CHARLES DICKENS AT WORK.
An unpretentious volume entitled Charles Dickens has been issued in the ‘World’s Workers’ series (Cassell & Co.), written by the eldest daughter of the great novelist. It is simply and pleasantly compiled, and though it may be read through at a sitting, it gives a good idea as to what manner of man Dickens was, and how he lived, talked, wrote, and spoke. As Forster’s Life of Dickens is beyond the reach of many, this book, which has been specially written for the young, will form a good introduction to his writings, of which there is a complete summary at the end of the volume. It forms an affectionate tribute from a daughter to a father, and, as was to be expected, exhibits the more human side of his character. A sketch of his demeanour in his study, as witnessed by one of his daughters, who had been taken there after an illness, will have the charm of novelty to many people. ‘For a long time there was no sound but the rapid moving of his pen on the paper; then suddenly he jumped up, looked at himself in the glass, rushed back to his desk, then to the glass again, when presently he turned round and faced his daughter, staring at her, but not seeing her, and talking rapidly to himself, then once more back to his desk, where he remained writing until luncheon-time.... It was wonderful to see how completely he threw himself into the character his own imagination had made, his face, indeed his whole body, changing, and he himself being lost entirely in working out his own ideas. Small wonder that his works took so much out of him, for he did literally live in his books while writing them, turning his own creations into living realities, with whom he wept, and with whom he rejoiced.’