Accessories to the Crime: Mapping Dickensian Trauma in Great Expectations and A Tale of Two Cities

Abstract

This article delves into Charles Dickens’s nuanced use of fashion accessories in two of his later works. I argue that because of nineteenth-century conventions Dickens has to intimate certain aspects of his characters’ interiority by creating a performative exterior. Such analyses, particularly regarding female accessories concerning mobility, reveal censored subjects and illustrate Dickens as a more compassionate writer regarding the female sex.