This essay examines how Charles Dickens presents women's nature in Oliver Twist through the contrasting figures of Rose, Agnes, and Nancy. Each character embodies a different relationship to Victorian ideals of female purity and moral worth. The paper argues that Dickens uses these three women — along with targeted quotations from the novel — to mount a sustained critique of the era's rigid, hypocritical standards for women, the poor, and social outcasts. Drawing on Nancy's complex morality, Agnes's fall from respectability, and the church's selective condemnation of sinners, the essay demonstrates that Dickens ultimately advocates for greater freedom and equality for women.
When assessing women's nature and how it is manifested in Oliver Twist, it becomes clear that the three main female characters — Rose, Agnes, and Nancy — each portray a different version of how women can be perceived and how they present themselves. The exploration of women's nature as defined in the Victorian age need not be limited to those three alone, however. It is revealing how Dickens poses and presents the women of Oliver Twist and the reactions typically elicited from readers and critics. On the whole, it is clear that Dickens mounted a full-frontal assault against the system and the regimentation imposed upon women, the poor, and the social outcasts of society. As it pertains to women, this assault targeted the expectation that a woman must keep herself virginal, prim, and proper as defined by the constructs and frameworks of that era (Dickens).
One passage from Oliver Twist makes it quite clear where women stand on the proverbial totem pole: "(t)hey made a great many other wise and humane regulations having reference to the ladies, which is not necessary to repeat" (Dickens, 1866, p. 11). The use of the words "wise" and "humane" belies the fact that the referenced regulations are neither. Further, the notion that sex itself — how much it is engaged in and with whom — determines a woman's worth and purity is deeply flawed. It is not beyond reason to suggest that affairs and children born outside of marriage are not straightforwardly condemnable. However, the Victorian response to such matters was an overcorrection, to put it lightly, even if the arbiters of that belief system regarded themselves as models of wisdom and restraint (Dickens).
Nonetheless, taking such a black-and-white view of who is moral and who is not is unwise. Nancy's moral code proves this in spades. Many would point to the company she keeps or to the fact that she is a prostitute. Yet her amalgamation of morals is far more complex and worthy of closer examination, because Nancy clearly possesses positive moral qualities within her character. Even so, many readers take note of her associates — Sikes and Fagin — or her status as a woman of the night and fail to take seriously anything else that is later revealed about her.
One can look at Nancy's own words: "I may use the word, for the alley and the gutter were mine, as they will be my deathbed" (Dickens, 1866, p. 318). These are the words of a woman who knows that she is fallible and deeply entangled with the worst aspects of life. However, that admission, as well as her actions toward Rose and Oliver, proves that her soul was not truly lost. She was a very flawed person and was certainly far from the Victorian definition of proper womanhood. Nonetheless, even if the Puritanical and Victorian ideals on display in Oliver Twist would not normally be ascribed to Nancy, they perhaps should be reconsidered in her case. Dickens was masterful in his portrayal of Nancy: while she is clearly a woman of the night, he never actually refers to her as a prostitute.
Nancy also offers perhaps the most damning indictment of how Victorian culture treated women and the poor when she says, "when such as me, who have no certain roof but the coffin-lid, and no friend in sickness or death but the hospital nurse, set our rotten hearts on any man, and let him fill that place that parents, home and friends filled once, or that has been a blank through all our wretched lives, who can hope to cure us?" Another passage from the novel reinforces this sentiment: "my dear young lady, crime, like death, is not confined to the old and withered alone. The youngest and fairest are too often its chosen victims" (Dickens, 1866, p. 227).
"Agnes and Rose represent opposite ends of Victorian respectability"
"Dickens attacks the church's selective condemnation of women"
It is simplistic to prescribe a certain fixed "way" that women should be. This holds true when speaking of the Victorian view of women and of virtually any other rigid framework applied to them. However, to suggest that women are not often predisposed toward emotional depth, nurturing instincts, and loving relationships would be equally specious. Women should be free to act as they wish within reasonable limitations, and they should not be treated as outcasts when they falter. Sikes, Fagin, and Nancy's companion were just as guilty and culpable — if not more so — than any of the women in Oliver Twist.
Dickens, Charles. "The Adventures of Oliver Twist." Google Books. N.p., 1 Jan. 1986. Web. 16 Oct. 2014.
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