Charles Dickens Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the 20th century critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories are still widely read today. Born in Portsmouth, Dickens left school to work in a factory when his father was incarcerated in a debtors' prison. Despite his lack of
Alfred Lamert Dickens farmhouse nearby for them to live in while he found them a home in London. Charles hired Alfred's widow, Helen, to care for and mind his mother, Elizabeth Dickens (died 1863), for the remainder of his mother's life. Alfred Lamert Dickens Alfred Lamert Dickens (1822–1860) was an English railway engineer, and was the younger brother of the Victorian novelist Charles Dickens. As a boy Alfred, nicknamed Enrique by friends, attended a school in Hampstead with his brother Frederick Dickens for two years, until his father John Dickens could no longer afford the fees. At the end of the school day