Ragged Dick Literary Elements

Adventure, Coming-Of-Age

New York City, late 1860s after the Civil War

The narrator is a third-person omniscient narrator. Although the thoughts and feelings presented in the book are chiefly those of the main character, other minor characters' thoughts and feelings are occasionally presented. For example, the narrator describes the fear, doubt, and nervousness Jim Travis feels while trying to steal Dick's money out of his bank account.

The tone and mood are chiefly optimistic. Although the hero and his friends suffer setbacks, they are never in serious danger and the outcomes of most of Dick's adventures are positive.

Richard Hunter, or "Dick" as he calls himself, is the protagonist. There are two chief antagonists: a bully by the name of Micky Maguire and a thief named Jim Travis.

The biggest ongoing conflict in the book is Dick's struggle to raise himself out of poverty through hard work, sacrifice, and assertiveness.

The climax of the book comes when Dick dives off the boat into the ferry to save a drowning boy. He succeeds and is rewarded with the opportunity he has been seeking for a long time.

Early in the book Dick and Henry rent a room from Mrs. Mooney that is not well kept. They are discussing moving to better quarters, and immediately afterwards Dick's bankbook is stolen.

Dick says that Mrs. Mooney, their landlady, "ain't got no prejudices against dirt." The house she keeps is filthy and threadbare.

Dick makes an allusion to John Jacob Astor III, a wealthy financier and philanthropist who is a member of one of the most prominent families in New York.

The boot-blacking kits that Henry and Dick use, and particularly Dick's, appear throughout the story. They serve at times to symbolize the boys' low station in life, but Dick uses his to provide accommodation for himself and Henry and to set aside savings.

The clerks who pay Dick to shine their shoes need to look presentable, and they enjoy a higher social station than Dick does. Yet Dick earns more money shining their shoes than the clerks do working in the store.

In the scene where Dick gets his two-dollar bill back from a dishonest clerk, Alger uses the same sentence pattern repeatedly during the dialogue:

"Boy," he said to Dick, "is this the bill you gave to be changed?"
"That boy," said the clerk, "came in and asked change for a bad bill."

The use of repeated structures allows the reader to understand who is speaking without breaking up the flow of the dialogue.

When Frank is accused of theft by the woman in the horse-car, and when he and Dick are subsequently exonerated, the other passengers are described as responding collectively as opposed to as individuals. The accusation of theft creates quite a stir, and people check for their own wallets and belongings. Yet the sympathies of the people in the horse-car are entirely on the side of the boys when the woman's wallet turns out to never have been stolen at all.

In Chapter VII, a building is described as "presenting a fine appearance" with its extensive white front. Many times throughout the book, buildings and streets are described in almost human terms, as though they had distinct personalities by virtue of their architecture and purpose.