狄更斯的一个很重要的头衔是“英语世界里第一位伟大的都市作家”，他的一切灵感都源自于伦敦街头。除了讲工人运动的《艰难时世》把背景设置在当时的世界工厂曼彻斯特以外，伦敦是狄更斯其他所有小说故事的发生地。在今天的伦敦街头，我们仍然可以找到狄更斯在书中提及的地标。
所谓都市作家，并不仅仅指他所生活的地方是都市。在狄更斯生活的时代，英国正从一个以乡村为主的国家转变为一个城市化程度高的国家。在这样的时代里，速度感是很强的(如今日中国)，印象强烈而又显得不真实的片段，取代了连贯的历史感，人际间的联系也远不像传统时代那么紧密。都市作家不仅仅要描写都市生活的具体内容，更要以都市人的方式去传达这些新的体验、感受。
狄更斯的作品中，画面转动都很快，人物会在各种想不到的地方“巧遇”，或者突然建立起某种联系，情节总是以戏剧化的急转来推进，所有人物都是一眼可以看穿的典型人物“招贴画式的创作”，有的研究者称之为“属于都市的街头艺术”。事实上，同时代的人也证实，狄更斯确实是走到哪编到哪，小说人物名字是偶然从陌生人那里听到的，形象是偶然在街头看到的，情节也很可能来自于看到的报纸。有时候会觉得狄更斯就是一位城市印象的收集者。但是，在这样一种编辑中，狄更斯显示出了强大的语言能力和想象编制能力。狄更斯情绪高昂，节奏感十足，热闹夸张而又有点简单粗俗的风格，是城市生活带给他的特殊体验，是他为了迎合城市读者和市场做出的努力。
十九世纪上半期，随着英国工业化的不断深入，一个新的市民阶级迅速形成，报刊以通俗的语言，内容，以及传播方式的广泛性刺激了平民化的阅读。与从前受贵族庇护的作家不同，狄更斯这个时代的作家已经完全职业化。狄更斯本人出身平民，要依靠个人的努力在伦敦立足，他必须考虑市场需求和反响。狄更斯是一位比较精明的作家，他的作品不再遵循“三卷式”出稿，也不再仅限于贵族上层阅读，狄更斯率先使用“按月分册，连载发行”的方式来推广一个全新的故事——即《匹克威克外传》。
连载形式对小说影响巨大:
1，狄更斯根据市场反响，随时调整小说人物的命运，写作很灵活。《老古玩店》《雾都孤儿》都是根据市场欢迎的小故事拓展出来的。
2，按期出版，写作速度快，同时营造戏剧性，吸引读者对以后故事的好奇与兴趣。“让读者欢笑也让读者流泪，更让读者意犹未尽的等待”
3，负面影响: 故事结构松散。前期小说“流浪汉式的叙述模式”后期创作成熟，结构完整。
狄更斯对伦敦的感情是复杂的在他笔下，伦敦有像流水一样变动、不可捉摸的一面，也有钢铁般坚固、冷漠的一面。
《董贝父子》选段:
似乎有一股强大的吸引力把他们吸进这座大都市中的某个部分，他们被它吞没了，再也没有出来。他们成为医院、墓地、监狱、河流、热病、疯狂、恶习和死亡的食物——他们向着在远方吼叫的怪物走去，然后消失了。
狄更斯曾经生活于伦敦底层，他把伦敦比作“大熔炉”——释放出惊人的能量，同时毫不留情地吞噬大量生命。在迎合市场以惊人的幽默天赋逗乐读者的同时，狄更斯希望用小说影响世界变革的方向。人物的“良心发现”几乎在狄更斯所有小说里都是至关重要的时刻。你可以觉得狄更斯浅薄，过于乐观，但他确实认为，写作的目的就是要让人良心发现，或者至少要“软化人们的内心”。他确实在市场需求和社会关怀中找到了一个平衡点，所以至今，狄更斯依然拥有大量读者。
(以下为一个英文视频字幕:)
There are dark shadows on the earth, butbits lights are stronger in the contrast. ---Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers
The starving orphan seeking a second helping of gruel.(稀粥) The spinster wasting away in her tattered wedding dress. The stone-hearted miser plagued by the ghost of Christmas past. More tyan a century after his death, these remain recognizable figures from the work of Charles Dickens. So striking is his body of work thatbit gave rise to its own adjective---Dickensian. But what are the features of Dickens's writing that make it so special?
Dickens's fiction brims with anticipation through brooding settings, plot twists and mysteries. These features of his work kept his audience wanting more. When first published,his stories were serialized, (连载) meaning they were released a few chapters at a time in affordable literary journals, and only later reprinted as books. This prompted fevered speculation over the cliffhangers and revelations he devised. Serialization not only made fiction available to a wider audience and kept them reading, but increased the hype around the author himself.(炒作) Dickens became particularly popular for his wit, which he poured into quirky characters and satiric scenarios. His characters exhibit the sheer absurdity of human behavior, and their names often personity traits or social positions. like the downtrodden Bob Cratchit, the groveling Uriah Heep, and the cheery Septimus Crisparkle. Dickens set these colorful characters against intricate social backdrops,(错综复杂的社会) which mimic the society he lived in.
For instance, he often considered the changes brought about by the Industrial Revolution. During this period, the lower classes experienced sordid(肮脏的)working and living conditions. Dickens himself experienced this hardship as a child when he was forced to work in a boot blacking factory after his father was sent to debtor's prison. This influenced his depiction of the Marshalsea prison in Little Dorrit, where the titular character cares for her convict father. Prisons, orphanages, or slums may seem grim seeting for a story, but they allowed Dickens to shed light on how his society's most invisible people lived. In Nicholas Nickleby, Nicholas takes a job with the schoolmaster Wackford Squeers. He soon realizes that Squeers is running a scam where he takes unwanted children from their parents for a fee, and subjects them to a violence and deprivation. Oliver Twist also deals with the plight of children in the care of the state, illustrating the brutal conditions of the workhouse in which Oliver pleads with Mr. Bumble for food. When he flees to London, he becomes ensnared in a criminal underworld.
These stories frequently portary Victorian life as grimy, corrupt, and cruel. But Dickens also saw his time as one which old traditions were fading away. Lodon was becoming the incubator of the modern world through new partens in industry, trade, and social mobility. Dickenss London is therefore a dualistic space: a harsh world that is simultaneously filled with wonder and possibility. For instance, the enigma of Great Expectations centers around the potantial of pip, an orphan plucked from obscurity by an anonymous benefactor and propelled into high society. In his search for purpose, Pip becomes the victim of other peoples ambitions for him, and must nagotiate with a shadowy cast of characters. Like many of Dickens protagonists, poor Pips position is constantly destablilized, just one of the reasons why reading Dickens is the best times for the reader, while being the worst times for his characters. Dickens typically offered clear resolution by the end of his novels, with the exception of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. The novel details the disappearance of the orphan Edwin under puzzling circumstances. However, Dickens died before the novel was finished and left no notes resolving the mystery. Readera continue to passionately debate over who Dickens intended as the murderer, and whether Edwin Drood was even murdered in the first place.
Throughout many adaptations, literary homages, and the pages of his novels, Dickens's sparkling language and panoramic worldview continue to resonate. Today, the adjective Dickensian often implies squalid working or living conditions. But to describe a novel as Dickensian is typically high praise, as it suggests a story in which true adventure and discovery occur jn the most unexpected places. Although he often explored bleak material, Dickens's piercing wit never failed to find light in the darkest corners.
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来源: 浙江大学慕课《世界文学史》讲狄更斯