Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of Eighty (commonly known as Barnaby Rudge) is a historical novel by British novelist Charles Dickens. Barnaby Rudge was one of two novels (the other was The Old Curiosity Shop) that Dickens published in his short-lived (1840–1841) weekly serial Master Humphrey's Clock. Barnaby Rudge is set during the Gordon Riots of 1780.
Barnaby Rudge was the fifth of Dickens' novels to be published. It had originally been planned to appear as his first, but changes of publisher led to many delays, and it first appeared in serial form in the Clock from February to November 1841.
It was Dickens' first attempt at a historical novel (his only other being the much later A Tale of Two Cities, also set in revolutionary times). It is one of his less esteemed novels and has rarely been adapted for film or television (the last attempt was a 1960 BBC production; prior to that, a silent film was made in 1915).
Read more about Barnaby Rudge: Plot Summary, Characters, Allusions/references From Other Works
Famous quotes containing the words Barnaby Rudge:
“There comes Poe, with his raven, like Barnaby Rudge,
Three-fifths of him genius, and two-fifths sheer fudge.
Who talks like a book of iambs and pentameters,
In a way to make people of common sense damn metres,
Who has written some things quite the best of their kind,
But the heart somehow seems all squeezed out by the mind.”
—James Russell Lowell (1819–1891)