Oliver Twist

"He is waiting in a coach at the door," replied Rose. "At this door!" cried the old gentleman. With which he hurried out of the room, down the stairs, up the coachsteps, and into the coach, without another word.

Orphan picaresque from workhouse through Fagin's gang to Brownlow's rescue and Monks conspiracy—with Nancy's betrayal and murder as Gothic pivots and Oliver's identity resolved through confession—so plot scores 90.

Of all bad deeds that, under cover of the darkness, had been committed within wide London's bounds since night hung over it, that was the worst. Of all the horrors that rose with an ill scent upon the morning air, that was the foulest and most cruel.

Oliver the passive innocent, Fagin the grotesque corrupter, Nancy the tragic heroine, Bill Sikes the brute, the Artful Dodger, Mr Brownlow, and Rose Maylie are typed but vividly rendered; Fagin alone is a landmark creation, so cast scores 88.

He had not moved; he had been afraid to stir. There had been a moan and motion of the hand; and, with terror added to rage, he had struck and struck again. Once he threw a rug over it; but it was worse to fancy the eyes, and imagine them moving towards him, than to see them glaring upward.

Monthly serial rhythm alternates action (Sikes's flight, the burglary) with sentimental pause (Maylie cottage); coincidences accelerate the second half with Gothic set-pieces slowing for effect, so pace scores 86.

He rose from the table; and advancing to the master, basin and spoon in hand, said: somewhat alarmed at his own temerity: "Please, sir, I want some more." The master was a fat, healthy man; but he turned very pale. He gazed in stupefied astonishment on the small rebel for some seconds, and then clung for support to the copper.

The famous "Please, sir, I want some more" and sustained ironic narration of institutional cruelty; Fagin's last night ("Eight—nine—then") and Newgate scenes are Gothic set-pieces at full power, so prose scores 92.

Among other public buildings in a certain town, which for many reasons it will be prudent to refrain from mentioning, and to which I will assign no fictitious name, there is one anciently common to most towns, great or small: to wit, a workhouse; and in this workhouse was born; on a day and date which I need not trouble myself to repeat.

Workhouse, London rookery, Fagin's den, the Maylies' country house, Newgate, and the Thames form a complete social cross-section from parish cruelty to criminal underworld to bourgeois redemption, so world scores 94.

the item of mortality whose name is prefixed to the head of this chapter. For a long time after it was ushered into this world of sorrow and trouble, by the parish surgeon, it remained a matter of considerable doubt whether the child would survive to bear any name at all.

Ch.I's deadpan workhouse birth and the immediate famous supper scene grab the reader with institutional satire before the plot begins, so hook scores 94.

He cowered down upon his stone bed, and thought of the past. His red hair hung down upon his bloodless face; his beard was torn, and twisted into knots; his eyes shone with a terrible light; his unwashed flesh crackled with the fever that burnt him up. Eight—nine—then. If it was not a trick to frighten him, and those were the real hours treading on each other's heels, where would he be, when they came round again!

The child protagonist in the criminal underworld, social reform as narrative engine, and the urban Gothic mode established the Victorian orphan plot and the novel of institutional critique, so innov scores 88.

Within the altar of the old village church there stands a white marble tablet, which bears as yet but one word: "AGNES." There is no coffin in that tomb; and may it be many, many years, before another name is placed above it! But, if the spirits of the Dead ever come back to earth, to visit spots hallowed by the love—the love beyond the grave—of those whom they knew in life, I believe that the shade of Agnes sometimes hovers round that solemn nook.

Moral tableau rather than twist—Agnes's tablet, the orphans' happiness through mercy, Fagin's execution—closes with sentimental didactic satisfaction from justice served rather than surprise, so ending scores 84.