David Copperfield

David Copperfield. Not the magician. But the boy of Blunderstone Rookery. Trotwood as he was later called by his aunt, Betsy Trotwood, was born in a novel written in serial form between 1849 and 1850. I just finished the account of what was a wonder-filled life that I cannot imagine had only existed in the mind of a mere mortal. Can one mind contain such goodness in all its superior splendor and evil in all its Murdstonian magnitude? I have to wonder if it all must not be real. Truly it is more real than MSNBC or CNN. Truly it is true in a way fabricated facts are not. Certainly this truth of goodness and purity and generous uncompromised caritas exists in some world outside of this one. Exists in a world where goodness does indeed triumph, where feminine loveliness can indeed exist unsullied by the soot and sacrilege of a corrupt culture, that masculinity can remain cheerfully heroic and manly in the face of all the forces of hard times. Where tthe Uriah Heeps and Litimers can be overcome by the Traddles and Peggoties. And where there is such a girl as Agnes. With much thanksgiving at this Thanksgiving, Mister Dickens, for such a world as you have given us, a world running on the fossil fuels of goodness and its irresistible winsomeness. May your book be read and imbibed in and feasted upon as the dinner that will await so many tomorrow.