Charles Dickens, a literary giant of the Victorian era, left an indelible mark on the world with his compelling novels and unforgettable characters. His keen observations on society, humanity, and the human condition continue to resonate with readers around the globe. Whether it's the poignant insights of Oliver Twist or the timeless morality of A Christmas Carol, Dickens' words have the power to inspire and provoke thought. In this collection, we bring you 31 of his most inspiring quotes, offering a glimpse into the wisdom and wit of a man whose works have stood the test of time. Immerse yourself in these memorable lines and discover the enduring legacy of Charles Dickens.
1. “She read Dickens in the same spirit she would have eloped with him.” - Eudora Welty
2. “Good for Christmas-time is the ruddy colour of the cloak in which--the tree making a forest of itself for her to trip through, with her basket--Little Red Riding-Hood comes to me one Christmas Eve to give me information of the cruelty and treachery of that dissembling Wolf who ate her grandmother, without making any impression on his appetite, and then ate her, after making that ferocious joke about his teeth. She was my first love. I felt that if I could have married Little Red Riding-Hood, I should have known perfect bliss. But, it was not to be; and there was nothing for it but to look out the Wolf in the Noah's Ark there, and put him late in the procession on the table, as a monster who was to be degraded.” - Charles Dickens
3. “And here you see me working out, as cheerfully and thankfully as I may, my doom of sharing in the glass a constant change of customers, and of lying down and rising up with the skeleton allotted to me for my mortal companion.” - Charles Dickens
4. “There are very few moments in a man's existence when he experiences so much ludicrous distress, or meets with so little charitable commiseration, as when he is in pursuit of his own hat.” - Charles Dickens
5. “Love, though said to be afflicted with blindness, is a vigilant watchman.” - Charles Dickens
6. “I see Barsad, and Cly, Defarge, The Vengeance, the Juryman, the Judge, long ranks of the new oppressors who have risen on the destruction of the old, perishing by this retributive instrument, before it shall cease out of its present use. I see a beautiful city and brilliant people rising from this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, in their triumphs and defeats, through long long years to come, I see the evil of this time and of the previous time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making explanation for itself and wearing it out. ” - Charles Dickens
7. “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.(John 11:25-26)” - Anonymous
8. “The great grindstone, Earth, had turned when Mr. Lorry looked out again, and the sun was red on the courtyard. But, the lesser grindstone stood alone there in the calm morning air, with red upon it that the sun had never give, and would never take away.” - Charles Dickens
9. “Meat, ma'am, meat.” - Charles Dickens
10. “Thackeray's a good writer and Flaubert is a great artist. Trollope is a good writer and Dickens is a great artist. Colette is a very good writer and Proust is a great artist. Katherine Anne Porter was an extremely good writer and Willa Cather was a great artist.” - Truman Capote
11. “A day wasted on others is not wasted on one's self.” - Charles Dickens
12. “So new to him," she muttered, "so old to me; so strange to him, so familiar to me; so melancholy to both of us!...” - Charles Dickens
13. “We changed again, and yet again, and it was now too late and too far to go back, and I went on. And the mists had all solemnly risen now, and the world lay spread before me.” - Charles Dickens
14. “Please, sir, I want some more.” - Charles Dickens
15. “Today, as a result of the policy of Macmillan's Government, Great Britain presents in the United Nations the face of Pecksniff and in Katanga the face of Gradgrind.” - Conor Cruise O'Brien
16. “Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be.” - Charles Dickens
17. “Of course they had more chains on him than Scrooge saw on Marley's ghost, but he could have kicked up dickens if he'd wanted. That's a pun, son.” - Stephen King
18. “Our love had begun in folly, and ended in madness!” - Charles Dickens
19. “There are many things which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited” - Charles Dickens
20. “In short, I should have liked to have had the lightest license of a child, and yet be man enough to know its value” - Charles Dickens
21. “If I may so express it, I was steeped in Dora. I was not merely over head and ears in love with her, but I was saturated through and through. Enough love might have been wrung out of me, metaphorically speaking, to drown anybody in; and yet there would have remained enough within me, and all over me, to pervade my entire existence.” - Charles Dickens
22. “When I have come to you, at last (as I have always done), I have come topeace and happiness. I come home, now, like a tired traveller, and findsuch a blessed sense of rest!” - Charles Dickens
23. “The day before the Queen's Ball, Father had a visitor--a very young girl with literary aspirations, someone Lord Lytton had recommended visit Father and sent over–and while Father was explaining to her the enjoyment he was having in writing this Drood book for serialisation, this upstart of a girl had the temerity to ask, 'But suppose you died before all the book was written?' [...] He spoke very softly in his kindest voice and said to her, 'One can only work on, you know--work while it is day.” - Dan Simmons
24. “When the last autumn of Dickens's life was over, he continued to work through his final winter and into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation?Would we trade all those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute?” - Dan Simmons
25. “... we produced a bundle of pens, a copious supply of ink, and a goodly show of writing and blotting paper. For there was something very comfortable in having plenty of stationary.” - Charles Dickens
26. “Možda si ti kakav neprobavljeni komad govedine, žličica gorčice, grumenčić sira, polovica nedokuhana krumpira. Ti imaš više veze sa drobom nego sa grobom, ma tko da bio!” - Charles Dickens
27. “Bolje je i nemati oči nego ih imati tako zle!” - Charles Dickens
28. “Blažene žene: one nikad ništa ne rade dopola. One uvijek u sve unose svu strast.” - Charles Dickens
29. “Ningún hombre sabe, hasta que llega el momento, qué profundidades hay en su interior. Para algunos hombres no llega nunca; dejémoslos descansar y demos gracias. Para mí, tú la has traído, tú la has forzado, y el fondo de ese mar embravecido se ha alzado desde entonces... Te amo. Lo que quieren decir otros hombres cuando usan esa expresión no lo sé; lo que quiero decir yo es que estoy bajo la influencia de una atracción terrible, que he resistido en vano y que me domina. Puedes arrastrarme al fuego, puedes arrastrarme a la horca, puedes arrastrarme a la muerte, puedes arrastrarme a todo aquello que siempre he evitado, puedes arrastrarme a cualquier peligro y cualquier desgracia. A eso y a la confusión de mis pensamientos, que es tal que no valgo para nada, es a lo que me refiero cuando digo que eres mi ruina.” - Charles Dickens
30. “A man would die tonight of lying out on the marshes, I thought. And then I looked at the stars, and considered how awful it would be for a man to turn his face up to them as he froze to death, and see no help or pitty in all the glittering multitude.” - Charles Dickens
31. “She had curiously thoughtful and attentive eyes; eyes that were very pretty and very good.” - Charles Dickens
