The Violent Effigy Quotes

“Dickens' plots are his most discardable properties, and often have to be pushed aside to let the strange poetry of his imagination emerge.”
― John Carey, The Violent Effigy: A Study of Dickens' Imagination

“Dickens' hypocrites are the prime beneficiaries of his inventive genius. The heroes and heroines have no imagination. We could scrap all the solemn parts of his novels without impairing his status as a writer. But we could not remove Mrs. Gamp or Pecksniff or Bounderby without maiming him irreparably.”
― John Carey, The Violent Effigy: A Study of Dickens' Imagination