The four books collected here reveal much of Dickens's development as a novelist. His early works lampooned the abuses of society, but with a confidence that they could be overcome with goodwill and common sense. In his later novels he had become a penetrating social critic, analyzing the materialism and greed of his age in long, complicated panoramas that no longer solutions that depended on a triumph of human nature.

If the ending of Great Expectations raises the question of just how much sophistication Dickens had reached in his characterizations, that may be because the book has two endings. Critics generally agree that the original,less happy resolution is a natural conclusion to this most perfectly con-structed of Dickens's novels. The happier resolution, included at the end of this version, is more in keeping with the earlier Dickens, whose change-of-heart conclusions were sure crowd pleasers. His friend, the author Edward Bulwer-Lytton, had advised Dickens to add this ending, and Dickens followed his advice.

Foreword

Great Expectations

Hard Times

A Christmas Carol

A Tale of Two Cities