0:00:07 > 0:00:09'This is Dickens World in Kent -
0:00:09 > 0:00:11'a vast tourist attraction
0:00:11 > 0:00:17'built to take visitors inside the novels of Charles Dickens.'
0:00:17 > 0:00:20- Hello. - Good afternoon. How are you?
0:00:20 > 0:00:25- Good, thank you. Who are you? - Pleased to meet you. Mr Micawber at your service, sir.
0:00:25 > 0:00:27Are you Mr Micawber? Very good. And you are?
0:00:27 > 0:00:31- 'Ello, sir. I'm Nancy. - Are you Nancy? Aren't you dead?
0:00:35 > 0:00:39That's our famous Great Expectations boat ride.
0:00:39 > 0:00:41- Great Expectations boat ride? - Indeed.
0:00:41 > 0:00:44OK. Have you got the Artful Dodgems? Have you got that?
0:00:44 > 0:00:46Artful Dodgems?
0:00:46 > 0:00:48May I come through?
0:00:48 > 0:00:52- You may, sir. - Fantastic, thank you very much, just get in here.
0:00:56 > 0:01:01'But surely there's more to Dickens than this?
0:01:01 > 0:01:06'More than just a logo attached to television costume dramas
0:01:06 > 0:01:09'and West End shows about street urchins.'
0:01:10 > 0:01:13It's so easy to label and package Charles Dickens,
0:01:13 > 0:01:16to exhibit him as some sort of Victorian showman,
0:01:16 > 0:01:22a one-off, a dazzling talent like Harry Houdini or Charlie Chaplin,
0:01:22 > 0:01:24a superstar from the past.
0:01:27 > 0:01:30I want to show that the work of Charles Dickens
0:01:30 > 0:01:34isn't just quality entertainment for a long-dead audience.
0:01:34 > 0:01:38Dickens's world of the imagination is as complex and as dark
0:01:38 > 0:01:42and as sophisticated as any modern city,
0:01:42 > 0:01:45and the characters he creates are as real
0:01:45 > 0:01:47and as psychologically driven
0:01:47 > 0:01:50as the inhabitants of any urban landscape today.
0:01:50 > 0:01:54And that's why I believe that the true Dickensian world...
0:01:54 > 0:01:57is our world.
0:02:03 > 0:02:07'Dickens, the 19th-century novelist, speaks to us now.
0:02:07 > 0:02:10'And I want to gauge his impact and relevance
0:02:10 > 0:02:15'by talking not to literary critics and biographers but to his readers.'
0:02:17 > 0:02:20'I'll meet those who Dickens makes laugh.'
0:02:20 > 0:02:22"It was difficult to enjoy her society
0:02:22 > 0:02:25"without becoming conscious of a smell of spirits."
0:02:25 > 0:02:30So what he's basically saying is this woman stank of alcohol!
0:02:30 > 0:02:33'The readers he stops in their tracks.'
0:02:33 > 0:02:36The thing is, he has a very driving narrative.
0:02:36 > 0:02:41He's got to get where he's going. But along the way something like that will just BOOM!
0:02:42 > 0:02:47'And those who suggest that Dickensian characters are still living among us now.'
0:02:50 > 0:02:52Some of it's timeless, yeah.
0:02:52 > 0:02:55And you see it all the time. Not me, obviously...
0:02:55 > 0:02:57No, me, definitely!
0:03:13 > 0:03:19'Before the bestsellers of Dan Brown and JK Rowling,
0:03:19 > 0:03:22'before the literary fireworks of Ian McEwan and Martin Amis,
0:03:22 > 0:03:25'there was the spectacularly popular
0:03:25 > 0:03:30'and critically applauded writing of Charles Dickens.
0:03:30 > 0:03:33'Dickens was the complete writer.'
0:03:34 > 0:03:40He wrote 15 novels, he invented 989 brand-new characters,
0:03:40 > 0:03:44he edited newspapers and magazines.
0:03:44 > 0:03:48He wrote speeches, plays, short stories, pamphlets, letters.
0:03:48 > 0:03:52Sometimes he did all these things simultaneously.
0:03:52 > 0:03:56Now, I haven't read all of these. I doubt many people have.
0:03:56 > 0:04:02But I don't think we should be put off by the sheer volume of Dickens's output, or his reputation.
0:04:02 > 0:04:06The great thing about him is that he had such a distinctive tone,
0:04:06 > 0:04:08such a unique style that was recognisable
0:04:08 > 0:04:11as he tackled the big issues -
0:04:11 > 0:04:14crime, death, poverty, riches, guilt, fear.
0:04:14 > 0:04:18And I think you can join him at any point.
0:04:18 > 0:04:22Each novel to me feels like a continuation of all the rest.
0:04:22 > 0:04:28Every character just one inhabitant in a virtual world created in his imagination.
0:04:28 > 0:04:32So I think the best way to tackle Dickens is to choose your point...
0:04:32 > 0:04:34and dive in!
0:04:43 > 0:04:46"To resume the consideration of the curious question of refreshment..."
0:04:46 > 0:04:50'Comedian Phill Jupitus didn't know any Dickens
0:04:50 > 0:04:54'until he decided to perform a show at the Edinburgh Festival.
0:04:54 > 0:04:58'There he would read out loud works he was seeing for the first time.'
0:04:58 > 0:05:03"I turn my disconsolate eye on the refreshments that are to restore me.
0:05:03 > 0:05:07"I find that I must either stuff into my delicate organisation
0:05:07 > 0:05:10"a currant pin cushion which I know will swell
0:05:10 > 0:05:13"into immeasurable dimensions when it's got there.
0:05:13 > 0:05:16"Or I must extort from an iron-bound quarry with a fork,
0:05:16 > 0:05:19"as if I were farming an inhospitable soil,
0:05:19 > 0:05:23"some glutinous lumps of gristle and grease called pork pie."
0:05:27 > 0:05:32I just found myself forgetting I was at a gig. And doing it live.
0:05:33 > 0:05:37He'd give reign to the most inconsequential of thoughts.
0:05:37 > 0:05:41He'd expand on ideas and they kind of build through the pieces.
0:05:41 > 0:05:43You can almost sense his thought process as he writes.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47Can I just take one which is, um... Mugby Junction.
0:05:47 > 0:05:50Now not many people know Mugby Junction.
0:05:50 > 0:05:52Mugby Junction's one of the latest...
0:05:52 > 0:05:54It's not really a novel as such, is it?
0:05:54 > 0:06:00No, it's just a story about a man who arrives at this train station, Mugby Junction,
0:06:00 > 0:06:06which becomes a bit of a sort of allegory for where he's at in life.
0:06:06 > 0:06:09"He spoke to himself. There was no-one else to speak to.
0:06:09 > 0:06:12"Perhaps though, had there been anyone else to speak to,
0:06:12 > 0:06:14"he would have preferred to speak to himself.
0:06:14 > 0:06:18"Speaking to himself, he spoke to a man within five years of 50 either way,
0:06:18 > 0:06:22"who had turned grey too soon, like a neglected fire.
0:06:22 > 0:06:26"A man with many indications on him, of having been much alone."
0:06:26 > 0:06:27Oooh!
0:06:27 > 0:06:29And it's just...
0:06:29 > 0:06:32You just stop, and it's just....
0:06:32 > 0:06:34What's the fire thing, "like a decaying..."?
0:06:34 > 0:06:37It was, "A man turned grey too soon, like a neglected fire."
0:06:37 > 0:06:39A neglected fire!
0:06:39 > 0:06:42He has a driving narrative in the pieces. Got to get where he's going.
0:06:42 > 0:06:45Along the way, something like that will just...BOOM!
0:06:45 > 0:06:47Stops you in your tracks. The other thing I find is
0:06:47 > 0:06:49it's not flashy.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52We have this image of Dickens with big, long sentences, very florid,
0:06:52 > 0:06:54and it's not like that at all.
0:06:54 > 0:06:56A lot of it is very simple,
0:06:56 > 0:06:59and suddenly there's a phrase there that just...
0:06:59 > 0:07:03- It's very difficult to go two pages without a phrase...- Yes.
0:07:03 > 0:07:06- Just giving you a little...- Yeah.
0:07:06 > 0:07:09I mean, emotionally, I felt...
0:07:09 > 0:07:13cos when I read him, it was three years ago, I was 45...
0:07:13 > 0:07:16I felt like an idiot for not having picked any up before.
0:07:20 > 0:07:22Dickens was born in 1812.
0:07:22 > 0:07:25By the time he was 30,
0:07:25 > 0:07:28he was the most famous writer in the world.
0:07:28 > 0:07:30By then, he'd made his name and his fortune
0:07:30 > 0:07:33with the comic tale The Pickwick Papers,
0:07:33 > 0:07:34and with Oliver Twist,
0:07:34 > 0:07:39the rags to riches story of the orphan who asks for more.
0:07:39 > 0:07:42He wrote his novels in monthly instalments,
0:07:42 > 0:07:48keeping his massive audience hungry for each arresting plot development or extraordinary new character.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51He delighted them with A Christmas Carol,
0:07:51 > 0:07:53and in later novels such as Hard Times,
0:07:53 > 0:07:56Little Dorrit and Bleak House,
0:07:56 > 0:07:59he secured his reputation as a champion of social justice,
0:07:59 > 0:08:04with his vivid and angry portraits of the condition of Britain.
0:08:08 > 0:08:11But there's one novel that gives us the most tantalising insight
0:08:11 > 0:08:14into the life of Dickens himself...
0:08:17 > 0:08:19..and that's David Copperfield,
0:08:19 > 0:08:22the book he described as his favourite child.
0:08:25 > 0:08:26Dickens wrote,
0:08:26 > 0:08:30"Of all my books, I like this the best."
0:08:30 > 0:08:34David Copperfield is the most autobiographical of his novels -
0:08:34 > 0:08:38it tells the story of a young boy going through a troubled childhood,
0:08:38 > 0:08:40but on to become a successful writer.
0:08:40 > 0:08:43Now I think the closeness of the subject
0:08:43 > 0:08:45and the intimacy of the style
0:08:45 > 0:08:50together shine a special light on the rest of his work.
0:09:01 > 0:09:05'In the novel, David's childhood starts as a happy one.
0:09:10 > 0:09:14'Though his father is dead, he's loved by his mother
0:09:14 > 0:09:17'and cosseted by their maid, Peggotty.
0:09:17 > 0:09:20'But we constantly see through the child's eyes
0:09:20 > 0:09:23'as soon the world turns dark around him.'
0:09:23 > 0:09:28I remember when I started reading David Copperfield for the very first time.
0:09:28 > 0:09:30It was one of those books that,
0:09:30 > 0:09:32as it says in the blurb, you cannot put down.
0:09:32 > 0:09:35I was drawn into it and the reason was,
0:09:35 > 0:09:39it has the most accurately sustained piece of writing
0:09:39 > 0:09:43from the perspective of a child that I've ever come across.
0:09:43 > 0:09:46Here's the start of Chapter Two, I Observe.
0:09:46 > 0:09:48This is the very young David Copperfield
0:09:48 > 0:09:50aged about what...two, three...
0:09:50 > 0:09:55looking up at what's around him, trying to describe his surroundings,
0:09:55 > 0:09:58his mother, and Peggotty, the family maid.
0:09:58 > 0:10:02"The first objects", he says, "that assume a distinct presence before me
0:10:02 > 0:10:05"as I look far back into the blank of my infancy,
0:10:05 > 0:10:09"are my mother with her pretty hair and youthful shape,
0:10:09 > 0:10:11"and Peggotty, with no shape at all
0:10:11 > 0:10:13"And eyes so dark they seemed to darken
0:10:13 > 0:10:16"the whole neighbourhood in her face."
0:10:16 > 0:10:18That's that thing of children,
0:10:18 > 0:10:21remembering things much larger than they were in reality.
0:10:21 > 0:10:23"Eyes so dark
0:10:23 > 0:10:27"that they seemed to darken the whole neighbourhood in her face,
0:10:27 > 0:10:29"and cheeks and arms so hard and red
0:10:29 > 0:10:33"that I wondered the birds didn't peck her in preference to apples."
0:10:33 > 0:10:36Again, everything is very simple at this stage.
0:10:36 > 0:10:39Dickens the great wordsmith, the literary showman,
0:10:39 > 0:10:42is actually putting everything back into his box of tricks,
0:10:42 > 0:10:43and shutting that box tight.
0:10:43 > 0:10:45So everything is in monosyllables.
0:10:45 > 0:10:49"Cheeks and arms so hard and red."
0:10:49 > 0:10:50And then that little image,
0:10:50 > 0:10:54the bird pecking at her cheeks in preference to apples.
0:10:54 > 0:10:57Of course, that's an image a child would understand. The bird pecking.
0:10:57 > 0:11:00He wouldn't have anything more sophisticated
0:11:00 > 0:11:01to compare Peggotty's cheeks to.
0:11:08 > 0:11:13'But David's idyll shatters as his mother remarries
0:11:13 > 0:11:16'to a cold and heartless man called Mr Murdstone.
0:11:16 > 0:11:21'And now David can only see harshness wherever he gazes.'
0:11:24 > 0:11:25"I could not look at her,
0:11:25 > 0:11:28"I could not look at him. I knew quite well
0:11:28 > 0:11:30"that he was looking at us both.
0:11:30 > 0:11:34"And I turned to the window and looked out there at some shrubs
0:11:34 > 0:11:36"that were drooping their heads in the cold."
0:11:41 > 0:11:45The young Copperfield is the camera in this picture,
0:11:45 > 0:11:47and everything we're perceiving,
0:11:47 > 0:11:50we're reading about, is done, as it's perceived, through his eyes.
0:11:50 > 0:11:52"And I turned to the window..."
0:11:52 > 0:11:55and that thing of childhood where as you grow up,
0:11:55 > 0:11:56if you receive bad news,
0:11:56 > 0:11:59if there's been a sudden dramatic moment,
0:11:59 > 0:12:03you instantly recall the first image you saw at the time,
0:12:03 > 0:12:06an image that, no matter how insignificant it appears,
0:12:06 > 0:12:09still burns there in your heart with significance.
0:12:09 > 0:12:14This whole process in these first few chapters of David Copperfield
0:12:14 > 0:12:19is not just a fascinating story from the perspective of the little boy
0:12:19 > 0:12:24but actually quite a modern, experimental exercise in language.
0:12:24 > 0:12:27He's not like a serious novelist,
0:12:27 > 0:12:32who would very consciously set out to impress us
0:12:32 > 0:12:34with the stylistic mastery he has
0:12:34 > 0:12:37over a description of child psychology.
0:12:37 > 0:12:40Instead he wants to write himself out of the picture.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43He doesn't want us to feel written at by an author.
0:12:43 > 0:12:46Instead he wants us to be pulled in to the work,
0:12:46 > 0:12:50and to watch it and observe it from the perspective of the little boy,
0:12:50 > 0:12:54sitting low, on the floor, at the world around him.
0:13:03 > 0:13:08'Dickens's lifelong sympathy with the way children think
0:13:08 > 0:13:11'actually affected everything he wrote.'
0:13:12 > 0:13:16The very first time I took my son to see a film at the cinema,
0:13:16 > 0:13:18afterwards I asked him what he thought.
0:13:18 > 0:13:22He said it was very good, just like a DVD you could only see once.
0:13:22 > 0:13:25And it's that ability as a child to describe something
0:13:25 > 0:13:29no way an adult would, that Dickens always carried around with him.
0:13:32 > 0:13:36'Dickens wrote children's stories for adults.
0:13:36 > 0:13:38'He stressed the power of the imagination,
0:13:38 > 0:13:41'the power a child has in abundance,
0:13:41 > 0:13:43'as a way of describing and reacting to
0:13:43 > 0:13:45'the world he saw around us.
0:13:45 > 0:13:50'Even as he matured as a writer, his novels read like fairy tales,
0:13:50 > 0:13:54'of heroes growing up with wicked step-parents, running away,
0:13:54 > 0:13:59'gaining vast fortunes, being lost and found.'
0:14:08 > 0:14:13'In 1849 Dickens published the first instalment of David Copperfield.
0:14:13 > 0:14:16'Like all his novels, it was released as a serial,
0:14:16 > 0:14:19'issued in 19 monthly parts.
0:14:19 > 0:14:25'Dickens was writing only weeks before his audience was reading him.'
0:14:27 > 0:14:28'The original manuscript is housed
0:14:28 > 0:14:32'in the National Art Library at London's Victoria and Albert Museum,
0:14:32 > 0:14:36'and I looked to see if it betrayed any signs of the relentless pressure
0:14:36 > 0:14:37'Dickens must have been under.'
0:14:40 > 0:14:41Am I allowed to touch them?
0:14:41 > 0:14:43Yes, please. Please do. Open it.
0:14:43 > 0:14:46It starts off with part number three,
0:14:46 > 0:14:49the first volume had the first two parts.
0:14:49 > 0:14:52"Personal history and experience of David Copperfield.
0:14:52 > 0:14:53"Chapter seven."
0:14:55 > 0:14:57I'm seeing if I can read it.
0:14:57 > 0:15:03"School began in earnest that day."
0:15:03 > 0:15:06It is quite... This would go off to the printers?
0:15:06 > 0:15:09- This would go to the printers. - They could decipher this?- Yes!
0:15:09 > 0:15:12But look at this, this is a mess, isn't it?
0:15:12 > 0:15:14This is in fact, extremely,
0:15:14 > 0:15:16really neat...
0:15:16 > 0:15:18- Really?- ..And clear.
0:15:18 > 0:15:21You can tell that because the compositors,
0:15:21 > 0:15:26when they set from these manuscripts were extremely accurate.
0:15:26 > 0:15:31So he's writing these novels almost live, in a way.
0:15:31 > 0:15:35People are watching him write, in that he doesn't quite know...
0:15:35 > 0:15:37He has a rough idea where he wants to go,
0:15:37 > 0:15:40but doesn't quite know how it's going to end.
0:15:40 > 0:15:42He seems to have been fairly disciplined.
0:15:42 > 0:15:45He had a copy date of the 20th of each month.
0:15:45 > 0:15:50And he was normally two, three weeks in advance.
0:15:50 > 0:15:56- Really?- So he was relatively good at keeping up with...
0:15:56 > 0:15:59The idea of being two weeks in advance of any writing deadline,
0:15:59 > 0:16:02to me is completely alien, I have to say!
0:16:05 > 0:16:08I don't want to read too much analysis into the handwriting
0:16:08 > 0:16:14but I get the sense of a very, very restless, unsettled personality.
0:16:24 > 0:16:28You know, having been a lifelong Dickens fan, to have this...
0:16:28 > 0:16:32I am like a kid in a sweetie shop at the moment.
0:16:32 > 0:16:36But a sweetie shop run by a guy who makes bloody good sweets.
0:16:50 > 0:16:54'Dickens started his writing career first as a court reporter
0:16:54 > 0:16:58'and then as a parliamentary sketch writer.
0:16:58 > 0:17:02'He was trained to be fast, vivid and entertaining.
0:17:02 > 0:17:08'So it's no surprise when he had his first piece of fiction published in 1833, when he was just 21,
0:17:08 > 0:17:12'that it was in the form of a comic short story.
0:17:12 > 0:17:16'And more, much more comedy, was to follow.'
0:17:22 > 0:17:26As a kid I was two things - I was very bookish, you know,
0:17:26 > 0:17:31I loved reading, and I was also into comedy, but I always regarded those two worlds as being quite separate.
0:17:31 > 0:17:34Literature was serious, and for the funny stuff,
0:17:34 > 0:17:39I spent all my money on comics and listening to great radio shows
0:17:39 > 0:17:42like Hitchhikers' Guide To The Galaxy.
0:17:42 > 0:17:48And then I remember when I got hooked on Dickens, I picked up The Old Curiosity Shop, as you do,
0:17:48 > 0:17:52and very early on, I came across this episode
0:17:52 > 0:17:54where there's a great guy called Dick Swiveller
0:17:54 > 0:17:57who has no money. And he's in a pub, and he's bought a meal.
0:17:57 > 0:18:01And he says to the innkeeper he'll come round later that night
0:18:01 > 0:18:03and pay for it, and writes something down in a book.
0:18:03 > 0:18:05And his friend says to him,
0:18:05 > 0:18:08"Are you just writing down a reminder to come back this evening?"
0:18:08 > 0:18:11and Dick says, "Not exactly, Fred.
0:18:11 > 0:18:16"I enter into this little book the names of the streets that I can't go down while the shops are open.
0:18:16 > 0:18:20"This dinner today closes Long Acre.
0:18:20 > 0:18:22"I bought a pair of boots in Great Queen Street last week
0:18:22 > 0:18:25"and made that no thoroughfare too.
0:18:25 > 0:18:28"There's only one avenue to the Strand left open now,
0:18:28 > 0:18:32"and I shall have to stop up that tonight with a pair of gloves."
0:18:32 > 0:18:36So what Dick Swiveller's doing is he's got a mental map of London
0:18:36 > 0:18:39and he's just crossing out the streets he can't move down,
0:18:39 > 0:18:41because he owes people money there.
0:18:41 > 0:18:44And I was thinking, that's funny, but it reminds me of something,
0:18:44 > 0:18:49it reminds me of a stand-up comedy routine or a sketch,
0:18:49 > 0:18:53or that Charlie Chaplin scene where he's quite happily eating his own shoes
0:18:53 > 0:18:56because he has no food left and no money to buy some.
0:18:56 > 0:19:00And that for me was a great eye-opener about Dickens.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03I think we're put off by this notion we have of Charles Dickens
0:19:03 > 0:19:08as this great Victorian novelist, because it implies he's serious,
0:19:08 > 0:19:12whereas in fact I think he's the finest comedian we've ever produced.
0:19:16 > 0:19:20'By that I mean, much comedy today is still conditioned
0:19:20 > 0:19:23'by the way Dickens wrote it in the 19th century,
0:19:23 > 0:19:28'and comedy writers and performers today owe a huge debt to him.
0:19:28 > 0:19:32'Other people who work in comedy think so too.'
0:19:33 > 0:19:35There's this thing about Mrs Gamp.
0:19:35 > 0:19:40Oh, Mrs Gamp who's the nurse in Martin Chuzzlewit.
0:19:40 > 0:19:42This sentence where he goes,
0:19:42 > 0:19:45"It was difficult to enjoy her society
0:19:45 > 0:19:48"without becoming conscious of a smell of spirits."
0:19:48 > 0:19:52So what he's basically saying is "This woman stank of alcohol".
0:19:52 > 0:19:55The way he puts it, "It was difficult to enjoy her company!"
0:19:55 > 0:19:59But Mrs Gamp, again, is kind of like a character from Psychoville,
0:19:59 > 0:20:02she's this small, squat woman.
0:20:02 > 0:20:05What you can do is, you can put a bottle of spirits on the side.
0:20:05 > 0:20:09She says, "I may take a drink. Or I may not.
0:20:09 > 0:20:12"It just depends on how I'll be disposed."
0:20:12 > 0:20:14She'll drink the whole lot is what will happen.
0:20:14 > 0:20:20I'm devoted to Pickwick Papers. And Mr Jingle.
0:20:20 > 0:20:22He's a complete conman. A real con.
0:20:22 > 0:20:25And he speaks very fast so nobody else can get a word in.
0:20:25 > 0:20:28Bang-bang-bang, like a machine gun. He's a very funny character.
0:20:28 > 0:20:32It's desperately dark, as well. Like...
0:20:32 > 0:20:37It's a man talking about how a woman's head was knocked off
0:20:37 > 0:20:40by the top of an arch, in front of her children and then he's going,
0:20:40 > 0:20:44"She couldn't even eat a sandwich. She didn't have a head any more."
0:20:44 > 0:20:48" 'Heads, heads, take care of your heads', cried a loquacious stranger
0:20:48 > 0:20:52"as they came out under the low archway, which in those days formed the entrance to the coach yard.
0:20:52 > 0:20:57"Terrible place - dangerous work - other day - five children - mother - tall lady -
0:20:57 > 0:21:01"eating sandwiches - forgot the arch - crash - knock - children looked round -
0:21:01 > 0:21:03"mother's head off - sandwich in her hand -
0:21:03 > 0:21:05"no mouth to put it in - head of a family off -
0:21:05 > 0:21:10"shocking - shocking. Didn't keep a sharp look out enough, eh? Eh, sir? Eh?"
0:21:10 > 0:21:11THEY LAUGH
0:21:11 > 0:21:15That's Peston on about 17 espressos.
0:21:15 > 0:21:17THEY LAUGH
0:21:17 > 0:21:19Yes! That's spot on.
0:21:19 > 0:21:24It's that sense of the rhythms of colloquialisms and the way people speak.
0:21:24 > 0:21:28Because in reality, we don't finish our sentences and we all interrupt each other.
0:21:28 > 0:21:30That's the performer in him.
0:21:30 > 0:21:35There's a bit from Bleak House here with a little child roadsweeper.
0:21:35 > 0:21:38"She says to me, she says, 'Are you the boy at the inquich?'
0:21:38 > 0:21:43"I says 'Yes', she says to me, she says, 'You could show me all them places'. I says, 'Yes, I can',
0:21:43 > 0:21:46"she says to me, 'Do it' and I done it, and she give me a sovereign and I hooked it.
0:21:46 > 0:21:50"I hadn't much of the sovereign neither. I had to pay five bob down in old Tom Alone's
0:21:50 > 0:21:56" 'fore they'd square it to give me change and then a young man thieved another fiver while I was asleep.
0:21:56 > 0:21:57"Another boy thieved ninepence."
0:21:57 > 0:22:01I'm half expecting you now to go "Am I bovvered?"
0:22:01 > 0:22:03Exactly, yeah.
0:22:14 > 0:22:17'Dickens's comedy still seems fresh,
0:22:17 > 0:22:20'but it's the dark and serious nature of his themes
0:22:20 > 0:22:24'that make his novels seem surprisingly modern.
0:22:24 > 0:22:29'And there's no more dominant theme in those novels...than money.'
0:22:34 > 0:22:39'In Dickens's world, heroes and villains are obsessed with money -
0:22:39 > 0:22:42'how to get it, what to do with it,
0:22:42 > 0:22:44'and above all, the terror of losing it.
0:22:44 > 0:22:46'A huge fear of debt and poverty
0:22:46 > 0:22:50'can be traced back to Dickens's own childhood.
0:22:50 > 0:22:53'His father, John Dickens, was forever in debt,
0:22:53 > 0:22:56'and at one point endured the public shame
0:22:56 > 0:22:58'of being sent to debtors' prison.'
0:23:00 > 0:23:04'Charles was taken out of school, and aged 12, was sent to work
0:23:04 > 0:23:07'in a shoe polish warehouse to feed his family.
0:23:07 > 0:23:11'The experience haunted him for the rest of his life.'
0:23:17 > 0:23:20'When he came to write David Copperfield,
0:23:20 > 0:23:23'Dickens poured many of these feelings
0:23:23 > 0:23:26'into the serial debtor Mr Micawber.'
0:23:31 > 0:23:34Now, Mr Micawber is such a brilliant character.
0:23:34 > 0:23:38I think we have this image of him from TV adaptations
0:23:38 > 0:23:41of being just a sort of gregarious, fat, rather optimistic chap who,
0:23:41 > 0:23:45even though he has no money, is always talking about his expectation
0:23:45 > 0:23:48that something is just around the corner,
0:23:48 > 0:23:49something is going to turn up.
0:23:49 > 0:23:52It's so different when you read the book.
0:23:52 > 0:23:55There, it's a much more sophisticated, painful read,
0:23:55 > 0:23:58because Micawber can start off by being very affectionate
0:23:58 > 0:24:01and outgoing and full of high spirits,
0:24:01 > 0:24:04and there's a genuine affection between him and Copperfield.
0:24:04 > 0:24:09But within seconds, as soon as the realisation comes upon him
0:24:09 > 0:24:10of the debt that he carries,
0:24:10 > 0:24:15Micawber is reduced to being an almost childlike, self-pitying
0:24:15 > 0:24:19little creature, railing about how he's doomed for the debtors' prison.
0:24:19 > 0:24:23He starts making knife-cutting gestures across his throat
0:24:23 > 0:24:25and talks about what a tragic figure he is.
0:24:25 > 0:24:27And then he can pull himself together
0:24:27 > 0:24:30and start singing songs and dancing the hornpipe.
0:24:30 > 0:24:33It's a very realistic and affectionate,
0:24:33 > 0:24:37and yet frustrated look at the twisted poison
0:24:37 > 0:24:39that can be injected into someone's personality
0:24:39 > 0:24:41by this awareness of debt.
0:24:41 > 0:24:43It's so hard to read,
0:24:43 > 0:24:47you almost have to put your fingers across your eyes as you read it.
0:24:54 > 0:24:56This looks like Julius Caesar.
0:24:56 > 0:25:00- That is Julius Caesar. That was the Leeds Playhouse.- Right.
0:25:00 > 0:25:02'For 63-year-old actor Ian Hurley,
0:25:02 > 0:25:08'Dickens's portrait of Micawber has a special significance.
0:25:08 > 0:25:13'When work dried up, Ian found himself in debt,
0:25:13 > 0:25:15'owing the bank £40,000.'
0:25:21 > 0:25:27Mr Micawber, you can see that when he has these highs and lows
0:25:27 > 0:25:33and when someone has a debt problem, it really doesn't go...
0:25:33 > 0:25:37It, it... You see how he's trying to escape from it.
0:25:37 > 0:25:42Well, here's the passage which describes that sense of being up and down
0:25:42 > 0:25:43that goes through Mr Micawber.
0:25:43 > 0:25:48"It was nothing at all unusual for Mr Micawber to sob violently
0:25:48 > 0:25:51"at the beginning of one of these Saturday night conversations
0:25:51 > 0:25:55"and sing about Jack's delight being his lovely Nan towards the end of it.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58"I've known him come home to supper with a flood of tears
0:25:58 > 0:26:01"and a declaration that nothing was now left but a jail
0:26:01 > 0:26:04"and go to bed making a calculation of the expense
0:26:04 > 0:26:10"of putting bow windows on the house in case anything turned up, which was his favourite expression."
0:26:10 > 0:26:15It will give you a high and a low and can make you cry.
0:26:15 > 0:26:21You can even be driving along in your car and you think about this and you cry. But to....
0:26:21 > 0:26:24Why the high? Where does the high come from?
0:26:24 > 0:26:28Well, the high is the telling yourself that it's OK.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32Because of the presence of the worry of debt you will take highs from it
0:26:32 > 0:26:36to remove the... Let's say to remove the depression of it.
0:26:36 > 0:26:40And I think this is where the highs come and the crying and the emotion.
0:26:40 > 0:26:42And he does great flourishes.
0:26:42 > 0:26:45He suddenly... When he's trying to enjoy himself
0:26:45 > 0:26:48he enjoys himself very, very noisily and energetically,
0:26:48 > 0:26:50as if to show there's nothing wrong.
0:26:50 > 0:26:52And that's very interesting.
0:26:52 > 0:26:55To show there's nothing wrong, to show that it's OK.
0:26:55 > 0:26:59"It's OK, yeah, fine, come and have another drink! It's fine."
0:26:59 > 0:27:04And someone says to you, "You look a bit sad, you look a bit tense."
0:27:04 > 0:27:06You say, "No, no, no, I'm fine, it's OK!"
0:27:06 > 0:27:12And the other thing he does is sometimes pretend that he's paying stuff back,
0:27:12 > 0:27:14but he'll know he's running up a debt
0:27:14 > 0:27:17and with a great flourish he'll write an I-O-U.
0:27:17 > 0:27:20I think that's wonderful. I think it's a wonderful idea.
0:27:20 > 0:27:24I just wish I could write a few I-O-Us to the bank and say,
0:27:24 > 0:27:26"Well, that's you paid!"
0:27:32 > 0:27:35'Micawber is a brilliant creation on his own.
0:27:35 > 0:27:41'But what Dickens also does is show how debt spreads like an infection,
0:27:41 > 0:27:44'so that it extends its hold beyond Micawber
0:27:44 > 0:27:47'on to anybody who he befriends.'
0:27:49 > 0:27:52Like David Copperfield's friend Tommy Traddles
0:27:52 > 0:27:57who sells a number of objects to the pawn shop to raise some money for Micawber.
0:27:57 > 0:28:02And then one day Traddles decides there's one thing he really wants back from that pawn shop,
0:28:02 > 0:28:06a little decorative pot given to him by his girlfriend.
0:28:09 > 0:28:12'As the pawnbroker will only sell it back to Traddles
0:28:12 > 0:28:18'at an inflated price, he begs Peggotty to buy it back for him.
0:28:18 > 0:28:23'Leaving Traddles himself waiting anxiously around the corner.'
0:28:25 > 0:28:30'At first Peggotty leaves empty-handed,
0:28:30 > 0:28:33'but then the broker calls her back.'
0:28:35 > 0:28:38'And finally she returns, triumphant.'
0:28:46 > 0:28:49It's like a scene from a film, it's like a farce,
0:28:49 > 0:28:54where money is reduced to something very small, very specific
0:28:54 > 0:28:58and yet very, very meaningful.
0:29:09 > 0:29:11'When Dickens wrote David Copperfield
0:29:11 > 0:29:17'his public image was of a restless but nonetheless contented family man.'
0:29:19 > 0:29:22'He'd been married to Catherine Dickens for 13 years
0:29:22 > 0:29:27'and with their brood of eight children it seemed like they had a happy home.'
0:29:31 > 0:29:37'Privately, though, Dickens developed misgivings about Catherine's suitability as a wife
0:29:37 > 0:29:40'and there were quiet strains within the marriage.'
0:29:42 > 0:29:47'In David Copperfield we can sense Dickens's own ambivalence towards his marriage
0:29:47 > 0:29:51'in his portrayal of David's relationship with his wife, Dora.'
0:29:55 > 0:30:00'Impulsive and immature, David is at first blind to the fact
0:30:00 > 0:30:02'that Dora is wrong for him.'
0:30:04 > 0:30:09'But wiser friends and family can see trouble coming from the start.'
0:30:11 > 0:30:14Here's a scene with David and his aunt Betsey Trotwood,
0:30:14 > 0:30:20and the loudest sound in this whole passage is of Betsy Trotwood biting her lip.
0:30:20 > 0:30:24"So you fancy yourself in love, do you?"
0:30:24 > 0:30:27"Fancy, Aunt?" I exclaimed as red as I could be.
0:30:27 > 0:30:30"I adore her with my whole soul."
0:30:30 > 0:30:33"Dora indeed!" returned my Aunt.
0:30:33 > 0:30:36"And you mean to say the little thing is very fascinating, I suppose?"
0:30:36 > 0:30:40"My dear Aunt, no-one could form the least idea what she is."
0:30:40 > 0:30:44"Ah! And not silly?" said my aunt.
0:30:44 > 0:30:45"Silly, Aunt?"
0:30:45 > 0:30:49"Not light-headed?" "Light-headed, Aunt?"
0:30:49 > 0:30:52I could only repeat this daring speculation.
0:30:52 > 0:30:56"Well, well, I only ask. I don't depreciate her.
0:30:56 > 0:30:59"Poor little couple. And so you think you were formed for one another
0:30:59 > 0:31:02"and are to go through a party-supper-table kind of life,
0:31:02 > 0:31:05"like two pretty pieces of confectionary?
0:31:05 > 0:31:07"Do you, Trot?"
0:31:07 > 0:31:10It's a difficult, uncomfortable read
0:31:10 > 0:31:14as you go through this plotline in the book.
0:31:14 > 0:31:19It's a daring, sophisticated, brutal analysis
0:31:19 > 0:31:23of two young people committing nuptial suicide.
0:31:28 > 0:31:33'It's almost as if Dickens was toying with the boundaries
0:31:33 > 0:31:37'that separated his private life from public gaze.
0:31:37 > 0:31:41'In 1859, he and Catherine had another child, a girl,
0:31:41 > 0:31:45'and they called her...Dora.'
0:31:46 > 0:31:50Meanwhile the fictional Dora was proving far, far too much
0:31:50 > 0:31:53for the novel to bear.
0:31:53 > 0:31:56The love story was staining the rest of the novel
0:31:56 > 0:31:59with a mood of bitterness and guilt.
0:31:59 > 0:32:03The marriage between Dora and David had to come to an end.
0:32:03 > 0:32:07But in Victorian times it would have been improper for it to end
0:32:07 > 0:32:10with divorce or even separation.
0:32:10 > 0:32:13So Dickens has Dora fall ill
0:32:13 > 0:32:18and quite suddenly and quite conveniently die.
0:32:23 > 0:32:27Now, his daughter was born a week before Dora is killed in the novel
0:32:27 > 0:32:31and at the time Dickens writes to his wife Catherine,
0:32:31 > 0:32:34"I'm uncertain of my movements, for after another splitting day
0:32:34 > 0:32:37"I still have Dora to kill.
0:32:37 > 0:32:39"I mean the Copperfield Dora!"
0:32:44 > 0:32:47SEAGULLS CAW
0:32:53 > 0:32:57'This is Broadstairs on the Kent coast.'
0:32:59 > 0:33:03'Dickens often brought his family here in the summer
0:33:03 > 0:33:06'to escape from the crowds and heat of London.'
0:33:10 > 0:33:13'The year he was finishing David Copperfield
0:33:13 > 0:33:17'they stayed at Fort House, since renamed Bleak House.'
0:33:20 > 0:33:22'It's occasionally open to the public
0:33:22 > 0:33:26'but it's also home to Richard and Jackie Hilton.
0:33:26 > 0:33:30'And they have a sometimes unorthodox take
0:33:30 > 0:33:32'on the life of Charles Dickens.'
0:33:32 > 0:33:36We're just going into the Charles Dickens dining room...
0:33:36 > 0:33:42- Right.- ..which is where he used to, um...from all reports,
0:33:42 > 0:33:46have a seven or eight-course breakfast.
0:33:46 > 0:33:48That would finish me off, that would.
0:33:48 > 0:33:51- I'd be in bed for an hour after. - Yeah, me too.
0:33:51 > 0:33:55And no doubt people come and ask you all sorts of questions.
0:33:55 > 0:33:58Well, they do, yeah, but I don't know that much.
0:33:58 > 0:34:03Only that he was married with seven children.
0:34:03 > 0:34:07- Nine.- Sorry, nine children.
0:34:07 > 0:34:10THEY LAUGH
0:34:10 > 0:34:14- But he had quite a few women on the side.- Oh, did he now?
0:34:14 > 0:34:18Well, I know about one. You reckon there were all sorts going on?
0:34:18 > 0:34:20Yeah, for sure.
0:34:22 > 0:34:26- So this would have been living quarters as well.- Yeah.
0:34:26 > 0:34:31- I mean, did you know much about Dickens before the house? - Nothing at all.
0:34:31 > 0:34:33And how do you feel now, six years on?
0:34:33 > 0:34:37Do you feel there's this other presence around? This life that you've....
0:34:37 > 0:34:39Well, you can hear soldiers sometimes.
0:34:39 > 0:34:44- Hear soldiers? - You can hear soldiers, Cos this was called Fort House
0:34:44 > 0:34:46and we did contact Most Haunted
0:34:46 > 0:34:48cos I thought it would be good for people to know.
0:34:48 > 0:34:52- A Christmas Special!- Yeah!
0:34:52 > 0:34:57- And this is at night?- At night. But the voices are in the daytime.
0:34:57 > 0:34:59What voices? Where do these voices come from?
0:34:59 > 0:35:05You hear a woman's voice, and she'll say, "Not again!" in a very posh voice.
0:35:06 > 0:35:13Let's get out. Let's... This is extraordinary! I didn't know any of this.
0:35:14 > 0:35:19- Where are we going? In here?- This is Charles Dickens's bedroom.- Uh-huh?
0:35:19 > 0:35:21Um...
0:35:21 > 0:35:24And I gather there's a cellar, someone was saying?
0:35:24 > 0:35:27- Yes, that's right.- And what did Dickens use the cellar for, then?
0:35:27 > 0:35:31I think mainly probably some of his staff slept in it.
0:35:31 > 0:35:36But I think he also used it for contraband.
0:35:36 > 0:35:38- Contraband?- Contraband, yeah.
0:35:38 > 0:35:40When he died,
0:35:40 > 0:35:46there were two 50-gallon drums - barrels, rather - of tobacco
0:35:46 > 0:35:51and 2,000 bottles of brandy found in the cellar.
0:35:51 > 0:35:53Oh, that's completely coloured my view of him
0:35:53 > 0:35:56as being a respectable member of society!
0:36:10 > 0:36:12Now, look at this.
0:36:12 > 0:36:15This is where Dickens wrote.
0:36:15 > 0:36:18This is where he finished David Copperfield.
0:36:18 > 0:36:20His little airy nest, as he called it.
0:36:20 > 0:36:23And it's about the size of a nest, it is quite small.
0:36:23 > 0:36:25I'm surprised how small it is.
0:36:25 > 0:36:31It's almost like he forced himself to sit down and write.
0:36:31 > 0:36:34It's the Victorian equivalent of a writer
0:36:34 > 0:36:39switching off his mobile phone and disconnecting the internet
0:36:39 > 0:36:41to avoid all distractions here.
0:36:41 > 0:36:45But here is where this whole room
0:36:45 > 0:36:49forces you to look out towards the sea.
0:36:49 > 0:36:53In David Copperfield, he describes towards the end of the novel,
0:36:53 > 0:37:00a gargantuan storm scene that kills several major characters in the novel.
0:37:00 > 0:37:03I won't reveal the names, that would spoil things.
0:37:03 > 0:37:08And Dickens himself found these quite traumatic scenes,
0:37:08 > 0:37:12not just in the storm, but as the novel reached its conclusion,
0:37:12 > 0:37:14quite difficult to finish.
0:37:14 > 0:37:18He says he was nearly "clean knocked over" by the writing of it.
0:37:18 > 0:37:20At one point he says, "It defeated me."
0:37:20 > 0:37:26In actual fact, those scenes were some of the most powerful scenes that Dickens had written to date.
0:37:26 > 0:37:29And he did it here, at this desk.
0:37:29 > 0:37:33Let's see if I can get some inspiration.
0:37:34 > 0:37:36Maybe for my next link.
0:37:36 > 0:37:42As I look out towards the sea, just drink it all in.
0:38:01 > 0:38:06'Dickens's popularity rested not just on his characters and stories,
0:38:06 > 0:38:08'but also on his satire.'
0:38:12 > 0:38:17'His early works savage the Victorian governing classes'
0:38:17 > 0:38:19'appalling treatment of its dispossessed.'
0:38:22 > 0:38:24'And as he wrote more and more,
0:38:24 > 0:38:29'he poured derision on ever vaster sections of society.'
0:38:33 > 0:38:37'As Dickens grew more successful, he was welcomed into the British establishment,
0:38:37 > 0:38:40'and the closer he looked at that establishment,'
0:38:40 > 0:38:45the surer he was that it was rotten to the core.
0:38:45 > 0:38:47And that's why, in the later novels,
0:38:47 > 0:38:51it's this world that he wants to show us up close.
0:38:51 > 0:38:54Welcome to Dickensopolis.
0:39:03 > 0:39:07'Today, Dickens's satire still stings.
0:39:07 > 0:39:10'In the novel Little Dorrit, he caricatures
0:39:10 > 0:39:15'the way the country is run by "the Circumlocution Office." '
0:39:18 > 0:39:22"The Circumlocution Office was the most important department under government.
0:39:22 > 0:39:25"Its finger was in the largest public pie
0:39:25 > 0:39:28"and in the smallest public tart.
0:39:28 > 0:39:32"If another gunpowder plot had been discovered half an hour before the lighting of the match,
0:39:32 > 0:39:36"nobody would have been justified in saving the parliament
0:39:36 > 0:39:40"until there had been half a score of boards, half a bushel of minutes,
0:39:40 > 0:39:44"several sacks of official memoranda and a family vault full of
0:39:44 > 0:39:49"ungrammatical correspondence on the part of the Circumlocution Office."
0:39:52 > 0:39:55Dickens's description of bureaucracy run riot
0:39:55 > 0:39:57really set the template
0:39:57 > 0:40:01for any satirical take on government written ever since.
0:40:01 > 0:40:04In this, we have the beginnings of Big Brother
0:40:04 > 0:40:07in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four,
0:40:07 > 0:40:10Sir Humphrey Appleby in Yes, Minister
0:40:10 > 0:40:13and even the obstructiveness and obtuseness
0:40:13 > 0:40:17that Harry Potter meets from the Ministry of Magic.
0:40:23 > 0:40:26'One of Dickens's favourite targets was the law.'
0:40:30 > 0:40:35'The novel Bleak House is set against the background
0:40:35 > 0:40:38'of a disputed inheritance and the infamous, long-running
0:40:38 > 0:40:42'Chancery lawsuit of Jarndyce v Jarndyce.'
0:40:45 > 0:40:48The case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce
0:40:48 > 0:40:51is based on a long-running Chancery dispute
0:40:51 > 0:40:56that I'm sure Tony Arlidge has at his fingertips and can tell us all about.
0:40:56 > 0:40:58I was in it. I appeared in it!
0:40:58 > 0:41:03But that was an actual case which I think lasted 20-odd years.
0:41:03 > 0:41:06'I met Judge John Lafferty,
0:41:06 > 0:41:09'the first visually impaired judge on the bench,
0:41:09 > 0:41:12'senior barrister Antony Arlidge QC
0:41:12 > 0:41:15'and Ellis Sareen, also a barrister, to see
0:41:15 > 0:41:18'how well they thought Dickens made his case,
0:41:18 > 0:41:21'and whether there's still a case to answer.'
0:41:21 > 0:41:23We also need to remember in all of this
0:41:23 > 0:41:27- that he has got this fantastic vividness of phrase.- He has.
0:41:27 > 0:41:30When the Lord Chancellor comes in,
0:41:30 > 0:41:34all the barristers in their white wigs and black gowns get up and bow
0:41:34 > 0:41:39like "so many pianoforte keys".
0:41:39 > 0:41:42Even now, there are days in the Courts of Chancery where there are
0:41:42 > 0:41:45quite a large number of barristers present at one time.
0:41:45 > 0:41:53And in just one little phrase, he absolutely encapsulates that.
0:41:53 > 0:41:56Do you feel that Dickens presents
0:41:56 > 0:42:00a fair portrait of how the law operated at the time that he was writing?
0:42:00 > 0:42:04He's out to pillory the way in which institutions can evolve
0:42:04 > 0:42:06so that they're there to serve as much
0:42:06 > 0:42:08the interests of their practitioners,
0:42:08 > 0:42:13to the detriment of the vulnerable, the poor and the needy,
0:42:13 > 0:42:16as they are to right the wrongs in society.
0:42:16 > 0:42:19Central to it, actually, is something that remains a problem -
0:42:19 > 0:42:24that very often, particularly with small civil claims,
0:42:24 > 0:42:27the cost of the legal proceedings is bound to exceed
0:42:27 > 0:42:30the damages that are obtained.
0:42:30 > 0:42:32Yes. In the time of Bleak House,
0:42:32 > 0:42:36there were lawyers who prolonged litigation for their own advantage.
0:42:36 > 0:42:39There have been ever since, and there always will be.
0:42:39 > 0:42:41That's always going to be a problem.
0:42:41 > 0:42:43One thing I do want to ask is,
0:42:43 > 0:42:46when you read these accounts of the law,
0:42:46 > 0:42:49do you feel implicated or part of that?
0:42:49 > 0:42:53There's always a tendency... for example, politicians looking at The Thick Of It would tell me
0:42:53 > 0:42:58"Oh, I know someone just like that." It's never themselves,
0:42:58 > 0:43:00but it's always someone that they know.
0:43:00 > 0:43:02I just wonder how you feel?
0:43:02 > 0:43:05It's a fair cop, guv. You've got me bang to rights.
0:43:05 > 0:43:10Some of it's timeless. Yeah... and you see it all the time.
0:43:10 > 0:43:11Not me, obviously.
0:43:11 > 0:43:18The great thing about it is that it is hugely entertaining.
0:43:18 > 0:43:21That's right, the great thing about Dickens is his theatricality.
0:43:21 > 0:43:23It's a series of vivid scenes.
0:43:23 > 0:43:26And how about today? If Dickens were writing today, then,
0:43:26 > 0:43:30what in the way the system works now, is there anything you think
0:43:30 > 0:43:33he would immediately seize on?
0:43:33 > 0:43:36Oh, I don't think he'd be short of material.
0:43:41 > 0:43:44'It's not just in our institutions that we can sometimes spot
0:43:44 > 0:43:47'the timelessness of Dickens's attacks.'
0:43:50 > 0:43:54'The characters who dominate his institutions can seem familiar too.
0:43:54 > 0:43:59'Today, we may have the likes of Mr Murdoch, but in Little Dorrit,
0:43:59 > 0:44:01'Dickens gives us a Mr Merdle.'
0:44:03 > 0:44:08"Mr Merdle was immensely rich; a man of prodigious enterprise;
0:44:08 > 0:44:11"a Midas who turned all he touched to gold.
0:44:11 > 0:44:15"He was in everything good, from banking to building.
0:44:15 > 0:44:19"He was in Parliament, of course. He was in the City necessarily.
0:44:19 > 0:44:21"The weightiest of men had said to projectors
0:44:21 > 0:44:26"What name have you got? Have you got Merdle?" And the reply being in the negative
0:44:26 > 0:44:30had said "Then I won't look at you."
0:44:30 > 0:44:34The whole novel is a depiction partly of this figure.
0:44:34 > 0:44:37One figure, Merdle, moving through society,
0:44:37 > 0:44:40and first the politicians and then the media
0:44:40 > 0:44:44and then the law all come to pay homage to him.
0:44:44 > 0:44:48But he himself is a strange shadowy figure whose bank collapses,
0:44:48 > 0:44:53whose money fritters away and who ends up killing himself in a bath.
0:44:53 > 0:44:56It's a frightening and sadly familiar depiction
0:44:56 > 0:44:58of the whole of British society
0:44:58 > 0:45:02converging around one man who tries to control it,
0:45:02 > 0:45:04and in the end...imploding.
0:45:04 > 0:45:07Now, surely something as horrific as that,
0:45:07 > 0:45:10150 years ago, couldn't happen today.
0:45:10 > 0:45:12I mean, we know so much more now, don't we?
0:45:27 > 0:45:29'It wasn't just as a novelist
0:45:29 > 0:45:32'that Dickens expressed his views on society.
0:45:32 > 0:45:36'As a journalist, and then as a magazine editor,
0:45:36 > 0:45:41'he had the chance to publish his observations on everything.
0:45:41 > 0:45:45'And he fed his enormous appetite for the detail of life
0:45:45 > 0:45:48'by taking long walks almost every day,
0:45:48 > 0:45:50'regularly clocking up to 20 miles.'
0:45:53 > 0:45:56'As he walked, he observed every little oddity -
0:45:56 > 0:45:58'a weird play of light,
0:45:58 > 0:46:02'or the strange bend of a nose on a passer-by.'
0:46:07 > 0:46:14'And he was most inspired by the walks he took at night.'
0:46:15 > 0:46:20There's a fantastic essay that he wrote called "Night Walks"
0:46:20 > 0:46:24in which he describes wandering over to an insane asylum,
0:46:24 > 0:46:27Bethlehem Hospital, a house full of lunatics.
0:46:27 > 0:46:31And he goes there because he has a particular fancy in his head.
0:46:31 > 0:46:34"Are not the sane and the insane
0:46:34 > 0:46:38"equal at night as the sane lie adreaming?"
0:46:38 > 0:46:43"Are not all of us outside this hospital who dream more or less
0:46:43 > 0:46:46"in the condition of those inside it every night of our lives?"
0:46:46 > 0:46:50Basically, we're as mad as the people inside at night,
0:46:50 > 0:46:53by what goes on inside our head in our dreams.
0:46:53 > 0:46:55"Said an afflicted man to me
0:46:55 > 0:46:58"when I was last in a hospital like this,
0:46:58 > 0:47:01" 'Sir, I can frequently fly!'
0:47:01 > 0:47:04"I was half-ashamed to reflect that so could I, by night.
0:47:04 > 0:47:06"Said a woman to me on the same occasion,
0:47:06 > 0:47:09" 'Queen Victoria comes to dine with me,
0:47:09 > 0:47:14" 'and Her Majesty and I dine off peaches and macaroni in our nightgowns.'
0:47:14 > 0:47:18"Could I refrain from reddening with consciousness when I remembered
0:47:18 > 0:47:21"the amazing royal parties I myself had given at night?"
0:47:21 > 0:47:25That's what I love about Dickens, his ability to come up
0:47:25 > 0:47:27with a conclusion or make an observation
0:47:27 > 0:47:28you'd think would be bizarre,
0:47:28 > 0:47:32but actually, when you hear it, seems perfectly natural.
0:47:32 > 0:47:35That's why I think the night plays such a prominent role
0:47:35 > 0:47:38in his writing, because it gives him this ability
0:47:38 > 0:47:41to take those two worlds, the everyday and the familiar
0:47:41 > 0:47:44and the unfamiliar, the dark and the mysterious,
0:47:44 > 0:47:47and superimpose them on each other simultaneously,
0:47:47 > 0:47:49so that throughout his writing,
0:47:49 > 0:47:52those two worlds are weaving in and out of each other,
0:47:52 > 0:47:56so at no one point do you know exactly where you stand.
0:48:12 > 0:48:17'All sorts of human pathologies intrigued Dickens,
0:48:17 > 0:48:20'and David Copperfield includes an extraordinary character
0:48:20 > 0:48:22'who suffers from delusions.'
0:48:23 > 0:48:26'But instead of being shut up in an asylum,
0:48:26 > 0:48:30'he's been taken in by David's Aunt Betsey.
0:48:30 > 0:48:32'He's the rather marvellous Mr Dick.'
0:48:37 > 0:48:43'Mr Dick is one of the strangest, most peculiar characters
0:48:43 > 0:48:45'I've ever encountered,
0:48:45 > 0:48:49'not just in a Dickens novel, but in any novel.
0:48:52 > 0:48:55'For most of his life, he's been writing a project'
0:48:55 > 0:48:57which he calls The Memorial.
0:48:57 > 0:49:00We never quite get to the bottom of what The Memorial is.
0:49:00 > 0:49:04It's this very nebulous historical document that he's trying to write,
0:49:04 > 0:49:08but his work on a daily basis is interrupted by thoughts
0:49:08 > 0:49:13in his head about the execution of King Charles I.
0:49:13 > 0:49:16These thoughts torture and torment him,
0:49:16 > 0:49:22and the only thing he can do to get this these thoughts of the execution of Charles I out of his head
0:49:22 > 0:49:25is to write them down on big pieces of paper,
0:49:25 > 0:49:30to gather those bits of paper up and to fashion a paper kite out of them
0:49:30 > 0:49:34and to go outside and fly the kite in the air.
0:49:34 > 0:49:36Now, when I describe it like that,
0:49:36 > 0:49:39you might think that sounds so deranged and bizarre
0:49:39 > 0:49:43that it's unbelievable, and yet when you read David's account
0:49:43 > 0:49:44of his relationship with Mr Dick,
0:49:44 > 0:49:48it suddenly seems believable.
0:49:49 > 0:49:53"I used to fancy as I sat by him of an evening on a green slope
0:49:53 > 0:49:56"and saw him watch the kite high in the quiet air
0:49:56 > 0:49:59"that it lifted his mind out of its confusion
0:49:59 > 0:50:02"and bore it into the skies.
0:50:02 > 0:50:06"As he wound the string in and it came lower and lower down
0:50:06 > 0:50:09"out of the beautiful light till it fluttered to the ground
0:50:09 > 0:50:12"and lay there like a dead thing,
0:50:12 > 0:50:14"he seemed to wake gradually out a dream,
0:50:14 > 0:50:16"and I remembered to have seen him take it up
0:50:16 > 0:50:18"and look about him in a lost way,
0:50:18 > 0:50:21"as if they had both come down together,
0:50:21 > 0:50:25"so that I pitied him with all my heart."
0:50:27 > 0:50:32The truth is, we're not really looking at some grotesque eccentric,
0:50:32 > 0:50:35exaggerated for our amusement.
0:50:35 > 0:50:38With Mr Dick, we're watching a quite accurate
0:50:38 > 0:50:44and heartrendingly real portrayal of someone with a mental illness.
0:50:44 > 0:50:47In fact, some have commented with the benefit of hindsight
0:50:47 > 0:50:50that Dickens's own manic behaviour may have indicated
0:50:50 > 0:50:56signs of an element of bipolarity in his personality.
0:50:56 > 0:51:00Now, whatever the truth of that is, you can't help but feel
0:51:00 > 0:51:04that Dickens himself saw the world in this unique way.
0:51:04 > 0:51:09He even described, in a letter, his own imagination as an infirmity,
0:51:09 > 0:51:13a tendency to fancy or perceive relations between things
0:51:13 > 0:51:16that are not apparent generally.
0:51:16 > 0:51:19Which is what Mr Dick does.
0:51:19 > 0:51:23I really do think it's no exaggeration to say
0:51:23 > 0:51:26that Mr Dick is a heightened version of Mr Dickens.
0:51:38 > 0:51:42'In 1850, as he finished David Copperfield,
0:51:42 > 0:51:44'Dickens was still in control
0:51:44 > 0:51:49'not only of his fanciful, but also his darker thoughts.
0:51:49 > 0:51:51'But this didn't last.
0:51:51 > 0:51:54'Seven years later,
0:51:54 > 0:51:57'what he had subconsciously expressed in the novel
0:51:57 > 0:52:00'seeped into reality, and he left his wife.
0:52:00 > 0:52:03'He then pursued a relationship
0:52:03 > 0:52:06'he'd begun with a 19-year-old actress, Ellen Ternan.'
0:52:08 > 0:52:12'Yet the pressure of keeping the liaison secret,
0:52:12 > 0:52:16'together with growing panic that his talent would desert him,
0:52:16 > 0:52:17'began to make him ill.'
0:52:21 > 0:52:24'But Dickens refused to slow down.
0:52:24 > 0:52:31'In 1867, he embarked on a series of public reading tours,
0:52:31 > 0:52:33'determined to power on.'
0:52:39 > 0:52:45This is Dickens's own annotated reading copy of the scene
0:52:45 > 0:52:51in which Sykes kills Nancy in Oliver Twist.
0:52:51 > 0:52:56And this was the highlight of Dickens's public readings.
0:52:56 > 0:52:59It had people fainting in the aisles and running out.
0:52:59 > 0:53:02And you can see it's got his underlinings
0:53:02 > 0:53:06and emphasis where he is signalling to himself
0:53:06 > 0:53:09that he's going to pause and add dramatic action.
0:53:09 > 0:53:13We've got here little marks in the side margin. "Beckon down",
0:53:13 > 0:53:18"You won't be too violent", underlining, "murder coming".
0:53:18 > 0:53:22That's a little note to himself now to shift up another gear.
0:53:22 > 0:53:27We're in the home stretch of this bludgeoning.
0:53:27 > 0:53:31And once we get up to the moment of the murder itself,
0:53:31 > 0:53:36this is turning into quite a passionate, violent,
0:53:36 > 0:53:39very physical performance here.
0:53:39 > 0:53:43The annotations are now scarring the whole of the text here.
0:53:43 > 0:53:49"Action!" "Mystery!" "Terror to the end." "Dashed out his brains!!"
0:53:49 > 0:53:51Double exclamation mark at the end.
0:53:51 > 0:53:56Dickens's public readings were quite sensational.
0:53:56 > 0:54:00They were the hottest ticket in town. They were wildly popular.
0:54:00 > 0:54:04People would queue up overnight. The place would be mobbed.
0:54:04 > 0:54:06It was like Lady Gaga coming to town.
0:54:06 > 0:54:13His tour of America was quite strenuous and energetic,
0:54:13 > 0:54:15and really fatigued him. He was quite ill.
0:54:15 > 0:54:19But Dickens couldn't help but throw himself into it,
0:54:19 > 0:54:21physically and mentally.
0:54:21 > 0:54:23Many say that in particular,
0:54:23 > 0:54:27it was his performance of the reading of the Sykes and Nancy scene
0:54:27 > 0:54:29that in the end killed him.
0:54:39 > 0:54:45'In June 1870, Dickens suffered a stroke, and died at home.
0:54:45 > 0:54:51'He was 58, and he was halfway through writing a new novel.
0:54:51 > 0:54:54'It was a small, unremarkable ending
0:54:54 > 0:55:00'for a writer that had lived such a large, remarkable life.
0:55:00 > 0:55:05'But then Dickens never was very comfortable with endings.'
0:55:10 > 0:55:14'David Copperfield finishes with a whole host of characters, including Mr Micawber,
0:55:14 > 0:55:18'sailing off to Australia to start a new life.'
0:55:22 > 0:55:26'And they succeed. Micawber grows prosperous,
0:55:26 > 0:55:30'while at home, David marries again and lives happily ever after.'
0:55:32 > 0:55:37'But this ending doesn't feel so happy when we shut the book.'
0:55:41 > 0:55:47For me, Dickens's endings are disappointing.
0:55:47 > 0:55:50I know I'm going to be hauled over the coals
0:55:50 > 0:55:53by militant Dickensian Taliban for saying that,
0:55:53 > 0:55:57but I feel that Dickens hated finishing his novels
0:55:57 > 0:56:00and his heart wasn't in it.
0:56:00 > 0:56:04It's when his characters are restless and struggling
0:56:04 > 0:56:07and energetic that they're at their most animated,
0:56:07 > 0:56:10and it's when they become static that something goes out of them.
0:56:10 > 0:56:14For Dickens, I think a happy ending is dull.
0:56:14 > 0:56:18It's how people struggle to try and attain a happy ending
0:56:18 > 0:56:20that's much, much more interesting.
0:56:27 > 0:56:32'It's over 170 years since Dickens published his first novel,
0:56:32 > 0:56:37'and readers still find his work surprisingly fresh.'
0:56:39 > 0:56:42The thing about Dickens is, it stands up so well.
0:56:42 > 0:56:45A lot of the humour is entirely modern.
0:56:45 > 0:56:46It is gripping.
0:56:46 > 0:56:51He has great plots. He has the most incredible characterisation,
0:56:51 > 0:56:54but always with a sort of psychological basis.
0:56:54 > 0:56:58Whoever he writes about, even if it's a sort of loathsome character
0:56:58 > 0:57:00they're human beings. He takes them warts and all.
0:57:00 > 0:57:03It's like that moment in a song when you go "Oh, yeah."
0:57:03 > 0:57:05You hear a song and go, "Oh, that's how I feel."
0:57:13 > 0:57:15I said at the start of this programme
0:57:15 > 0:57:18that I thought each Dickens novel
0:57:18 > 0:57:21feels like a continuation of the rest.
0:57:21 > 0:57:24Each novel gives you a unique vision of the world
0:57:24 > 0:57:26that's curiously like your own,
0:57:26 > 0:57:31and yet strangely magnified and distorted, and as a result,
0:57:31 > 0:57:34Dickens makes you read the characters around you completely afresh.
0:57:34 > 0:57:38He forces you to gaze much more intently
0:57:38 > 0:57:41at your physical surroundings and inside,
0:57:41 > 0:57:48looking at the state of your own mental and emotional condition.
0:57:48 > 0:57:51That's why Dickens's work is, for me,
0:57:51 > 0:57:55still the greatest example in the English language
0:57:55 > 0:57:59of a mind trying to engage comically and yet honestly
0:57:59 > 0:58:03with what it means to be human.
0:58:03 > 0:58:04And that's why, also,
0:58:04 > 0:58:09I think the best reaction to reading a Dickens for the very first time
0:58:09 > 0:58:11is to do what quite a lot of people do
0:58:11 > 0:58:14when they read a Dickens for the very first time,
0:58:14 > 0:58:18which is to pick up a new one and start reading that straight away.
0:58:54 > 0:58:57Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:58:57 > 0:59:00E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk