"The novel has always been a contradictory form. Here is a long form narrative mainly read originally..." — Matthew Pearl

As new technology emerges as the greatest challenge to novels since the advent of film, it may be that the fragmentation of storytelling into installments key to Dickens's era will be recreated in some way.

My high school English teacher in junior year, Dr. Robert Parsons, assigned us some Poe stories, including 'The Black Cat' and 'The Purloined Letter.' Being an animal person, I had trouble with 'The Black Cat!' I got hooked instead by 'The Purloined Letter,' a Poe story with detective C. Auguste Dupin.

When it comes to referring to Dickens's life, performing plays with your nine children for friends and family during Christmas is Dickensian.

The intense media coverage of today's campus shootings presents a double edged sword. On the one hand, it gives us a chance to think about and reflect on the causes; on the other hand, in a very small minority of unstable minds, the repeated telling of the stories can be interpreted as glamorous.