PP, Chp. 01-02

[Tristram]

I completely agree, Jean: Modern medicine is one of the things that make me be grateful for living now, however romantic the appeal of Victorian society - especially the idea of living like Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, which I find a very stylish kind of life - may be. Had it not been for modern medicine, I would no longer be among the living, and neither would my two children. I would have died of an appendicitis, and both of my kids from fever. Coming to think of it, half of the people I know would be dead by now if we were contemporaries of the 19th century.

[Everyman]

Tristram wrote: "Had it not been for modern medicine, I would no longer be among the living, and neither would my two children."

Nor would I. The modern medical treatment of my current condition has been brutal, but it has also been all that has kept me alive so far.

[Mary Lou]

We're so glad to have you both still here with us!

[Kim]

Mary Lou wrote: "We're so glad to have you both still here with us!"

I agree. Most of the time.

[Everyman]

Kim wrote: "Mary Lou wrote: "We're so glad to have you both still here with us!"

I agree. Most of the time."

Grump.

[Kim]

Dedication of the Original Edition.

TO

MR. SERJEANT TALFOURD, M.P.,

ETC., ETC.

MY DEAR SIR,

If I had not enjoyed the happiness of your private friendship, I should still have dedicated this work to you, as a slight and most inadequate acknowledgment of the inestimable services you are rendering to the literature of your country, and of the lasting benefits you will confer upon the authors of this and succeeding generations, by securing to them and their descendants a permanent interest in the copyright of their works. Many a fevered head and palsied hand will gather new vigour in the hour of sickness and distress from your excellent exertions ; many a widowed mother and orphan child, who would otherwise reap nothing from the fame of departed genius but its too frequent legacy of poverty and suffering, will bear, in their altered condition, higher testimony to the value of your labours than the most lavish encomiums from lip or pen could ever afford.

Beside such tributes, any avowal of feeling from me, on the
question to which you have devoted the combined advantages
of your eloquence, character, and genius, would be powerless indeed.
Nevertheless, in thus publicly expressing my deep and grateful
sense of your efforts in behalf of English literature, and of those
who devote themselves to the most precarious of all pursuits, I
do but imperfect justice to my own strong feelings on the subject,
if I do no service to you.

These few sentences would have comprised all I should have
had to say, if I had only known you in your public character. On
the score of private feeling, let me add one word more.

Accept the dedication of this book, my dear Sir, as a mark of
my warmest regard and esteem as a memorial of the most
gratifying friendship I have ever contracted, and of some of
the pleasantest hours I have ever spent as a token of my fervent
admiration of every fine quality of your head and heart as an
assurance of the truth and sincerity with which I shall ever be,

MY DEAR SIR,

Most faithfully and sincerely yours,

CHARLES DICKENS.

48, DOUGHTY STREET,

September 27, 1837.

I needed to know who this person was:

Sir Thomas Noon Talfourd SL (26 May 1795 – 13 March 1854) was an English judge, politician and author. At the general election in 1835 he was elected MP for the Parliamentary Borough of Reading, a result repeated in the general election of 1837. He chose not to run in the general election of 1841, but stood again in the general election of 1847 and was elected. In the House of Commons Talfourd introduced a copyright Bill in 1837, but the dissolution of Parliament in 1837 following the death of William IV meant that it had to be reintroduced in the new Parliament in 1838. By that time, the bill met with strong opposition. Talfourd re-introduced it again in 1839, 1840 and 1841. It finally became law in 1842, albeit in modified form, and at a time when Talfourd was not in Parliament. Charles Dickens dedicated The Pickwick Papers to Talfourd.

In his early years in London Talfourd was dependent in great measure on his literary contributions. He was then on the staff of the London Magazine, and was an occasional contributor to the Edinburgh Review and Quarterly Review, the New Monthly Magazine, and other periodicals; on joining the Oxford circuit, he acted as law reporter to The Times. His legal writings on literary matters are excellent expositions, animated by a lucid and telling, if not highly polished, style. Among the best of these are his article On the Principle of Advocacy in the Practice of the Bar (in the Law Magazine, January 1846); his Proposed New Law of Copyright of the Highest Importance to Authors (1838); Three Speeches delivered in the House of Commons in Favor of an Extension of Copyright (1840); and Speech for the Defendant in the Prosecution, the Queen v. Moxon, for the Publication of Shelley's Poetical Works (1841), a celebrated defense of Edward Moxon.

Talfourd's tragedy Ion was privately printed in 1835 and produced the following year at Covent Garden theatre. It was also well received in America, and was revived at Sadler's Wells Theatre in December 1861. This dramatic poem turns on the voluntary sacrifice of Ion, king of Argos, in response to the Delphic oracle, which had declared that only with the extinction of the reigning family could the prevailing pestilence incurred by the deeds of that family be removed.

Two years later, at the Haymarket Theatre, The Athenian Captive was acted with moderate success. In 1839 Glencoe, or the Fate of the Macdonalds, was privately printed, and in 1840 it was produced at the Haymarket. The Castilian (1853) did not excite much interest.

Talfourd died in 1854 in Stafford, after an apoplectic seizure in court while addressing the jury from his judge's seat at the town's Shire Hall, where he is commemorated by a bust, sculpted by John Graham Lough.

Dickens was amongst the mourners at his funeral at West Norwood Cemetery.

[Kim]

Preface to the Original Edition.
PREFACE.

THE author's object in this work, was to place before the reader a constant succession of characters and incidents ; to paint them in as vivid colours as he could command ; and to render them, at the same time, life-like and amusing.

Deferring to the judgment of others in the outset of the undertaking, he adopted the machinery of the club, which was suggested as that best adapted to his purpose : but, finding that it tended rather to his embarrassment than otherwise, he gradually abandoned it, considering it a matter of very little importance to the work whether strictly epic justice were awarded to the club, or not.

The publication of the book in monthly numbers, containing only thirty-two pages in each, rendered it an object of paramount importance that, while the different incidents were linked together by a chain of interest strong enough to prevent their appearing unconnected or impossible, the general design should be so simple as to sustain no injury from this detached and desultory form of publication, extending over no fewer than twenty months. In short, it was necessary or it appeared so to the author that every number should be, to a certain extent, complete in itself, and yet that the whole twenty numbers, when collected, should form one tolerably harmonious whole, each leading to the other by a gentle and not unnatural progress of adventure.

It is obvious that in a work published with a view to such considerations, no artfully interwoven or ingeniously complicated plot can with reason be expected. The author ventures to express a hope that he has successfully surmounted the difficulties of his undertaking. And if it be objected to the Pickwick Papers, that they are a mere series of adventures, in which the scenes are ever changing, and the characters come and go like the men and women we encounter in the real world, he can only content himself with the reflection, that they claim to be nothing else, and that the same objection has been made to the works of some of the greatest novelists in the English language.

The following pages have been written from time to time, almost as the periodical occasion arose. Having been written for the most part in the society of a very dear young friend who is now no more, they are connected in the author's mind at once with the happiest period of his life, and with its saddest and most severe affliction.

It is due to the gentleman, whose designs accompany the letter-press, to state that the interval has been so short between the production of each number in manuscript and its appearance in print, that the greater portion of the Illustrations have been executed by the artist from the author's mere verbal description of what he intended to write.

The almost unexampled kindness and favor with which these papers have been received by the public will be a never-failing source of gratifying and pleasant recollection while their author lives. He trusts that, throughout this book, no incident or expression occurs which could call a blush into the most delicate cheek, or wound the feelings of the most sensitive person. If any of his imperfect descriptions, while they afford amusement in the perusal, should induce only one reader to think better of his fellow men, and to look upon the brighter and more kindly side of human nature, he would indeed be proud and happy to have led to such a result.

[Kim]

PREFACE to the Cheap Edition of 1847

AN author who has much to communicate under this head, and expects to have it attended to, may be compared to a man who takes his friend by the button at a Theatre Door and seeks to entertain him with a personal gossip before he goes in to the play.

Nevertheless, as Prefaces, though seldom read, are continually written, no doubt for the behoof of that so richly and so disin- terestedly endowed personage, Posterity (who will come into an immense fortune), I add my legacy to the general remembrance ; the rather as ten years have elapsed since the Pickwick Papers appeared in a completed form, and nearly twelve since the first monthly part was published.

It was observed, in the Preface to the original Edition, that they were designed for the introduction of diverting characters and incidents ; that no ingenuity of plot was attempted, or even at that time considered very feasible by the author in connection with the desultory mode of publication adopted ; and that the machinery of the Club, proving cumbrous in the management, was gradually abandoned as the work progressed. Although, on one of these points, experience and study have since taught me something, and I could perhaps wish now that these chapters were strung together on a stronger thread of general interest, still, what they are they were designed to be.

In the course of the last dozen years, I have seen various accounts of the origin of these Pickwick Papers ; which have, at all events, possessed for me the charm of perfect novelty. As I may infer, from the occasional appearance of such histories, that my readers have an interest in the matter, I will relate how they came into existence.

I was a young man of three-and-twenty, when the present publishers, attracted by some pieces I was at that time writing in Morning' Chronicle newspaper of which one series had lately been collected and published in two volumes, illustrated by my esteemed friend MR. GEORGE CRUIKSHANK, waited upon me to propose a something that should be published in shilling numbers then only known to me, or I believe, to anybody else, by a dim recollection of certain interminable novels in that form, which used, some five-and-twenty years ago, to be carried about the country by pedlars, and over some of which I remember to have shed innumerable tears, before I served my apprenticeship to Life.

When I opened my door in Furnival's Inn to the partner who represented the firm, I recognised in him the person from whose hands I had bought, two or three years previously, and whom I had never seen before or since, my first copy of the Magazine in which my first effusion, 1 dropped stealthily one evening at twilight, with fear and trembling, into a dark letter-box, in a dark office, up a dark court in Fleet Street appeared in all the glory of print ; on which occasion by-the- bye how well I recollect it ! I walked down to Westminster Hall, and turned into it for half-an-hour, because my eyes were so dimmed with joy and pride, that they could not bear the street, and were not fit to be seen there. I told my visitor of the coincidence, which we both hailed as a good omen ; and so fell to business.

The idea propounded to me was that the monthly something should be a vehicle for certain plates to be executed by MR. SEYMOUR, and there was a notion, either on the part of that admirable humourous artist, or of my visitor (I forget which), that a " NlMROD Club," the members of which were to go out shooting, fishing, and so forth, and getting themselves into difficulties through their want of dexterity, would be the best means of introducing these. I objected, on consideration, that although born and partly bred in the country, I was no great sportsman, except in regard of all kinds of locomotion ; that the idea was not novel, and had been already much used ; that it would be infinitely better for the plates to arise naturally out of the text ; and that I should like to take my own way, with a freer range of English scenes and people, and was afraid I should ultimately do so in any case, whatever course I might prescribe to myself at starting. My views being deferred to, I thought of Mr. Pickwick, and wrote the first number ; from the proof sheets of which, MR. SEYMOUR made his drawing of the Club, and that happy portrait of its founder, by which he is always recognized, and which may be said to have made him a reality. I connected Mr. Pickwick with a Club, because of the original suggestion, and I put in Mr. Winkle expressly for the use of MR. SEYMOUR. We started with a number of twenty-four pages instead of thirty-two, and four illustrations in lieu of a couple. MR. SEYMOUR'S sudden and lamented death before the second number was published, brought about a quick decision upon a point already in agitation ; the number became one of thirty-two pages with two illustrations, and remained so to the end.

It is with great unwillingness that I notice some intangible and incoherent assertions which have been made, professedly on behalf of MR. SEYMOUR, to the effect that he had some share in the invention of this book, or of anything in it, not faith- fully described in the foregoing paragraph. With the moderation that is due equally to my respect for the memory of a brother artist, and to my self-respect, I confine myself to placing on record here the facts :

That, MR. SEYMOUR never originated or suggested an incident, a phrase, or a word, to be found in this book. That, MR. SEYMOUR died when only twenty-four pages of this book were published, and when assuredly not forty-eight were written. That, I believe I never saw MR. SEYMOUR'S hand-writing in my life. That, I never saw MR. SEYMOUR but once in my life, and that was on the night but one before his death, when he certainly offered no suggestion whatsoever. That, I saw him then in the presence of two persons, both living, perfectly acquainted with all these facts, and whose written testimony to them possess. Lastly, that MR. EDWARD CHAPMAN (the survivor of the original firm of CHAPMAN and HALL) has set down in writing, for similar preservation, his personal knowledge of the origin and progress of this book, of the monstrosity of the baseless assertions in question, and (tested by details) even of the self-evident impossibility of there being any truth in them. In the exercise of the forbearance on which I have resolved, I do not quote MR. EDWARD CHAPMAN'S account of his deceased partner's reception, on a certain occasion, of the pretences in question. My friends told me it was a low, cheap form of publication by which I should ruin all my rising hopes, and how right my friends turned out to be, everybody now knows.

" Boz," my signature in the Morning Chronicle appended to the monthly cover of this book, and retained long afterwards, was the nick-name of a pet child, a younger brother, whom I had dubbed Moses, in honour of the Vicar of Wakefield ; which, being facetiously pronounced through the nose, became Boses, and being shortened, became Boz. "Boz" was a very familiar household word to me, long before I was an author, and so I came to adopt it.

It has been observed of Mr. Pickwick, that there is a decided change in his character, as these pages proceed, and that he becomes more good and more sensible. I do not think this change will appear forced or unnatural to my readers, if they will reflect that in real life the peculiarities and oddities of a man who has anything whimsical about him, generally impress us first, and that it is not until we are better acquainted with him that we usually begin to look below these superficial traits, and to know the better part of him.

Lest there should be any well-intentioned persons who do not perceive the difference (as some such could not when OLD MORTALITY was newly published) between religion and the cant of religion, piety and the pretence of piety, or humble reverence for the great truths of Scripture and an audacious and offensive obtrusion of its letter and not its spirit in the commonest dissen-sions and meanest affairs of life, to the extraordinary confusion of ignorant minds, let them understand that it is always the latter, and never the former, which is satirized here. Further, that the latter is here satirized as being, according to all experience, inconsistent with the former, impossible of union with it, and one of the most evil and mischievous falsehoods existent in society whether it establish its head-quarters, for the time being, in Exeter Hall, or Ebenezer Chapel, or both. It may appear unnecessary to offer a word of observation on so plain a head. But it is never out of season to protest against that coarse familiarity with sacred things which is busy on the lip, and idle in the heart ; or against the confounding of Christianity with any class of persons who, in the words of SWIFT, have just enough religion to make them hate, and not enough to make them love, one another.

I have found it curious and interesting, looking over the sheets of this reprint, to mark what important social improvements have taken place about us, almost imperceptibly, since they were originally written. The license of Counsel, and the degree to which Juries are ingeniously bewildered, are yet susceptible of moderation ; while an improvement in the mode of conducting


It has been observed of Mr. Pickwick, that there is a decided change in his character, as these pages proceed, and that he becomes more good and more sensible. I do not think this change will appear forced or unnatural to my readers, if they will reflect Parliamentary Elections (especially for Counties) is still within the bounds of possibility. But legal reforms have pared the claws of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg ; a spirit of self-respect, mutual forbearance, education, and co-operation, for such good ends, has diffused itself among their clerks ; places far apart are brought together, to the present convenience and advantage of the Public, and to the certain destruction, in time, of a host of petty jealousies, blindnesses, and prejudices, by which the Public alone have always been the sufferers ; the laws relating to imprisonment for debt are altered ; and the Fleet Prison is pulled down !

With such a retrospect, extending through so short a period, I shall cherish the hope that every volume of this Edition will afford me an opportunity of recording the extermination of some wrong or abuse set forth in it. Who knows, but by the time the series reaches its conclusion, it may be discovered that there are even magistrates in town and country, who should be taught to shake hands every day with Common-sense and Justice ; that even Poor Laws may have mercy on the weak, the aged, and unfortunate ; that Schools, on the broad principles of Christianity, are the best adornment for the length and breadth of this civilised land ; that prison-doors should be barred on the outside, no less heavily, and carefully than they are barred within ; that the universal diffusion of common means of decency and health is as much the right of the poorest of the poor, as it is indispensable to the safety of the rich, and of the State ; that a few petty boards and bodies less than drops in the great ocean of humanity, which roars around them are not to let loose Fever and Consumption on God's creatures at their will, or always to keep their little fiddles going for a Dance of Death!

And that Cheap Literature is not behind-hand with the Age, but holds its place, and strives to do its duty, I trust the series in itself may help much worthy company to show.

Sept. 1847 London

[Bionic Jean]

Thanks very much for putting this here in full, Kim. The entire situation makes me very sad.

[Kim]

May 1836.

POSTSCRIPT FROM THE EDITOR.

ALWAYS anxious to amuse our readers by every means in our power, we beg to present them with the following verbatim copy of a letter actually addressed and sent by an anonymous correspondent to the Editor of the Pickwick Papers, a fortnight since.

Our correspondent's notions of punctuation are peculiar to himself, and we have not ventured to interfere with them.


"SIR

"In times when the great, and the good are. largely associating for. the amelioration of the Animal Kingdom, it seems remarkable, that any writer should, counteract their, intentions, by. such careless paragraphs as. the one. I. inclose ! if it is carelessness, only, it may be corrected if it is. bad taste. I am afraid it. will be more difficult, but perhaps you could, in another paper, point out, to the obtuse, like myself, the wit or humour, of depicting, the noblest of animals faint, weary, and over driven,

' When the Knees quiver and the Pulses beat.'

Subjected to a. Brute ; only to be. tolerated because he at. least is ignorant, of. the Creature and his Creator, to whom he is responsible, and whose. ' admirable frolic and fun ' consists in giving, his brutal history of his horse, in bad English ! ! "

And then follows an extract from a newspaper, containing the Cabman's description of his Horse, from page 6 of our first number.

This is evidently a very pleasant person a fellow of infinite fancy. We shall be happy to receive other communications from the same source and on the same terms, that is to say, post paid.

NOTE. This address and postscript were issued with the third Part.

[Tristram]

Thanks for supplying all this background information, Kim! As to Mr. Pickwick's change towards becoming more good and sensible, I suggest that we should keep this in mind as one of the topics for a summary discussion of the novel.

[Suki]

I'm starting this very late! I had first picked up the book in early January as I was struggling through the 'flu, and the first sentence/paragraph nearly did me in!

I joined the club because, although I have read many of the classics, I always seemed to skip over Dickens. I am familiar with the general storyline of most of his works, but I want to read them all properly at least once. I am glad to be going through his works in the order in which they were written, with you all. The posts on this thread are absolutely amazing, with all the background information and Kim's wonderful art posts.

Once I made it past the first few opening sentences, I started to really enjoy the book. I found the gap between the self-image that Mr Pickwick and his traveling companions have of themselves as sophisticated men of the world and the reality of their extreme naïveté to be very funny, but also rather worrying as I am developing a certain fondness for them, and at this point it seems that they really shouldn't be let out alone!

Although I have never read PP before, I have often seen them mentioned in other literature of the time-- sometimes they are spoken of quite fondly, but quite a few of the proper, God-fearing lady characters revile them as crass, boorish, and not at all suitable for young people, young ladies in particular. Maybe it's all that brandy!

[Tristram]

Don't worry, Suki, we are reading at a very slow pace and therefore we will not have finished the book before the middle of May. Time enough for you to catch up. It's nice to hear that you worry about Mr. Pickwick and his friends being left to their own devices in the real world outside but you may be comforted to hear that they'll soon find a faithful servant who knows enough of the ways of the world to fend off the worst. Saying that, however, our Pickwickians do tend to find themselves in very strange predicaments all the same. And it's all for us to enjoy!

[Mary Lou]

Suki wrote: "I have often seen them mentioned in other literature of the time..."

We've talked about Elizabeth Gaskell's reference to Pickwick; Cranford is on my to-read list, but knowing that its characters are Pickwick fans makes me want to move it up on the list while their adventures are still fresh in my mind.

I'm glad you're feeling better and were able to conquer that first chapter of meeting minutes. Every time I read it, it makes me wonder how anyone (or maybe just me) got past it to the rest of the book!

[Bionic Jean]

It would be interesting to know how many issues of the second installment were sold, compare with the first. After all, at the time Dickens was only a young man, and not nearly as popular and well-known; the attraction lay in Robert Seymour's engravings.

Did the public of the time feel jaded too, or was their taste very different, I wonder.

[Suki]

Mary Lou wrote: "Suki wrote: "I have often seen them mentioned in other literature of the time..."

We've talked about Elizabeth Gaskell's reference to Pickwick; Cranford is on my to-read list, but knowing that its..."

One of the characters in Cranford is a big Pickwick fan; some of the "proper" spinsters are quite scandalized by this. :)

Cranford is a lovely, gentle book. I think you would like it.

[Peter]

Hi Suki

Anytime is a good time to read Pickwick and I hope you are feeling better and now enjoying the Pickwickian romps. Please join in. Next up is Oliver Twist.

The more Canadians that join the Curiosities the better. Hello from Victoria.

[Suki]

Peter wrote: "Hi Suki

Anytime is a good time to read Pickwick and I hope you are feeling better and now enjoying the Pickwickian romps. Please join in. Next up is Oliver Twist.

The more Canadians that join the..."

Hi Peter!

I am carrying on with Pickwick, and finding parts very funny.

Oliver Twist is one of the Dickens I have already read, but would like to read again. I thought it would be horribly gloomy and depressing, but it was much more light-hearted than I expected.

[Mary Lou]

Suki wrote: "Cranford is a lovely, gentle book. I think you would like it. ..."

This is a perfect description of what I'm looking for more and more these days. Real life has enough excitement! Cranford has just moved much closer to the top of my reading list!

[Peter]

Mary Lou wrote: "Suki wrote: "Cranford is a lovely, gentle book. I think you would like it. ..."

This is a perfect description of what I'm looking for more and more these days. Real life has enough excitement! Cra..."

Mary Lou

I think you would really enjoy Cranford. “Gentle” is a perfect word for it.

[Tristram]

I have never read Cranford yet but really loved Silvia's Lovers. I had some problems with Mary Barton, though, but on the whole up to now, Mrs. Gaskell has never disappointed me.

[Julie]

I haven't read enough Gaskell. I'll have to add Cranford to my list too.