Among the many bestselling novels published in England between 1837 and 1861, a few employed first-person narration:

William Makepeace Thackeray's Fitz-Boodle's Confessions, 1843

William Makepeace Thackeray's Barry Lyndon, 1844

Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, 1847

Charles Dickens's David Copperfield, 1850

Charles Dickens's Bleak House first-person (part of novel), 1853

Edward Bulwer Lytton's My Novel, by Pisistratus Caxton; or, Varieties in English Life, 1853

R. M. Ballantyne's The Coral Island, A Tale of the Pacific Ocean, 1853

Edward Bulwer Lytton's What Will He Do with It? by Pisistratus Caxton, 1853

Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White, 1860

Charles Dickens's Great Expectations, 1860

[If you have more examples, please send them to: pallingh at lakeheadu.ca (replace "at" by "@").]


Created 4 December 2004

Last modified 28 December 2023