Post 1 Oliver Twist - Royce Le

Born unhealthy, his mother found "lying in the street,"  no wedding ring, his mother dying shortly after giving birth to him, and no dad, Oliver Twist is introduced to the story. (p. 3). I'm envisioning that he will go to an orphanage and live his life in destitute, thus, making him eventually run away judging from what I have read so far and the cover with him and the sack he has in his hands. After reading further along in the book, I see the flaws of collectivism and I feel sympathy for Oliver. The reason I feel the way I do is because of Oliver’s unfair placement in a “branch-workhouse” where twenty or thirty other “juvenile offenders against the poor-laws” also stay (p. 5). Not only is his living conditions horrible, the warden who take the allowance of the kids “to her own use,” is abusing her power as a caretaker for those children in need (p. 5) Visualizing how Oliver is “flogged as a public warning and example” frustrates me because it brings back experiences I had with being discriminated and mistreated (p.20). Along with being mistreated, it aggravates me to see Oliver and other kids being taken as an apprentice or adopted just so that they can serve as practically a slave judging from the way Oliver acted when he was adopted by a couple known as the Sowerberrys’, “Oliver lingered no longer, but meekly followed his new mistress (p. 25). I am starting predict why this book was banned; the material of wrongful adoption and mistreatment could have brought up the past turbulence in America dealing with slavery. Going back to cruel treatment and discrimination, Oliver experienced even more of this when he had to endure “ill-treatment of Noah Claypole,” another apprentice of Mr. Sowerberry (p. 34). Noah bullied him and insulted his mother to an extend that it angered Oliver to take action and stand up for himself, but when he did this, another unfair action took place and oppressed his spirit. Mrs. Sowerberry did not like Oliver from the start; she gave him jibes about his mother and how she deserved all the insults that has been talked about his dead mother, not only that, but she left him “shut up in the back kitchen, in company with a pump and a slice of bread” (P. 44). Already this book has angered me to no end, I hate this oppression and discrimination happening in this book, and I wonder to the reason why Charles Dickens wrote such a novel.