Nicholas Nickleby

Nicholas Nickleby finds himself penniless after his father's death and turns to his wealthy uncle to help him find work in effort to protect his mother and sister. But Ralph Nickleby proves both hard-hearted and unscrupulous, and Nicholas finds himself forced to navigate  his own way in the world. This adventure gave Dickens the opportunity to portray an extraordinary gallery of rogues and eccentrics: Wackford Squeers, the tyrannical headmaster of Dotheboys Hall, a school for unwanted boys; the slow-witted orphan Smike, rescued by Nicholas; and the gloriously theatrical Mr and Mrs Crummles and their daughter, the 'infant phenomenon'. Like many of Dickens's novels, Nicholas Nickleby is characterised by his outrage at cruelty and social injustice, but is also a lively work, revealing his comic genius at its highest.

The story was originally published as a serial from 1838 to 1839 and first published as a book in 1839 by Chapman & Hall, London. The first editions feature 40 engraved plates by Phiz.