Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist depicts several social issues in Victorian London, especially the mistreatment of orphans and poor children. Oliver and other orphans are shown living in the workhouse, where they receive little food and are treated terribly. Oliver comes to symbolize the powerlessness of children against the wealthy and powerful adults who control them. Dickens also highlights issues like child labor, the victimization of women in society, and the failings of the new poor laws to adequately address poverty. Through Oliver's story set in London versus the countryside, Dickens comments on the dangers of mob mentality in cities and the corruption of the criminal underworld.

1. Name:- Pandya Riva M.
Roll no :- 25
Paper no :- 6
Topic:- Social issues in Oliver Twist.

2. Charles Dickens was an English writer and
social critic .
He created some of the worlds best
known fictional characters and is regarded
as the greatest novelist of the Victorian
era.
Dickens wrote a lot of novels about the
struggles of poor and battle between right
and wrong.

3.  Dickens presents a portrait of
the childhood of a considerable
number of Victorian orphans.
 It is a story of criminal world.
 Oliver Twist one of the title
character and protagonist in
the novel.
 Dickens intensifies his satire on
life and society under the poor
laws.
 Dickens also shows the
victimization of women in
Victorian society

4. Powerlessness
of Childs and
women
Society and
class
Mob mentality
City v/s
countryside
Other issues,
pickpocket,
chain snatching

5. Dickens was interested in the plight of the
powerless in the novel.
Oliver and children were the primary
symbol of it.
Oliver and children were controlled and
over powered by wealthy and powerful
adult. like, Mr. Bumble and Fagin.
Dickens also introduced the issues of child
labor in work house.

6.  Oliver and other children are
treated terribly and fed very
little.
 Oliver's famous sentence
“Please sir I want some
more” illustrates not only
his starvation but also his
desire for the love.
 Dickens Characterizes
Oliver as “ A close prisoner
in the dark and solitary room
to which he had been
consigned by the wisdom
and mercy of the board”.

7.  Women in this era were treated as
second class citizens in society.
This age become an icon of 19th
century middle class femininity and
domesticity.
 Especially Nancy who ends up
giving her life in trying to act
against the Men who have power
over her.
 When she is asking to take Oliver
to skies she tells him that she
would help him but she doesn’t
have the power
 Women were powerless at the
hands of society.

8.  Dickens spends lot of time of narrative energy
in depicting the plight of poor and working
class in Oliver Twist.
 The final chapters of this novel serve to
reinforce the moral superiority of the middle
class.
 Dickens also described superficial class and
theme of poverty.
 He challenged the Victorian idea of charity for
the so called Deserving poor , he showed
that the workhouse was failed to solve the
problem of poverty and unwanted children.

9.  In Oliver Twist the city and the countryside
each take on symbolic meaning .
 The city is corrupt and dirty, while country is
pure and clean.
 It is in city that Oliver is forced into immortality
,while in the Country that Oliver is able to
recover his health.

10. This dichotomy is likely related to the
danger of the mob mentality that is so
prevalent in the novel.
In the city everyone is so close together ,it
seems to always be the immoral
contingent that wins out or drowns out few
moral voices.
In the country ,the people are not a mob
but a community.

11. There are some more issues like chain
snatching, pick pocketing, corruption in
society.
The basis of the new power system
The evils of criminal world in London.
The victimization of children

12.  Thus, Dickens shows various social
issues in this novel .He point out especially
the issue of poor children who treated by
the power of devils. Its also against the
new poor law system because it
established a system of working class for
the poor or sick..

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