Charles Dickens to discuss them. "Nicholas Nickleby" (1838–39), "The Old Curiosity Shop" (184041) and, finally, his first historical novel, "Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty", as part of the "Master Humphrey's Clock" series (1840–41), were all published in monthly instalments before being made into books. In the midst of all his activity during this period, there was discontent with his publishers and John Macrone was bought off, while Richard Bentley signed over all his rights in "Oliver Twist". Other signs of a certain restlessness and discontent emerge—in Broadstairs he flirted with Eleanor Picken, the young fiancée of his solicitor's
Charles Dickens attitude towards women. Righteous indignation stemming from his own situation and the conditions under which working-class people lived became major themes of his works, and it was this unhappy period in his youth to which he alluded in his favourite, and most autobiographical, novel, "David Copperfield": "I had no advice, no counsel, no encouragement, no consolation, no assistance, no support, of any kind, from anyone, that I can call to mind, as I hope to go to heaven!" Dickens was eventually sent to the Wellington House Academy in Camden Town, where he remained until March 1827, having spent about two