David Copperfield

Nicknames play a significant symbolic role in David Copperfield. David’s personal nicknames—and the people who assign them—help the reader track his subtle, personal changes over the course of the novel. When Miss Betsey gives David the nickname “Trot” (after her own last name, Trotwood), she designates herself as the most important and influential person in his life at that point. Likewise, when Steerforth gives David the nickname “Daisy” and Dora calls him “Doady,” each wields the most influence over David. The condescending “Daisy” and the underdeveloped, childish “Doady” bespeak each character’s view of David. It is telling that even as other characters nicknames David, the most enduring figures in his life, Miss Betsey and Agnes, continue to call him by his original nickname, “Trot.”

David Copperfield features many evocative names that provide immediate, strong impressions of their characters. Mr. Creakle, for example, speaks in a soft, creaking voice, and his personality is quietly menacing (like a creaking floor). Mr. Murdstone’s name evokes murder and cruelty, which is very much in keeping with his harsh disciplinarian philosophies. Uriah Heep’s name suggests urine and garbage heaps, making David’s disgust with him all the more relatable. Likewise, the Wickfields evoke the hopeful, flickering wicks of candles, while the Strongs resonate with resilience and perseverance. 

Charles Dickens uses Memorial—the autobiography Mr. Dick works on obsessively—to slyly comment on David’s memoir writing and to meta-fictionally reference the auto fictional qualities of David Copperfield). David’s reflections on Memorial are a commentary on the ludicrous yet laudable act of writing autobiography:

What Mr. Dick supposed would come of the Memorial, if it were completed; where he thought it was to go, or what he thought it was to do; he knew no more than anybody else, I believe. Nor was it at all necessary that he should trouble himself with such questions, for if anything were certain under the sun, it was certain that the Memorial never would be finished. (513-514)

Even if Memorial will never be “completed,” David admires Mr. Dick’s dedication. There may be some ethereal—and even educational—value in the ritual of writing autobiography, and that perhaps no Memorial—no human life, no human legacy—is ever fully finished.

The symbolic meaning of dogs and dog-related imagery evolves over the course of the novel. When Mr. Murdstone enters David’s family, the new family dog growls ferociously at David, serving as an extension of his new stepfather’s equally threatening presence. Thus, when David bites Mr. Murdstone’s hand and is thereafter tagged at school with the sign “TAKE CARE OF HIM. HE BITES” (193), he symbolically behaves like a dog—either biting the hand that feeds him, or lashing out when backed into a corner.

Jip, Dora’s yipping lap dog, is a symbolic mirror of Dora’s effervescent personality and pampered, carefree perspective. Whenever David and Dora argue, Jip circles around them, yipping, signaling Dora’s own distress. When Dora becomes fatally ill after childbirth, she signals her fear of death to Agnes and Miss Betsey by worrying that Jip will die. Ultimately, Jip does die at the same time as Dora: a metaphorical extension of his mistress.