Christmas Carol - Softcover

The classic, definitive, world-famous Nonesuch Press edition of 1937, finally available again and bound in leather and linen. The text in these stunning volumes is taken from the 1867 Chapman and Hall edition, which became known as the Charles Dickens edition and was the last edition to be corrected by the author himself. The Nonesuch edition contains full-color illustrations selected by Dickens himself, by artists including Hablot Knight Browne ("Phiz"), George Cruikshank, John Leech, Robert Seymour, and George Cattermole.

The Nonesuch Dickens reproduces the original elegance of these beautiful editions. Books are printed on natural cream-shade high quality stock, quarter bound in bonded leather with cloth sides, include a ribbon marker, and feature special printed endpapers. Each volume is wrapped in a protective, clear acetate jacket.

The books are available as individual volumes, or as sets. The six-volume set contains Oliver Twist, Bleak House, Christmas Books, Nicholas Nickleby, David Copperfield, and Great Expectations together with Hard Times. The three-volume set contains A Tale of Two Cities, Little Dorrit, and The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit.

Charles Dickens was born at Portsmouth on 7 February 1812. He received little formal education, but taught himself shorthand and became a reporter of parliamentary debates for the Morning Chronicle. He began to publish sketches in various periodicals, which were subsequently republished as Sketches by Boz. The Pickwick Papers were published in 1836-7 and after a slow start became a publishing phenomenon and Dickens's characters the centre of a popular cult. He began Oliver Twist in 1837, followed by Nicholas Nickleby (1838) and The Old Curiosity Shop (1840-41).After finishing Barnaby Rudge (1841) Dickens set off for America; he went full of enthusiasm for the young republic but, in spite of a triumphant reception, he returned disillusioned. His experiences are recorded in American Notes (1842). Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-4) did not repeat its predecessors' success but this was quickly redressed by the huge popularity of the Christmas Books, of which the first, A Christmas Carol, appeared in 1843. During 1844-6 Dickens travelled abroad and he began Dombey and Son while in Switzerland. This and David Copperfield (1849-50) were more serious in theme and more carefully planned than his early novels. In later works, such as Bleak House (1853) and Little Dorrit (1857), Dickens's social criticism became more radical and his comedy more savage. Charles Dickens died on 9 June 1870.