Winter 2021: Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens

The Pickwick Book Club is a community of local bookworms, students, and teachers who meet monthly to discuss a nineteenth-century novel. Often considered the first novel of Dickens’s maturity, Dombey and Son offers a powerful analysis of family life and gender relations during the early years of nineteenth-century industrial capitalism.

 
Pickwick Club monthly meeting schedule with guest speakers
Date Readings Facilitator Resources

February 28

Dombey and Son: Chapters 1-10

Professor John Jordan, Dickens Project Director

 Zoom video recording of the discussion 

March 28

Dombey and Son: Chapters 11-31

 Professor John Jordan, Dickens Project Director

 

April 25

Dombey and Son: Chapters 32-48

 Facilitator to be announced

 

May 23

Dombey and Son: Chapters 48-end

 Facilitator to be announced

 

Recommended Edition: We recommend the Penguin Classics edition of the novel, but other versions are fine. Download the novel to read at Gutenburg.org or to listen to at LibriVox.org. 

The Santa Cruz Public Libraries provide support for the reading group.

 

Dombey and Son publication schedule

  • I - October 1846 (chapters 1-4)
  • II - November 1846 (chapters 5-7)
  • III - December 1846 (chapters 8-10)
  • IV - January 1847 (chapters 11-13)
  • V - February 1847 (chapters 14-16)
  • VI - March 1847 (chapters 17-19)
  • VII - April 1847 (chapters 20-22)
  • VIII - May 1847 (chapters 23-25)
  • IX - June 1847 (chapters 26-28)
  • X - July 1847 (chapters 29-31)
  • XI - August 1847 (chapters 32-34)
  • XII - September 1847 (chapters 35-38)
  • XIII - October 1847 (chapters 39-41)
  • XIV - November 1847 (chapters 42-45)
  • XV - December 1847 (chapters 46-48)
  • XVI - January 1848 (chapters 49-51)
  • XVII - February 1848 (chapters 52-54)
  • XVIII - March 1848 (chapters 55-57)
  • XIX-XX - April 1848 (chapters 58-62)