A tale of one city’s link to Dickens
Historian Richard Jones from Werrington dressed as Charles Dickens. Photo: David Lowndes/Peterborough ET
AS the bi-centenary of Charles Dickens’ birth is marked with some special events in Peterborough, Ann Molyneux-Jackson finds out more about his connections with the city and talks to the man who is bringing him back to life.
IT was the place where Oliver Twist asked if he could have some more and where Mr Bumble, the beadle, ruled the roost.
But did you know that the workhouse in one of Charles Dickens’ best loved novels, where a meagre amount of gruel was doled out to the unfortunate urchins under its roof, was based on one in Peterborough, which is now the Wortley Almshouses pub?
Dickens went there on one of several visits to the city and then used it and the Peterborough beadle in his book.
One can only imagine what he witnessed in those less than salubrious surroundings.
The writer, who was born 200 years ago next Tuesday, is known to have travelled the length and breadth of the country to give readings of his famous works to the public and the first of these events may well have taken place in our city.
“It is suggested by many experts that Dickens did the very first of his famed public readings in Peterborough in the autumn of 1852,” said Stuart Orme, interpretation manager at Peterborough Museum.
“It’s debated as to which was first, Peterborough or Chatham.”
A visit to the city on another book reading tour is recorded on December 18, 1855.
Readers may also be interested to know that, just as many of us have done, Dickens once waited on a platform at Peterborough North railway station.
We know this because he recorded his visit to a café there, as he was changing trains in 1856, for posterity in a magazine article.
He wrote about the appalling service, “a bun of great antiquity” and how he “sat meekly in the cafe, my tears merging with the tea.”
Dickens came back to give another reading on October 19, 1859, recreating scenes from Pickwick Papers and The Story of Little Dombey.
Stuart Orme said: “The Peterborough Advertiser described the event in glowing terms, paying tribute to Dickens’ ‘essentially dramatic genius’ and said ‘that our emotions seem to be at the command of a potent magician, who, at will shakes us with laughter or moves us to tears’.”
Stuart Orme added: “Dickens was also delighted with this reading, saying in a letter about the Peterborough event that ‘We had a splendid rush last night; I think the finest I have ever read to. It was as fine an instance of thorough absorption in a fiction as any of us are likely to see again’.”
Stuart Orme will be talking about Charles Dickens and his connections with Peterborough at an event taking place at the John Clare Theatre in the Central Library next Tuesday, (February 7) at 7pm.
But the man stepping into the rather large shoes of the writer himself during the evening will be professional historian Richard Jones dressed in Victorian garb for the occasion.
The 62-year-old, from Orton Avenue, Woodston, Peterborough, will be entertaining the audience with short pieces from Oliver Twist, A Christmas Carol and Hard Times, in much the same way as Dickens would have done during his lifetime, when his talent brought him respect, success and riches.
“Being a historian, I take many parts, not Dickens especially but he is one of my favourites,” said Richard.
“He is so good I can’t pass him by.”
Choosing the readings for the birthday event has not been easy, which is probably not surprising when you consider that Dickens wrote 20 novels and many short stories, plays and articles.
“I think I will probably do a reading from Hard Times because the beginning and the end lend themselves to it,” Richard said.
“I have looked into the readings he would have given here such as A Christmas Carol but I’m not mad on it.
“The trial scene in Pickwick Papers he used to read a lot, and the funeral scene in Martin Chuzzlewit.
“I wanted to do the scene from Oliver Twist with Bill and Nancy but it’s difficult to act Nancy’s part.”
One of Richard’s favourites from Dickens’ more light-hearted novels is Martin Chuzzlewit and of the serious tomes, he prefers Barnaby Ridge and A Tale of Two Cities.
“Dickens would do two or three hour readings from memory and sometimes rewrite parts of the novels to make it easier for him to perform,” he said.
“He used to do the voices, he was an amazing man.
“Whenever he came to a different character he would change his voice.”
Richard added: “This is about trying to put across a little of what Dickens did across.
“He would be booked to give a talk and he also had an acting company that he would go around and act with.”
Charles Dickens lived during a time of dramatic change in England.
“He was watching the real destruction of society, the Corn Laws, the Poor Laws, and the Enclosure Acts made him really angry at the trouble they were causing the local people, who had their land taken off them and were being moved on.
“He gave a lot of characters these experiences such as Jo in Bleak House who used to say, “I keep being moved on.”
Dickens was praised for the realism in his novels and their mass appeal made them the soap operas of their day.
“They were serialised in magazines and people were clamouring for them,” said Richard.
“Everybody read his work, from the lowest to the greatest in society.”
But as well as highlighting the problems in society, Dickens also wanted to do something about them.
“That’s one of the things I like about him,” said Richard.
“Forget the bad way he treated his wife and family, he did a lot of good out of a genuine heart, including setting up a house for fallen women with his own money.
“He shamed the upper echelons of society and took the mickey out of them.
“By writing about things he brought them to people’s notice and could affect a change.”
Like Dickens, Richard Jones dabbled in acting having spent some time at drama school and with a theatre company.
“With characters like Uriah Heep and Ebenezer Scrooge, no-one could ever over act,” he said.
“I particularly like Krook, who spontaneously combusts, and was played by Johnny Vegas in the BBC adaptation of Bleak House.”
Richard added: “Dickens wanted to be an actor, that’s why later on he formed his own troupe to go around and perform little stage plays that could be done in an evening.”
He was popular then and the huge success of the recent BBC adaptation of Great Expectations proves that as the bicentenary of his birth approaches, his appeal is still as great as ever.
What the Dickens is going on?
Peterborough is going back to Dickensian times with a celebration of the life and work of Charles Dickens to mark the bicentenary of his birth next week.
Richard Jones will be dressing up as the famous writer for the main event on Dickens’ birthday, Tuesday, 7 February at the John Clare Theatre in Central Library, Broadway, Peterborough.
Tickets cost £3 or £2 for concessions and are available in advance at Central Library.
As a taster for the birthday event, Richard will be appearing at several libraries around the city, as part of National Libraries Day on Saturday (February 4).
Meet him at Bretton Library from 10.30am to 11.15am, Orton Library from noon to 12.45pm and Werrington Library from 2pm to 2.45pm.
For more information and to book, contact Central Library on 01733 864280 or e-mail libraryenquiries@vivacity-peterborough.com
Birth of a literary great
Charles Dickens was born in Portsmouth on 7th February, 1812.
His father John kept getting into debt and was eventually sent to Marshalsea prison.
The entire family were kept there, except for Charles, who was sent to work in Warren’s shoe polish factory where he endured appalling conditions.
“It was the most fearful time of his life,” said historian Richard Jones.
“He just felt like he was in this hopeless situation and said that every day of his life it was like dying.
“He felt there was no hope and no help.”
Dickens began his literary career as a journalist and in 1833 he became parliamentary journalist for The Morning Chronicle.
In April 1836, he married Catherine Hogarth and within the same month the highly successful Pickwick Papers was published.
He is responsible for a huge list of novels including Bleak House, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Nicholas Nickleby, The Old Curiosity Shop, Barnaby Rudge, A Christmas Carol, Martin Chuzzlewit, Hard Times and Little Dorrit.
He was also a theatre enthusiast, wrote plays and performed before Queen Victoria in 1851.
Dickens spent much of his time abroad whether lecturing against slavery in the United States or touring Italy with companions Augustus Egg and Wilkie Collins, a contemporary writer who inspired Dickens’ final unfinished novel The Mystery of Edwin Drood, which was recently screened on BBC TV.
He was estranged from his wife in 1858 after the birth of their ten children, but maintained relations with his mistress, the actress Ellen Ternan.
He died of a stroke in 1870 and is buried at Westminster Abbey.
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