标题：Hard Times
图书信息
出版社: Bantam Classics (1981年3月1日)
外文书名: 狄更斯: 艰难时世
丛书名: Bantam Classics
简装: 320页
正文语种: 英语
ISBN: 0553210165
条形码: 9780553210163
尺寸: 10.6 x 1.9 x 17.4 cm
重量: 159 g
作者简介
Charles Dickens was born in a little house in Landport, Portsea, England, on February 7th, 1812. At the age of eleven, Dickens was taken out of school and sent to work in a London blacking warehouse, where his job was to paste labels on bottles for six shillings a week. When the family fortunes improved, Charles went back to school, after which he became an office boy, a freelance reporter, and finally an author. With Pickwick Papers (1836-7) he achieved immediate fame; in a few years he was easily the most popular and respected writer of his time. It has been estimated that one out of every ten persons in Victorian England was a Dickens reader. Oliver Twist (1837), Nicholas Nickelby (1838-9), and The Old Curiosity Shop (1840-41) were huge successes. Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-4) was less so, but Dickens followed it with his unforgettable A Christmas Carol (1843). Bleak House (1852-3), Hard Times (1854), and Little Dorrit (1855-7) reveal his deepening concern for the injustices of British society. A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Great Expectations (1860-61) and Our Mutual Friend (1864-5) complete his major works.
内容简介
在线阅读本书
Written deliberately to increase the circulation of Dickens’s weekly magazine, Household Words, Hard Times was a huge and instantaneous success upon publication in 1854. Yet this novel is not the cheerful celebration of Victorian life one might have expected from the beloved author of The Pickwick Papers and The Old Curiosity Shop. Compressed, stark, allegorical, it is a bitter exposé of capitalist exploitation during the industrial revolution–and a fierce denunciation of the philosophy of materialism, which threatens the human imagination in all times and places. With a typically unforgettable cast of characters–including the heartless fact-worshipper 
Mr. Gradgrind, the warmly endearing Sissy Jupe, and the eternally noble Stephen Blackpool–Hard Times carries a uniquely powerful message and remains one of the most widely read of Dickens’s major novels.
媒体评论
书评
From School Library Journal
Grade 7-12-Dickens'' satire on the Victorian family and the philosophies of a society which sought to turn men into machines. 
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.  --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. 
From AudioFile
In Dickens''s story of the horrors of a utilitarian upbringing, reason and facts are everything, and imagination and creativity are nothing. The narrator''s British accent goes well with Dickens''s overly dramatic and lush prose. He uses different English accents for the numerous male characters, some speech defects for others and a breathy falsetto voice for all the women. While a straight rendition of the dialogue would be an improvement, luckily the story is mainly narrative. Some classics simply may not translate well either to audiobooks or to the 1990''s.  E.F.  (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine  --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition. 
Barry V. Qualls, Rutgers University
Graham Law’s edition of Hard Times is the most useful edition for teaching Dickens that I have seen...  --This text refers to the Paperback edition. 
Kate Flint, University of Oxford
This beautifully produced edition combines a freshly written, informative introduction with helpful and well-judged notes...  --This text refers to the Paperback edition.