To me, the most prevalent theme which the first few chapters of Ragged Dick presents is the idea that if someone is born into poverty, if they work hard enough and gain an education, they can raise their economic status and thus improve their social class. Dick's new friend Frank as well as the boy's uncle both encourage Dick to pursue an education and save up the money he earns from shoe shining to purchase books. In the economy of the time there was no other way to obtain an occupation of higher quality and pay unless one could find a method to obtain greater knowledge.
Most of the books I have read before this one have all stressed the idea that poverty is a condition of entrapment which makes it virtually impossible to rise out of the grime of the streets into the upper class sections of the city. The story Maggie: Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane exhibits the average story of the tenements where the parents are alcoholics and beat their children and each other, the brother makes his living in any way he can, one child doesn't even survive past 3, and then there is Maggie who hopes for the best to escape from the turmoil of poverty, and when her plan fails her she looks at death as her salvation from the destitute life. The entire book demonstrates how difficult it is to rise from rags to riches. Due to the majority of the population living in poverty and working the minimum wage jobs with maximum hours, historical evidence would suggest that moving from the slums to Wall Street would be highly unlikely, although there are always a few exceptions to every rule.
On the contrary, many upper class men and women believed that it was the attitudes of the poor which kept them confined to their low social and economic status. Frank and his uncle,Mr. Whitney, believed that Dick possessed characteristics and personality qualities which would enable him to progress in life. Before Dick leaves, Mr. Whitney tells Dick, regarding his economic state,"if I judge you rightly, it won't be long before you change it. Save your money, my lad, buy books, and determine to be somebody, and you may yet fill an honorable position" (49). Being given faith, staying hopeful and motivated, and persevering to make a better living are all qualities which if presented before someone might be the knowledge and determination they need to make more of a name for them self then an impoverished laborer. Ragged Dick presents the idea that anyone who maintains the correct mental outlook on their situation, can bring themselves up from poverty, which is the ideal many rich men and women and upper class men felt.
Andrew Carnegie, a million dollar man alive around the era that Ragged Dick was published, was a man who rose from a lone factory worker to the steel factory franchise owner his legacy is known for. He felt that if he could make the transition, so could anyone else. However, as shown by a fellow boot-blacker, Johnny, in any business "energy and industry are rewarded, and indolence suffers. Dick was energetic and on the alert for business, but Johnny was the reverse. The consequence was that Dick earned probably three times as much as the other" (8). Due to Dick's views on industry and business and how he ran his, it would suggest that he held character traits which would in turn set him up for success. His go-getting attitude about every life opportunity would make him a prime candidate out of anyone to make the social and economical climb.
The question I have after all of this, is whether or not it is plausible to make the claim that anyone in poverty can help themselves out of their situation if they have the right attitude? Or is it only people who hold energetic and industrious attitudes like Dick who have any chance of making the climb?
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