Secret Agony: Dickens and Shame

Abstract: To feel shame in all its painful gradations – Dickens understood this emotion, intimately. Shame is a judgement on the self that manifests in a desire to be hidden from the judgmental eyes of others; the word comes from the root "to cover." But to refuse to be ashamed may also guard integrity from outside shocks. Pride is not its opposite but its complement. Dickens was appalled by the person who has no inner critic, whose social advantages smooth away pricks of conscience. But there are also characters for whom a private hurt forbids shame, who turn to defiance or fantasy to deflect hidden anguish. Dickens's writing dramatizes how the effects of shame get played out on the public stage, in our private lives, in our deepest selves, reminding us that who does the shaming, who absorbs the shame, and who casts it off are questions that concern all of us.