In fact, Dickens himself was something of a social climber. He was personallyashamed of certain aspects of his past, such as his time as a child worker in a blackingfactory, and had always dreamed of bettering himself. In 1856 he had bought a countryhouse in Kent (Gad’s Hill) which he had seen many times in his childhood when takenon walks by his father, and he had often fantasized about living in it one day. Thereforehis novel David Copperfield his most popular novel about growing up shows the socialbackground of English society at that time and class issues throughout the novel.
Alsohe is one of the most important social commentators who used fiction effectively tocriticize economic, social, and moral abuses in the Victorian era. Dickens showedcompassion and empathy towards the vulnerable and disadvantaged segments ofEnglish society, and contributed to several important social reforms. David Copperfield, is one of Charles Dickens’s many famous literary works. Itconsiders an autobiography by the many comparisons found to his true life, and followsthe life of a young middle class boy named David. This novel, like many of Dickens’sworks, focuses on the one primary character; a Victorian novel written during Britain’sIndustrial Revolution. For this reason, the study aims at investigating and analyzingDickens’ representation of social class in his novel David Copperfield, because Dickenslived during a time of great social changes in Europe having publishing novels, thesubject of his writing varied of many topics, one of them focuses on the socialbackground of English society at that time. Some critics argue that he saw the novel asan important tool of social reform.
