When Dickens was 12, his father was imprisoned for debt

Dickens' childhood job influenced his novels

After his father was imprisoned, Dickens took up work in a shoe-blacking factory. His novels often featured hardscrabble protagonists, many of them children, forced to navigate the grim realities of the Industrial Revolution. Today, stories that follow in that model are described as "Dickensian."

A teenage Dickens found work as a political journalist

Dickens found work as a reporter for the Mirror of Parliament, a weekly newspaper focused on the British legislature. After a few years, he moved to the Morning Chronicle, where he began producing his creative work. Professor John Drew, author of "Dickens, the Journalist," said that the writer "realized he could wield a much more direct, if not more glamorous kind of power, by using his position as a leading writer of fiction and a magazine editor."

Scholars believe Dickens wrote over a million words of nonfiction

The author began writing professionally in his teens, first as a court reporter, then for many papers, penning op-eds, criticism, and other miscellany. While Dickens is often discussed as a novelist, he has a massive corpus of works situated in reality.

Dickens' earliest pieces were under the pseudonym 'Boz'

Dickens began working as a journalist in 1829, publishing his portraits of modern life under a pseudonym. In 1834, he used the pen name "Boz," a reference to his brother's childhood nickname, and eventually published a collection of his stories called "Sketches by Boz." By the 1840s, he'd ditched the pseudonym, enjoying his rarefied literary celebrity.

Take a tour of Charles Dickens' London

Much of Dickens' fiction concerns Victorian London and its people. This tour of the city, led by Dickens biographer Simon Callow, walks you through significant sites, like the place where Dickens' parents were married, the shoe-blacking factory where he worked as a boy, and the place where he created his first magazine.

Despite his sometimes caustic satire, Dickens was ultimately an optimist

Michael Slater, a professor of Victorian literature at Birkbeck College, notes that Dickens' anger at Parliament and social injustice never got in the way of his optimism. "There is a constant allegiance to the lives of ordinary people and their pleasures," he said in a 2001 interview with "In Our Time."

Read the works of Charles Dickens

Dickens' work has long been in the public domain, meaning it's freely available to readers. Project Gutenberg's collection of Dickens' novels allows you to read classic novels like "Oliver Twist" and "A Tale of Two Cities," as well as early works like "Sketches by Boz," at no cost.

As a child, Twain worked as a 'printer's devil'

Twain’s father died in 1847, forcing the 12-year-old Twain to leave school to earn money for the family. He took up work in a print shop as a “printer’s devil,” or an apprentice. He became fascinated with the technology, an experience he’d pursue further when he became a journalist several years later.

Dickens performed 'A Christmas Carol' over 100 times

The writer began performing readings of his works in 1853 and chose 'A Christmas Carol' for the inaugural event. In the 16 years that followed, he performed it over 100 times, using different voices for his characters and consistently revising the text for the stage.

'No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.'

-Charles Dickens (1812-1870), in "Our Mutual Friend"

Dickens' pet inspired Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Raven'

Dickens had a pet raven named Grip and made him a character in the novel "Barnaby Rudge: a Tale of the Riots of Eighty." Poe reviewed the work and suggested the raven should play a bigger role. A few years later, he fixed the problem himself when he wrote his most famous poem, "The Raven." The bird is preserved at the Free Library Philadelphia.

Austen left formal school at 9

Jane Austen was the seventh of eight children. At 9, her father, a clergyman in the Church of England, removed her and her sister from the Abbey School in Reading because he could not afford the tuition. Jane continued her education at home, where the family read aloud and performed plays.

John D. Rockefeller’s father was a well-known con artist

John D. Rockefeller was born to a man known as “Devil Bill” who made a living posing as a traveling doctor and selling fake herbal cures, and was also infamous for his storytelling and cons.

A bankrupt flour merchant in debtor’s prison helped inspire the Erie Canal

In 1807, Jesse Hawley, jailed for debt after struggling with high transport costs, published essays under the pen name “Hercules.” His writings laid out the canal’s route and benefits, galvanizing support for the project.

JP Morgan Jr. once angered the nation with his zero-dollar tax bill

In the aftermath of the Great Depression, Congress learned that Morgan and his banking partners had avoided paying any federal income tax in 1931 and 1932. By claiming their losses in the stock market, they seemingly erased what they owed.

Read Truth's account of escaping slavery in 1826

After her enslaver broke his promise to free her, Truth left before dawn, carrying her infant daughter and a bundle of clothes. She later found refuge with the Van Wagener family, who paid her master $20 for her freedom and $5 for her infant daughter.

Read Thoreau's 'Civil Disobedience'

The essay—originally delivered as a lecture and inspired by a night in jail for failing to pay a poll tax—argued that citizens should nonviolently resist unjust government policies, including slavery. Read the entirety of the essay for free.

Prison money diaries: the thriving underground economy behind bars

How people in prison earn money, how much they spend, and the lengths to which they go to secure basic needs and comforts.

In 1215, the Magna Carta declared that even the king was not above the law

Forced on King John by rebellious barons, the Magna Carta established limits on royal power and the principle that rulers are subject to law. Discover how this foundational text later influenced the development of constitutional government and modern human rights traditions.

Why one Emily Dickinson biographer believed she had epilepsy

Lyndall Gordon's "Lives Like Loaded Guns" points to a "handicap" referenced in several Dickinson poems. According to Gordon, the condition was so stigmatized during Dickinson's life that it made her reclusive. In this NPR interview, Gordon explains why she believes the theory is the best explanation for Dickinson's notorious isolation.

The origins of public education in the US stem from Puritan religious views

The 1647 Old Deluder Satan law reflects Puritan belief that illiteracy allowed Satan’s influence. The law—the first of its kind in the colonies—mandated towns of over 50 households hire a teacher and over 100 support a grammar school.

Voltaire's writing sent him into exile

In 1717, the writer's satirical poem "La Henriade" landed him in prison for a year. By 1726, the French government's distaste for his work caused him to leave the country for England, though he returned a few years later. That would be short-lived: In 1734, his "Lettres Philosophiques" sent him packing again, moving to Champagne, then Berlin, then Switzerland, before finally returning to Paris in 1778.

Financial hardships forced functionality into every piece of Marie Curie's wardrobe

Curie's upbringing in a family that lost its fortune when participating in failed uprisings for Polish independence instilled frugality in her. Much of the clothing she purchased, including for special occasions like her wedding, was repurposed for lab use.

For some debtors without assets that can be sold or returned, filing for bankruptcy can provide a path toward a clean slate

However, the bankruptcy process does not apply to several types of common debt, including money owed toward child support or alimony payments. Most debtors also do not qualify for relief from student loan payments.

The Brothers Grimm were lawyers before they were storytellers, but became interested in fairy tales as they began investigating how rules and customs had been passed down through cultures.

Credit reporting's earliest origins in the 1700s resemble a game of telephone, with rural merchants asking their most esteemed neighbors to vouch for them to sleuthing urban lenders

It would be decades before the system evolved into something more formulaic. For instance, New York City's Mercantile Agency—which was created to formalize information and rumors about borrowers, sorting the reports into enormous ledgers—wasn't started until 1841.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

Salvador Dalí believed he was his own dead brother, who had died nine months before he was born

Before writing 'Walden,' transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau nearly burned down his hometown with a campfire that grew out of control.

Mark Twain spent decades feuding with the US Postal Service, convinced its costs and regulations were bureaucratic overreach.

Play the role of a student in a game where you try to navigate college and remain debt-free, selecting different income levels, high school experience, race, ethnicity, and more.

Many legends about George Washington, including his supposed wooden teeth and the story of cutting down the cherry tree, lack evidence.

Meet the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence—most of whom didn't put pen to paper until August 2, 1776—and see their original signatures.

Sears sold DIY house kits starting at $600 in its famous catalog from 1908 through the 1940s, resulting in roughly 10,000 'Sears and Roebuck houses' being built.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Volcanic activity may have triggered the Black Death by spewing gases that led to crop failures in Europe, thus forcing the import of grain ships with plague-infested fleas.

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

In 1915, workers recovered a submarine-like vessel from the Chicago River, prompting fears of German espionage

The story of Dollree Mapp, whose legal challenge over her 1957 conviction for possessing "obscene material" led to a major strengthening of the Fourth Amendment

The tragic Pulitzer Prize-winning image 'The Vulture and the Little Girl' (1993) generated controversy, raised concerns about ethics in photography, and eventually led to the photographer's death.

Some coin denominations have ridges etched on their sides, partly to prevent counterfeiting, in a practice called 'reeding.'

The Ramones' 'Pet Sematary,' the theme song for the Stephen King novel of the same name, was written while the band was admiring the writer's collection of horror memorabilia.

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

English mathematician Ada Lovelace wrote the first computer algorithm a century before computers existed and hypothesized that computing devices would one day be able to compose music—foreseeing the generative AI systems of today.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

For centuries, it was common to sleep in two shifts: a few hours at the beginning of the night, and a longer period beginning around midnight

El Niño, Spanish for 'the boy,' was named after Jesus Christ because the phenomenon resembled the weather changes observed around Christmastime.

To reduce wrinkles in clothing, research recommends gentle wash cycles with more water and tumble drying with smaller loads and longer times.

About 2,000 US babies are born annually without some portion of their limbs, potentially leading to a lifetime of pricey prosthetics.