context

• Workhouses


  -The workhouses acted as a deterrent, so poor people wouldn't want to be poor anymore

  -Rich people looked down on the poor, they used them for cheap labour

  -They would punish the poor by separating them from families

  -The rich genuinely believed the poor were poor because they had chosen that lifestyle.
• The poor law act


  -1834

  -previously the church in each parish would give money to the poor

  -The poor law made it harder for them to get money

  -Would get sent to the workhouses to gain money

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• Charles Dickens


  -wrote novels to portray social criticisms

  -Specifically the way society treats children and the poor

  -At 12, his father was sent to prison, he was arranged to live alone

  -Dickens stayed at a workhouse and did child labour.

  -When his father returned he went back to school and became a law clerk (Like Bob Cratchit)
• Death


  - Almost half of all funerals in London, were for children younger than 10 years old

  -Victorian audiences would have understood that Tiny Tim's early death was highly likely
• Tiny Tim


  -For a modern audience, its challenging to read Tiny Tim's life, and we pity him immediately, as he cannot contribute to society

  -This was normal for Victorians, a person's value to society was directly linked to what they contributed physically
• Poverty


  - Dickens believed that only through education could the cycle of poverty be broken