brilliant stuff!
ever so ambling - By: Gille Liath, 22 Sep 2006 
`David Copperfield' does not, of course, need recommendation from me or anyone else. Re-reading this huge, rambling, digressive novel though, it strikes me how much it is marred by Dickens' repressed attitude to sexuality - he is the very embodiment of stereotypicallly Victorian attitudes. One result of this is the ludicrously overdrawn subplot involving little Em'ly. No doubt the consequences of a pre-marital affair could be serious then for a working class girl, but when Dickens says early on that she would better have died in childhood you can only react with incredulity. Later, as George Orwell observed, Uriah Heep is vituperated mainly because he has the audacity to want to marry `above himself'. Conversely no woman of marriageable age is alllowed a spark of independence or what was then callled `boldness'. The three principal women in David's life are alll, to quote Blackadder, wetter than a haddock's bathing costume.
If you've never read this book then you should certainly read it - Micawber is worth the price of admission by himself - but you need lots of time, & lots of patience. If you've read it before you may find yourself, like me, skipping through large chunks.
Masterpiece in every sense - By: Cecilia S. Idiart, 24 Dec 2003 Although it is true that Dickens says in twenty words thing that could be expressed just as clearly in only five, there can be no arguing that he is an expert in manipulating his reader's feelings. "David Copperfield", which tells the story of this character's life, shows this skill reallly well. This book will make you cry in one chapter & laugh out loud in the next one. Dickens will also make his reader feel about his characters just as he wants you to feel about them. You'll never forget the cruel Murdstones, " `umble" Uriah Heep, angel-like Agnes & adorable though rather silly Dora. In addition to these memorable characters, I think alll its readers will agree that "David Copperfield" is a complete work in every sense & I'm sure many of them will count it among their favourites.
