Preparing for the 2021 Chapter-a-Day Read-along: David Copperfield

As the bells of Notre Dame cathedral begin to echo and fade away, we get ready to close the book on the story of Quasimodo and Esmerelda and pull the next Chapter-a-Day Read-along book off the shelf, David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.

I have read several Dickens novels, and of them all I have the warmest feelings toward David Copperfield. But it has been almost twenty years since I last read it, and I have forgotten most of the story. I have carried these fond feelings with me over the years, and I am curious to see what the book will say to me at this point in my life.

Published in 1850, David Copperfield was written after Dickens’ earlier, lighter works like The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist, and The Old Curiosity Shop — which read-along participants may remember reading in 2019. Literary critics claim that David Copperfield marks a transition from his earlier works to the more mature works that followed it: Bleak House, A Tale of Two Cities, and Great Expectations Like virtually all of Dickens’ works, David Copperfield was first published serially, from May of 1849 to November of 1850. And as I mentioned in an earlier post, Charles Dickens called it his favorite novel:

Of all my books, I like this the best. It will be easily believed that I am a fond parent to every child of my fancy, and that no one can ever love that family as dearly as I love them. But, like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child. And his name is David Copperfield.

What to Know Before Beginning to Read David Copperfield

The first thing to know is that David Copperfield is an abbreviation of the full title:

The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account).

That is a mouthful! But it tells us a couple of important things. First, the novel is told in first person by the character David Copperfield himself. This gives the novel a certain immediacy and intimacy, but it also calls into question the reliability of the narrator and limits our experience to only what he knows about. Second, it hints at the type of novel it is: a bildungsroman, that is, a story that focuses on the coming of age of the main character. We can expect to see him mature and change as the novel develops, and we can expect the story to encompass many years of his life. Finally, the full title has echoes of earlier novels like The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling (1749) by Henry Fielding and The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1767) by Laurence Sterne.

There are many free copies of David Copperfield available online, including one at Project Gutenberg. There is also an audiobook version on Librivox. I’ll be reading the Penguin Classics Kindle edition for its copious footnotes, but I also have a leather bound copy from the Franklin Mint that may get some reading time as well.

David Copperfield is 64 chapters long and we will read it from August 22 to October 24. Follow along on Twitter and/or Facebook by using the hashtag: #davidcopperfieldreadalong

On a more personal note, I am super excited that David Copperfield will be the final book in my Classics Club Challenge of reading 50 classics in 5 years. I began the challenge on my 50th birthday five years ago, and over that time I have read forty-nine great classic novels. We will be finishing David Copperfield on the eve of my 55th birthday, just in time!

And as I mentioned earlier this year, I have a special bookish announcement coming, so stay tuned for it in the next few weeks!