Nicholas Nickleby

An important secondary character is Smike, a boy in his late teens whom Nicholas encounters at Dotheboys Hall, a Yorkshire school where Nicholas is an assistant teacher. Smike has been reduced to a pathetic wretch by years of ill-usage and half-starvation by the schoolmaster Mr. Squeers. Nicholas, taking pity on the boy, eventually leaves the school with Smike, who becomes his constant companion and friend in their subsequent adventures.

Nicholas Nickleby was the third novel written by Charles Dickens. Like his previous two novels, it was originally published in serial form, appearing in Bentley’s Miscellany over nineteen monthly installments from 1838 to 1839.

One of the most popular of Dickens’ novels, Nicholas Nickleby is full of a variety of interesting and amusing characters and incidents.

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