So begins the story of an orphan, born in the workhouse, who, ten years later escapes to London, where he is taken in by a gang of thieves. Rescued from a life of crime by a kindly gentleman, he is kidnapped back by the gang. One of their number, Nancy, overhears a plot by the mysterious Monks to have Oliver caught by the police. In trying to help him, Nancy meets the kindly gentleman at midnight on London Bridge, where she reveals the plan to him, but her treachery is discovered and Nancy is murdered by the robber Sikes. Monks is caught, his relationship with Oliver discovered, whilst Sikes is killed and Fagin taken into custody. Meantime, back at the workhouse, Mr Bumble has married Widow Corney, and lived to regret it! Oliver gets his inheritance and is brought up in the home of the kindly gentleman.
Characters
Narrator (Charles Dickens)
A surgeon
Old Sally
Young woman
Oliver Twist
Susan
Mrs Corney - Matrom
Mr Bumble - beadle
Governors
Workhouse children
Mr Sowerberry
Mrs Sowerberry
Charlotte
Noah Claypole
Artful Dodger
Charley Bates
Nancy
Bet
Young gang of thieves
Fagin
Bill Sikes
Mr Brownlow
Bookseller
Fang, the magistrate
Mrs Bedwin
Mr Grimwig
Monks
Officers & Bystanders
or The Parish Boy’s Progress
by Charles Dickens
Adapted for the stage in two acts
by Reg Mitchell
“Among other public buildings in a certain town, there is one anciently common to most towns, great or small: to wit, a workhouse. And in this particular workhouse was born, on a cold, blustery winter’s day, the item of mortality whose name was to become Oliver Twist.”
