Dickensian
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /dɪˈkɛn.zɪ.ən/
ipa: /dəˈkɛn.zi.ən/
Forms: form: more Dickensian
form: most Dickensian
Etymology: From Dickens (the surname of Charles Dickens (1812–1870)) + -ian (suffix forming adjectives or nouns meaning ‘belonging to, relating to, or like’).
Senses: glosses: Of, pertaining to, or created by the English author Charles Dickens.
examples: text: a Dickensian name
synonyms: Dickenesque
Dickensesque
Dickensish
Dickens-like
Dickensy
glosses: Similar to Dickens' writing style, especially in commenting on society, or in using emotion, humour, or rich descriptions.
examples: text: At last the first glimpse from a bridge of an open-top red bus, and a noticeable darkening of the atmosphere from the smoke of London: then the increasingly dingy stations with double-barrel names, set amid what has always been to me the outstanding feature of the "Premier Line" approach to London—the positively marvellous display of crazy chimney-pots on the grey inner suburban houses. As many as twenty, all of varying style, standing together like ranks of jagged teeth, and providing a Dickensian back-cloth which no other route can boast.
ref: 1951 October, R. S. McNaught, “Lines of Approach”, in Railway Magazine, page 704:
text: As though in expiation of their sires' wealth, schoolboys often had to live in conditions that would have disgraced a Dickensian workhouse.
ref: 1988, Cecil D. Eby, “Playing the Game”, in The Road to Armageddon: The Martial Spirit in English Popular Literature 1870–1914, Durham, N.C.; London: Duke University Press, →ISBN, page 89:
text: As earlier implied, the planet is threatened on three major fronts: […] (3) by a Dickensian world of wretched excess and wretched despair.
ref: 1993, William Sloane Coffin, “A Vision of the Future”, in A Passion for the Possible: A Message to U.S. Churches, Louisville, Ky.: Westminster/John Knox Press, →ISBN, page 10:
text: Down in the subway under the roundabout the looming social ordeal started to weigh down on me, […] By the time I pressed a huge and over-polished brass bell I'd devolved into a shifty-eyed, cinder-cheeked Dickensian urchin, and when the door opened I half expected to see Mrs Bridges throw up her fat, floury hands and scream for the cook's boy.
ref: 2001 February, Tim Moore, “Prologue”, in Frost on My Moustache: The Arctic Exploits of a Lord and a Loafer, New York, N.Y.: St. Martin’s Griffin, St. Martin’s Press, →ISBN, page 2:
text: Leaning against piracy fits in with China's desire to cast off its image of a country where exploited workers toil for a pittance in Dickensian factories that turn the air and water black with the pollution they discharge.
ref: 2008 September 15, Alan Wheatley, “China getting higher marks for tackling piracy”, in Reuters, archived from the original on 23 Apr 2010:
synonyms: Dickenesque
Dickensesque
Dickensish
Dickens-like
Dickensy
glosses: Reminiscent of the environments and situations most commonly portrayed in Dickens' writings, such as poverty, social injustice, and other aspects of Victorian England.
Derived terms: Dickensianly
Related terms: word: Dickenesque
word: Dickensesque
word: Dickensiana
word: Dickensish
word: Dickensite
word: Dickensy