I've read all the novels, not scratched the surface of the journalism.
He never surpassed The Pickwick Papers - that's the one book he wrote which is a flawless masterpiece, the book he was born to write. It's s the last great 17th-18th century picaresque rather than a modern novel. He never really worked out how to do a proper structure with the themes and plots all dovetailing, though gets close with Great Expectations, David Copperfield, Tale of Two Cities or Our Mutual Friend.
If you have a tolerance for his cutesy and the coincidence and catchphrases, if you aren't looking for 'serious' fiction, all his novels are good. They all have at least three or four great characters and a bunch of superb set pieces.
And when he's really cooking he's the greatest prose stylist the language ever had

>>23817100
>ESL
Lol, you will not understand Dickens.

>>23817131
Nabokov said Bleak House was his best book.

>>23817901
Well I'm telling you it's Pickwick Papers, and if I catch you talking to this Nabokov fellow again I'll kick your ass and I'll kick his

>>23817131
>He never surpassed The Pickwick Papers - that's the one book he wrote which is a flawless masterpiece, the book he was born to write. It's s the last great 17th-18th century picaresque rather than a modern novel.
Ah shit you beat me to it. Yeah, Pickwick Papers is when he peaked. A maximum of lols and observation of human nature, a minimum of sentimentality. I haven't read his whole oeuvre but enough to be confident that he never wrote anything better. I always imagine Alfred Jingle as a shabby Hugh Laurie

>>23817901
The people who say Pickwick Papers is his best book don't actually like Dickens as an author

>>23817982
I don't, he's extremely overrated. Even Anthony Trollope was a better writer than him. But Pickwick Papers was on point.

>>23817100
They did a 2 year dickens readalong where they read all 15 novels
https://discord.gg/EusdDdFe

>>23818001
sugoooi! Are they from lit?

>>23817100
What is this anon saying? Anyone care to translate?

>>23818091
Foreigner - intellectual sort - came to site - looking for tranny porn - made wrong turn - found book board - liked board - posted on board - silly man - asked questions - got answers - got wrong answers - despondency - despair - suicide - third one this week

>>23818037
No

>>23817100
>and will he help my ESL ass?
Not really, lots of archaic usage.

>>23818202
>19th century prose
>archaic
This site gets worse by the day.

>>23818216
>he assumed he knew what archaic means
Rather embarrassing.

>b. esp. of language: Belonging to an earlier period, no longer in common use, though still retained either by individuals, or generally, for special purposes, poetical, liturgical, etc.

Are you going to deny that 19th century literature is filled with words, meanings, and idioms no longer in common usage? When learning a language it is generally wise to avoid things with a good deal of archaic usage since you will not know what is and is not archaic.

>>23818404
>wut are relative terms
Brainlet.jpg

>>23818436
You would have been able to get away with not knowing the applicable definition had it not been for that bit of unintended irony you tacked onto the end which is what made your post embarrassing.

>>23818478
Lol you are such a pseud. I could refer to language from the 1980s as "archaic" by your definition. The point is, archaicism is a spectrum, and I don't think 19th century lit is particularly archaic. If you're learning English as a second language, you should absolutely be able to read modern literature such as came out of the 19th, 18th, and even 17th centuries. What's archaic about it? 99.9% of the words Dickens uses, including those that are old-fashioned, would be intelligible to an educated modern English speaker. You telling an ESL not to read Dickens is idiotic. You destroy literature and you destroy souls.

>>23818517
>the OED
>my definition
OK, if you want to give me credit for the OED I will accept it. You are on a literature forum and don't know the most applicable meaning of archaic in context of literature and language, and then cried about the state of the board when it was really your own ignorance and assumption that was at fault. This use of archaic (generally as an abbreviation) is used over and over and over in most every dictionary, not knowing this is essentially admitting to not knowing how to use a dictionary.

I never said not to read Dickens, I said it would not be good for the ESL looking to improve their English. The words Dickens uses are mostly not archaic but their meanings often are, hence my saying "archaic usage" instead of "archaic words," do you not know what usage means? Archaic words are less of an issue for ESLs since they probably will have to look up their meanings anyways; usage is trickier, if you can understand a sentence and also can not identify likely archaic usage you are stuck looking up every word in the sentence trying to identify the problem and your dictionary may not even give that usage. The better you understand current usage the better you will be at identifying archaic usage and know exactly what word is the problem and what word you need to look up.

>>23818684
>OK, if you want to give me credit for the OED I will accept it.
You are reddit personified.

>>23818832
Better than being stupid personified.

>>23817901
it's better than pickwick, that fag has been shilling pickwick here for years

>>23817100
Dickens was a "popular" author rather than a "literary" one, although he wrote at a time when literary standards were very high. He was popular because of his colourful (and recognisable) characters, intricate plotting and moral values.
It's well worth reading a sample of his work, but it's not essential to read everything. I would recommend Bleak House.

>>23817100
You’ll get burnout quick. Dickens is magical at his best and one of the best character creators, but boy, does he reuse the same tropes. He’s definitely a fun and engrossing read but not someone to binge