num_pages: 880
description: Considered by many readers, including Shaw, Chesterton, Conrad and Trilling, as one of Dickens's finest achievements, Bleak House tells the complex story of a notorious lawsuit in which love and inheritance are set against the classic urban background of nineteenth-century London, where fog on the river, seeping into the very bones of the characters, symbolizes the pervasive corruption of the legal system and the society which supports it. Displaying the writer's familiar panoramic sweep and enormous cast of brilliant characters, the novel is also a bold experimental narrative in which public and private worlds are brought into sharp focus. It was first published in monthly parts, 1852-3, accompanied by the illustrations by 'Phiz' reproduced in this volume. This edition also reprints the original Everyman preface by G. K. Chesterton.
language: English
title: Bleak House
titlecomplete: Bleak House
characters: Lady Dedlock, Mr Tulkinghorn, Allan Woodcourt, Esther Summerson, Caroline Jellyby, John Jarndyce, Jo, Mr Bucket, Ada Clare, William Guppy, Joshua Smallweed, Harold Skimpole, Charlotte Neckett, Mr George, Mr Snagsby, Richard Carstone, Sir Leicester Dedlock
genres: Classics, British Literature, Mystery, Novels, Classic Literature, Historical Fiction, Literature, 19th Century, Fiction, Victorian
ratings_count: 107002
places: England
publisher: Everyman's Library Oct-15-1991