Summer Reading for Jollification: Pickwick Papers (with some questions!)

Last updated on: June 4, 2020 at 12:29 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Summer Reading for Jollification: Pickwick Papers (with some questions!) 2020-06-04T12:29:00-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Sleep sometimes hides from me and I find words soothing. They distract me from my cares and allow me to unwind. Many nights the stories of Arthur Conan Doyle have given me rest, but now I have a new favorite: The Pickwick Papers.

This use is not an attempt to insult the book, but to praise it. The Pickwick Papers will stand close attention, I am sure any number of doctorates have been earned by it, but it does a harder thing: it can stand slight attention.

Any academic hack can write something best understood with care, but it is much harder to change a reader while encouraging him to relax. While we are unfocussed, the writer changes us. Shakespeare did it in his pastoral comedies and it was the genius of Dickens to be able to write something wonderful experienced at high speed.

Don’t sip Pickwick, gulp it, big gulp it if you are not in intellectual NYC where sipping is required. Like the main characters, most of whom strain a vest button or two to popping, Pickwick wants to make you intellectually fat, but not lazy.

My great-aunt, almost old enough to remember Dickens’ time, viewed it as high praise to say a man or woman was “stout.” This kind of fatness is no longer in favor, but to be “stout” in her terms was to be big, well-fed, happy, but fit. A stout man can go on adventures, it keeps off the gout.

There are lean, Lenten reading times: modern writing is full of such passages. Reading even a paragraph of Joyce strips a Christian down for action.

Where do we find a Sabbath rest? Where can we recreate without the foolishness that often accompanies light-heartedness?

The Pickwick Papers are full of fun and feasting on food that taken all the time would kill a man, but taken with Dickens makes him stout.

What did this first of Dickens great works teach me? It left me with five questions:

First, Pickwick and his friends adventure locally. Dickens gently mocks their adventures in deepest, darkest rural England, but still it is appealing. They slowly journey into an area and look at it. They don’t rush through it, but view it at human or horse speed. Can I look at Houston, my new hometown, that way?

If I do, how will it change me?

Second, Dickens sees the humor in his society as well as the social evils. He takes on prisons, not for the last time, but does so with hope of redemption. Dickens is a Christian. How could a secular society change humorously?

Third, Dickens’ mocks, but gently. Pickwick himself is a figure of fun, but beloved. His wise and foolish, not unlike most of us by the time we reach a ripe old age!

Fourth, Sam Weller like the other great literary Sam, Sam Gamgee of Lord of the Rings, becomes great by becoming a servant. Most of my career has functioned as being (at best!) the number two person to a greater man: Clyde Cook, Barry Corey. It is not a bad thing in my experience? What can Weller teach us about the dignity of having a “boss?”

Finally, how does Dickens educate our souls while making us relax and laugh? Why is so much “serious” modern writing grim?

Dickens wrote Bleak House and Great Expectations so he knew how to tell hard truths. He wrote Old Curiosity Shoppe a book where he made himself sad, let alone his reader. Pickwick showed that at least Dickens knew how to make his readers laugh, a skill he never lost, without debasing their minds. He was comic without clownishness.

Can most comedians say the same?

On Books

Previous Post

June 3, 2020

Needed Leadership and the Limits of Leadership (Missing Thatcher)

Next Post

June 5, 2020 Oliver Twist (More Summer Reading, With Questions to Ask, A Novel on Trouble Times)

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who built an ark to survive a great flood?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Moses David Noah Abraham

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »