Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
CHARLES DICKENS
Few cities are as closely associated with one writer as London is with
Charles Dickens
(1812-70). The recurrent motifs in his novels have become the clichés of Victorian London
- the fog, the slums and alleys, the prisons and workhouses and, of course, the stinking river.
Drawing on his own personal experience, he was able to describe the workings of the law and
the conditions of the poor with an unrivalled accuracy.
Born in Portsmouth, the second of eight children, Dickens spent a happy early childhood
mostly in Chatham, Kent. This was cut short at the age of 12 when his father was imprisoned in
Marshalsea debtors' prison, and Charles was forced to work in a boot-blacking factory on the
site of Charing Cross Station. The experience scarred him for life - he was hurt further when his
mother forced him to keep the job even after his father's release - and was no doubt
responsible for Dickens' strong philanthropic convictions. After two years as a solicitor's clerk at
Gray's Inn, he became a parliamentary reporter and wrote
Sketches by Boz
(Dickens' journalistic
pen name) and
The Pickwick Papers
, the two works that propelled him to fame in 1836.
The same year he married
Catherine Hogarth
, and there followed ten children - “the
largest family ever known with the smallest disposition to do anything for themselves”, as
Dickens later described them - and fifteen novels, each published in monthly (or weekly)
instalments, which were awaited with bated breath by the Victorian public. Then in 1857, at
the peak of his career, Dickens fell in love with the actress,
Ellen Ternan
; Dickens was 45,
Ternan just 18. His subsequent separation from his wife, and his insistence that she leave the
family house (while her sister Georgina and most of the children stayed), scandalized society
and forced the author to retreat to Kent.
Dickens died at his desk at the age of 58, while working on
The Mystery of Edwin
Drood
.
According to his wishes, there was no public announcement of his burial, though he was
interred in Westminster Abbey (at Queen Victoria's insistence) rather than in Rochester (as he
had requested). The twelve people present at the service were asked not to wear a black bow,
long hatband or any other accessories of the “revolting absurdity” of Victorian mourning.
If you're on the
Dickens trail
, there are one or two other sights worth checking out: the
Old
Curiosity Shop
(see p.145), on Lincoln's Inn Fields, the (possible) inspiration for Dickens' novel
of the same name; the atmospheric
Inns of Court
(see p.143), which feature in several
Dickens novels; “
Nancy's Steps
”, where Nancy tells Rose Maylie Oliver's story in
Oliver Twist
, on
the west side of London Bridge on the South Bank; and the evocative dockland area of
Shad
Thames
(see p.235), where Bill Sykes has his hide-out.
7
area. Nowadays, the various colleges and institutes have spread their tentacles to form
an almost continuous academic swathe from the British Museum all the way to Euston
Road, occupying some 180 buildings. Despite this, the university's piecemeal
development has left it with only a couple of distinguishing landmarks in the form of
Senate House
and
University College
. Several of the university departments run their
own small, specialist
museums and galleries
, scattered across the campus.
Senate House
Looming over central Bloomsbury is the skyscraper of
Senate House
, a “bleak, blank,
hideous” building, according to Max Beerbohm, now housing the university library.
Designed with discreet Art Deco touches by Charles Holden in 1932, and austerely
clad in Portland stone, it's best viewed from Malet Street. During the war it served as
the Ministry of Information, where the likes of Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene,
Dorothy L. Sayers and George Orwell worked. Orwell later modelled the Ministry of
Truth in
1984
on it: “an enormous pyramidal structure of glittering white concrete,
soaring up, terrace after terrace, 300 metres into the air”.
SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies)
Thornhaugh St • Galleries Tues-Sat 10.30am-5pm, Thurs till 8pm • Free •
T
020 7898 4046,
W
soas.ac.uk •
!
Russell Square
To the north of Senate House, the
School of Oriental and African Studies
, or
SOAS
, puts
on fascinating temporary exhibitions of photography, sculpture and art at the rather