Dickens' Harrowing Childhood and Its Influence

Famed novelist Charles Dickens often depicted characters navigating their way through hardscrabble childhoods,

and it turns out these fictional stories weren’t so different from his own youth in

1820s England. While Dickens was able to attend school as a child, his father squandered

the family finances and was eventually sent to prison for not paying his debts. While the rest of

the family joined his father behind bars, 12-year-old Charles was sent to labor

in a shoe polish factory to help make money. Condemned to an assembly line,

he was forced to work grueling 10-hour days in exchange for only six shillings a week.

Dickens was able to return to school after his father repaid the family’s debts,