Oliver Twist The alternative title, "The Parish Boy's Progress", alludes to Bunyan's "The Pilgrim's Progress", as well as the 18th-century caricature series by William Hogarth, "A Rake's Progress" and "A Harlot's Progress". In this early example of the social novel, Dickens satirises the hypocrisies of his time, including child labour, the recruitment of children as criminals, and the presence of street children. The novel may have been inspired by the story of Robert Blincoe, an orphan whose account of working as a child labourer in a cotton mill was widely read in the 1830s. It is likely that Dickens's own youthful experiences
Storm Boy (novel) Storm Boy (novel) Storm Boy is a 1964 Australian children's book by Colin Thiele about a boy and his pelican. The book concentrates on the relationships he has with his father Hide-Away Tom , the pelican, and an outcast Aboriginal man called Fingerbone. The story has been dramatised several times. The film adaptation "Storm Boy" won the Jury and Best Film prizes at the 1977 AFI Awards. Storm Boy likes to wander alone along the fierce deserted coast among the dunes that face out into the Southern Ocean. After a pelican mother is shot, Storm Boy rescues the three chicks,