Dickens in Doughty Street: 100 Years of the Charles Dickens Museum
In 1837, a baby-faced, wavy-haired 25-year-old Charles Dickens moved into 48 Doughty Street. In the two short years that he, his wife Catherine and their two eldest kids called the Clerkenwell address home, the author penned The Pickwick Paper, Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby. The property was then used as a boarding house before being bought and saved from demolition by the Dickens Fellowship in 1923, opening as the Dickens Museum two years later.
Taking up two small rooms on the first and second floors of the building, the museum’s centenary exhibition, Dickens in Doughty Street, illustrates the life and legacy of one of London’s greatest writers via letters, manuscripts, rare first editions, sketches and the cheesy love poems he wrote at 18 (thought to be his earliest surviving writing).
The exhibit begins with a timeline of Charles’s portraits, tracing him from his 20s (modelling the aforementioned luscious locks) through to his 50s (sporting his signature ‘doorknocker’ beard). Move through the space and there are several cabinets showcasing manuscripts animated with scribbles, annotations and ink blotches, a wall displaying illustrations of his beloved stories and characters, like Little Nell and Fagin, and the court suit he wore to meet the royals just two months before his death (the only remaining suit of his in the world).
If The Muppets Christmas Carol is as far as your Dickens knowledge stretches, this is still an accessible showcase
A speaker plays...