Okie, I'll post it here in case anyone else wants to take a look
"Oliver Twist reflects Christian values."
Dickens’s exploration of Christian values is expressed through innocence in ‘Oliver Twist’ as a representation of the neglect and ill upbringing surrounding orphaned children. Calvinist views regarding children being born into original sin are challenged through their compromised innocence as a result of the faults of their guardians. The subverted Bildungsroman form of the novel explores Oliver’s life from birth and into the early years of his childhood; the three volumes represent the significant experiences he endured. The deliberate structural form thereby reiterates his innocence and develops his characterisation as an impressionable child; he maintains his innocence as a result of his naivety and lack of worldly experience. “Let the tears which fell, and the broken words which were exchanged in the long close embrace between the orphans, be sacred.” The diction of ‘sacred’, in conjunction with emotive language, reiterates the abandonment of the children by the Church and showcases to readers the institutionalisation it embodied. Dicken’s commentary on values of Christianity is targeted at the Church and the philanthropy of the rich, who were ignorant of the true nature of the children’s suffering, as represented through Oliver’s innocent quip when he asks “Please, sir, I want some more”. Dickens wrote that he “wished to show, in little Oliver, the principle of good surviving through every adverse circumstance, and triumphing at last.” This represents Oliver’s nature as a representative of the innocent children of Victorian England, and is further reiterated through Oliver’s pleas for Fagin’s forgiveness. The exclamatory language in “Oh! God forgive this wretched man!” represents Oliver’s intercession to God’s mercy for the Jew. This showcases the perceived extent of the innocence of children and suggests to readers that it is wholesome enough to overpower the blasphemy imbibed by criminal adults. By suggesting that Oliver’s prayers are able to account for the Jew, who, in a zoomorphic fit, “howled and tore at his hair”, Dickens conveys the concept that the innocence of children is an embodiment of their emotions.