David Copperfield

David Copperfield

by

Charles Dickens

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Chapter 1 Quotes

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker)
Page Number: 15
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 Quotes

This may be fancy, though I think the memory of most of us can go farther back into such times than many of us suppose; just as I believe the power of observation in numbers of very young children to be quite wonderful for its closeness and accuracy. Indeed, I think that most grown men who are remarkable in this respect, may with greater propriety be said not to have lost the faculty, than to have acquired it; the rather, as I generally observe such men to retain a certain freshness, and gentleness, and capacity of being pleased, which are also an inheritance they have preserved from their childhood.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker)
Page Number: 24
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 8 Quotes

Ah, what a strange feeling it was to be going home when it was not home, and to find that every object I looked at, reminded me of the happy old home, which was like a dream I could never dream again! The days when my mother and I and Peggotty were all in all to one another, and there was no one to come between us, rose up before me so sorrowfully on the road, that I am not sure I was glad to be there.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Peggotty, Mr. Murdstone , Clara Copperfield
Page Number: 101
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10 Quotes

What happiness (I thought) if we were married, and were going away anywhere to live among the trees and in the fields, never growing older, never growing wiser, children ever, rambling hand in hand through sunshine and among flowery meadows, laying down our heads on moss at night, in a sweet sleep of purity and peace, and buried by the birds when we were dead!

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Little Em'ly (Emily)
Page Number: 133
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11 Quotes

I set down this remembrance here, because it is an instance to myself of the manner in which I fitted my old books to my altered life, and made stories for myself, out of the streets, and out of men and women; and how some main points in the character I shall unconsciously develop, I suppose, in writing my life, were gradually forming all this while.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Mr. Micawber
Page Number: 150–151
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14 Quotes

The two things clearest in my mind were, that a remoteness had come upon the old Blunderstone life—which seemed to lie in the haze of an immeasurable distance; and that a curtain had for ever fallen on my life at Murdstone and Grinby's. No one has ever raised that curtain since. I have lifted it for a moment, even in this narrative, with a reluctant hand, and dropped it gladly.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Mr. Murdstone
Page Number: 188
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 15 Quotes

I cannot call to mind where or when, in my childhood, I had seen a stained glass window in a church. Nor do I recollect its subject. But I know that when I saw her turn round, in the grave light of the old staircase, and wait for us, above, I thought of that window; and that I associated something of its tranquil brightness with Agnes Wickfield ever afterwards.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield
Related Symbols: Stained Glass Window
Page Number: 194
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 16 Quotes

"Perhaps you'll be a partner in Mr. Wickfield's business, one of these days," I said, to make myself agreeable; "and it will be Wickfield and Heep, or Heep late Wickfield."

"Oh, no, Master Copperfield," returned Uriah, shaking his head, "I am much too umble for that!"

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Uriah Heep (speaker), Mr. Wickfield
Page Number: 204
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 21 Quotes

"You see," he said, wiping his head, and breathing with difficulty, "she hasn't taken much to any companions here; she hasn't taken kindly to any particular acquaintances and friends, no to mention sweethearts. In consequence, an ill-natured story got about, that Em'ly wanted to be a lady. Now my opinion is, that it came into circulation principally on account of her saying, at the school, that if she was a lady she would like to do so and so for her uncle—don't you see?—and buy him such and such fine things."

Related Characters: Mr. Omer (speaker), David Copperfield, Little Em'ly (Emily), Peggotty
Page Number: 261
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 22 Quotes

"I have been sitting here," said Steerforth, glancing round the room, "thinking that all the people we found so glad on the night of our coming down, might—to judge from the present wasted air of the place—to be dispersed, or dead, or come to I don't know what harm. David, I wish to God I had had a judicious father these last twenty years."

"My dear Steerforth, what is the matter?"

"I wish with all my soul I had been better guided!" he exclaimed. "I wish with all my soul I could guide myself better!"

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), James Steerforth (speaker), Little Em'ly (Emily), Peggotty, Ham Peggotty, Mrs. Gummidge
Related Symbols: The Sea
Page Number: 275
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 25 Quotes

"There are some low minds (not many, I am happy to believe, but there are some) that would prefer to do what I should call bow down before idols. Postively Idols! Before services, intellect, and so on. But these are intangible points. Blood is not so. We see Blood in a nose, and we know it, We meet with it in a chin, and we say, 'There it is! That's Blood!'"

Related Characters: David Copperfield
Page Number: 317
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 27 Quotes

"However," he said, "it's not that we haven't made a beginning towards housekeeping. No, no; we have begun. We must get on by degrees, but we have begun. Here," drawing the cloth off with great pride and care, "are two pieces of furniture to commence with. This flower-pot and stand, she bought herself. You put that in a parlor-window," said Traddles, falling a little back from it to survey it with the greater admiration, "with a plant in it, and—and there you are! This little round table with the marble top (it's two feet ten in circumference), I bought."

Related Characters: Tommy Traddles (speaker), David Copperfield, Sophy Crewler
Related Symbols: Flower Pot and Table
Page Number: 343
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 31 Quotes

I cannot bear to think of what did come, upon that memorable night; of what must come again, if I go on.

It is no worse, because I write of it. It would be no better, if I stopped my most unwilling hand. It is done. Nothing can undo it; nothing can make it otherwise than as it was.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), James Steerforth, Little Em'ly (Emily)
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 377
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 33 Quotes

What an idle time! What an unsubstantial, happy, foolish time! Of all the times of mine that Time has in his grip, there is none that in one retrospection I can smile at half so much, and think of half so tenderly.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Dora Spenlow
Page Number: 410
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 35 Quotes

Wherever Agnes was, some agreeable token of her noiseless presence seemed inseparable from the place. When I came back, I found my aunt's birds hanging, just as they had hung so long in the parlor window of the cottage; and my easy chair imitating my aunt's much easier chair in its position at the open window; and even the round green fan, which my aunt had brought away with her, screwed on to the window-sill. I knew who had done all this, by its seeming to have quietly done itself; and I should have known in a moment who had arranged my neglected books in the open order of my school days, even if I had supposed Agnes to be miles away.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield, Miss Betsey Trotwood
Page Number: 430
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 39 Quotes

"Father and me was both brought up at a foundation for boys; and mother, she was likewise brought up at a public, sort of charitable, establishment. They taught us all a deal of umbleness—not much else that I know of, from morning to night. We was to be umble to this person, and umble to that; and to pull off our caps here, and to make bows there; and always to know our place, and abase ourselves before our betters […] Father got made a sexton by being umble. He had the character, among the gentlefolks, of being such a well-behaved man, that they were determined to bring him in."

Related Characters: Uriah Heep (speaker), David Copperfield, Mrs. Heep
Page Number: 479–480
Explanation and Analysis:

"Weak indulgence has ruined me. Indulgence in remembrance, and indulgence in forgetfulness. My natural grief for my child's mother turned to disease; my natural love for my child turned to disease. I have infected everything I touched."

Related Characters: Mr. Wickfield (speaker), David Copperfield, Agnes Wickfield
Page Number: 482
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 42 Quotes

Some happy talent, and some fortunate opportunity, may form the two sides of the ladder on which some men mount, but the rounds of that ladder must be made of stuff to stand wear and tear; and there is no substitute for thorough-going, ardent, and sincere earnestness. Never to put one hand to anything, on which I could throw my whole self; and never to affect depreciation of my work, whatever it was, I find, now, to have been my golden rules.

How much of the practice I have just reduced to precept, I owe to Agnes, I will not repeat here. My narrative proceeds to Agnes, with a thankful love.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield, Dora Spenlow
Page Number: 507
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 45 Quotes

"There is nothing," said Annie, "that we have in common. I have long found that there is nothing. If I were thankful to my husband for no more, instead of for so much, I should be thankful to him for having saved me from the first mistaken impulse of my undisciplined heart."

Related Characters: Annie Strong (speaker), David Copperfield, Dora Spenlow, Mr. Dick, Doctor Strong, Jack Maldon
Page Number: 552
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 47 Quotes

"What shall I ever do!" she said, fighting thus with her despair. "How can I go on as I am, a solitary curse to myself, a living disgrace to every one I come near!" Suddenly she turned to my companion. "Stamp upon me, kill me! When she was you pride, you would have thought I had done her harm if I brushed against her in the street. You can't believe—why should you?—a syllable that comes out of my lips. It would be a burning shame upon you, even now, if she and I exchanged a word."

Related Characters: Martha Endell (speaker), David Copperfield, Little Em'ly (Emily), Mr. Peggotty
Page Number: 570
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 48 Quotes

Finding at last, however, that, although I had been all this time a very porcupine or hedgehog, bristling all over with determination, I had effected nothing, it began to occur to me that perhaps Dora's mind was already formed.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Dora Spenlow
Related Symbols: Jip
Page Number: 580
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 50 Quotes

"The miserable vanity of these earth-worms!" she said, when she had so far controlled the angry heavings of her breast, that she could trust herself to speak. "Your home! Do you imagine that I bestow a thought on it, or suppose you could do any harm to that low place, which money would not pay for, and handsomely? Your home! You were a part of the trade of your home, and were bought and sold like any other vendible thing your people dealt in."

Related Characters: Rosa Dartle (speaker), David Copperfield, James Steerforth, Little Em'ly (Emily), Peggotty, Ham Peggotty
Page Number: 599
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 52 Quotes

"Copperfield, I have always hated you. You've always been an upstart, and you've always been against me."

"As I think I told you once before," said I, "it is you who have been, in your greed and cunning, against all the world. It may be profitable to you to reflect, n future, that there never were greed and cunning in the world yet, that did not do too much, and over-reach themselves. It is as certain as death."

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Uriah Heep (speaker)
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 631
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 53 Quotes

"I am afraid it would have been better, if we had only loved each other as a boy and girl, and forgotten it. I have begun to think I was not fit to be a wife.

[…] If I had been more fit to be married, I might have made you more so, too. Besides you are very clever, and I never was."

"We have been very happy, my sweet Dora."

"I was very happy, very. But, as years went on, my dear boy would have wearied of his child-wife. She would have been less and less a companion for him. He would have been more and more sensible of what was wanting in his home. She wouldn't have improved. It is better as it is."

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Dora Spenlow (speaker), Agnes Wickfield
Related Symbols: Jip
Page Number: 638
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 54 Quotes

"When I lost the rest, I thought it wise to say nothing about that sum, but to keep it secretly for a rainy day. I wanted to see how you would come out of the trial, Trot; and you came out nobly—persevering, self-reliant, self-denying! So did Dick."

Related Characters: Miss Betsey Trotwood (speaker), David Copperfield, Uriah Heep, Tommy Traddles, Mr. Dick, Mr. Wickfield
Page Number: 647
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 55 Quotes

And on that part of [the shore] where she and I had looked for shells, two children—on that part of it where some lighter fragments of the old boat, blown down last night, had been scattered by the wind—among the ruins of the home he had wronged—I saw him lying with his head upon his arm, as I had often seen him lie at school.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), James Steerforth, Little Em'ly (Emily), Ham Peggotty
Related Symbols: The Sea
Page Number: 661
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 57 Quotes

"I wish Mr. Micawber, if I make myself understood," said Mrs. Micawber, in her argumentative tone, "to be the Caesar of his own fortunes. That, my dear Mr. Copperfield, appears to me to be his true position. From the first moment of this voyage, I wish Mr. Micawber to stand upon that vessel's prow and say, 'Enough of delay: enough of disappointment: enough of limited means. That was in the old country. This is the new. Produce you reparation. Bring it forward!'"

Related Characters: Mrs. Micawber (speaker), David Copperfield, Mr. Micawber
Page Number: 673
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 58 Quotes

I had thought, much and often, of my Dora's shadowing out to me what might have happened, in those years that were destined not to try us; I had considered how the things that never happen, are often as much realities to us, in their effects, as those that are accomplished. The very years she spoke of, were realities now, for my correction […] I endeavoured to convert what might have been between myself and Agnes, into a means of making me more self-denying, more resolved, more conscious of myself, and my defects and errors.

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield, Dora Spenlow
Page Number: 681
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 62 Quotes

And O, Agnes, even out of thy true eyes, in that same time, the spirit of my child-wife looked upon me, saying it was well; and winning me, through thee, to tenderest recollections of the Blossom that had withered in its bloom!

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield, Dora Spenlow
Page Number: 716
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 64 Quotes

O Agnes, O my soul, so may thy face be by me when I close my life indeed; so may I, when realities are melting from me like the shadows which I now dismiss, still find thee near me, pointing upward!

Related Characters: David Copperfield (speaker), Agnes Wickfield
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 729
Explanation and Analysis:
No matches.