How is the theme of 'Spiritual Alienation' portrayed in Oliver Twist?

Answer 1

In the novel Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens, the theme of 'Spiritual Alienation' is portrayed perhaps most vividly by the main character Oliver himself. Growing up in an orphanage, Twist knew right from wrong, as the ladies of the orphanage taught him Bible verses every night before bathing time. But when Oliver began living with the dastardly Fagan, he was alienated from his spirituality by the way of life he had to take up in order to survive: pick-pocketing and turning tricks on the streets of Londontown. This was Dickens way of showing the spiritual alienation in urban Victorian England--his argument was that the poor were not poor because they were sinful, but that they had to sin because they were poor.