Just how cruel was Charles Dickens to his characters? Thanks to this handy graphic by Melissa Symanczyk we can now follow death through his major works. In all, 53 people and 2 dogs have succumbed to the ultimate end via Dickens' hand. Symanczyk even awards a prize for best death with the honors going to the spontaneous human combustion event in Bleak House. The two deadliest? Bleak House & David Copperfield with seven fatalities in each. First Edition of Bleak House, in the original 20-in-19 monthly serial parts that were issued from March 1852 through September 1853 . First Edition of David Copperfield, in the original serial...
Charles Dickens’ Model for the Modern Rehab Facility: Victorian Health Care Reform
On November 29, 1842, London’s Morning Chronicle published a short, unusual piece by Charles Dickens, already a celebrated writer and novelist, titled The Sanatorium.Written shortly after Dickens’s return from his first American tour, it reflected both his deep and lasting interest in public affairs and his fascination with medicine and the medical profession, particularly mental illness, detailed descriptions of which form central passages in several of Dickens’s novels. Thomas Chapman was chairman of the Sanatorium Committee and a personal friend of Dickens (the character of Mr Dombey was supposedly based on Chapman). Chapman asked Dickens to write a brief piece...
Slumming With Charles Dickens: New York Library Relives His American Tours
Getting A Head Start On The Competition: Union College's Dickens in America.Although 2012 marks the bicentennial of Charles Dickens's birth, Union College in Schenectady, New York is jumping the gun with an exhibit at the Schaffer Library entitled Dickens in America. The Schaffer is showcasing several rare volumes of the author's works, including a recently acquired first edition of A Christmas Carol. The exhibit highlights the Victorian novelist's celebrated lecture tours of the United States in 1842 and 1867-68, and includes archival materials from several of Dickens's contemporaries. The collected papers of noted author, editor, statesman, and lawyer John Bigelow,...
A "Read" Letter Day For Dickens
Mr. Charles Dickens's Last Reading.(George C. Leighton for The Illustrated London News, Vol.56, 1870.)Of the greatest writer of the Elizabethan age, William Shakespeare, so little is known that many doubt him to be the true author of his incomparable plays. At the other end of the biographical spectrum is the greatest writer of the Victorian age, Charles Dickens. As British writer Simon Callow put it: "Of Shakespeare, we know next to nothing; of Dickens we know next to everything." The Huntington Library in San Marino, CA. added a little more to that knowledge on January 27, 2010 when they announced...
Charles Dickens’ Deluxe Dental Tool Is Top Pick at Bonham’s
Charles Dickens' Deluxe Dental Hygiene Solution Charles Dickens' toothpick sold at Bonham's-NY yesterday for $9,150, including the buyer's premium. The pre-sale estimate for the pick of the litterateur was $3000-$5000.Exhibited at Chapin Library, Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts, and at the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, in the Spring of 1970, the toothpick was sent to auction by its owners, the family collection of Barnes & Noble.Bonham's catalog description noted: "Dickens' toothpick, manufactured by Sampson Mordan & Co. of London, ivory and gold with retracting mechanism, 60 mm long when closed, engraved with Dickens' initials, manufacturer's and inventor's names, together with...