Charles Dickens

English writer Charles Dickens was known among other things, for social commentary in his novels. He once even expressed his belief that “Virtue shows quite as well in rags and patches as she does in purple and fine linen.” He separated from his wife after 22 years of marriage when he fell in love with an 18-year-old actress. His wife went through two miscarriages and bore him 10 children before being dumped. He went on to publish a letter in numerous newspapers in which he accused his wife of being responsible for the separation, and calling her stupid, morbidly depressed and a bad mother.