by Alex Storey

Created on: November 30, 2010   Last Updated: December 26, 2010

This tale of satire is a rich text for extremely troubled, contemporary, financial times of then and now. Loneliness and bankruptcy haunt the novel of two books, POVERTY and RICHES, which centre on the inadequacy of the government with society.  Bank cover ups, debt and poor regulation were as rife in Victorian times and Merdle is a 19th century version of Madoff or Maxwell. Their front was all fraud.

William Dorrit’s daughter Amy, is Little Dorrit and she grows up in debtors prison. Amy supports the family by sewing for Mrs Clennam at her home, where she falls in love with Arthur. 

William Dorrit is the lost heir to a large fortune and pays his way out of Marshalsea Prison - as Charles Dickens dad did - then dies in Rome after the family trip across the Alps.

Before Arthur Clennam’s father dies in China he gives him a mysterious watch meant for his mother. Inside the watch casing were the initials DNF. Mrs Clennam is a religious fanatic and refuses to reveal its meaning, though it is thought to be DO NOT FORGET. 

The Circumlocution Office is run with incompetence by people ready to sign off the sharp practise of  a Victorian RBS at a moments notice, which reflects Dickens criticism of bureaucracy at HM Treasury and the endless moving around of pieces of paper.

This incompetence in Little Dorrit echoes Charles Dickens disgust at the military blunder that led to the loss of so many soldiers at the Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War witnessed and reported on by so many of his journalist friends.

The original plan had been to capture guns discretely on the side of the valley, but instead the Light Brigade charged through the valley where the main bank of artillery was. 

This misguided order was effectively suicide for so many but the bravery still shown by the British soldiers terrified the Russians who would never again fight in an open field. Lord Cardigan led the charge and came home a hero having the sweater worn by the Light Brigade to fend of the Russian weather named after him. It became known as the Cardigan.

Bleeding Heart Yard is a cobbled courtyard in Farringdon and appears in this novel as a slum near the prison emphasizing Charles Dickens condemnation of London the way it appeared as an open sewer thanks to the Industrial Revolution.

Rigaud is the villain who blackmails Mrs Clennam though he gets his comeuppance when her house collapses killing this crook in the process.
All the Dorrit family savings are lost in the MerdleMadoffMaxwell banking collapse (and Merdle commits suicide) though Arthur and Amy eventually marry to give another Charles Dickens happy ending, once of course Arthur has been released from prison, having also spent time in Marshalsea.

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