The Pickwick Papers - My Charles Dickens #12in12

The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club (1836), Charles Dickens

The Posthumous Papers of thePickwick Club was the fictional publication that really made the name of Charles Dickens famous. After his reasonable success with descriptions and written sketches of London life (Sketches by Boz) in 1833-36, Dickens gained a popular following and the beginnings of a loyal audience thanks to the increasing success of The Pickwick Papers.

His publishers commissioned Dickens to provide the text for a picture novel about unsuccessful, bumbling sportsmen, with the pictures supplied by Robert Seymour. But rather than wait to be given illustrations to describe, Dickens began writing his descriptions before anything had been drawn and so, increasingly through The Pickwick Papers, his words took precedence over the illustrations. Seymour, who had originally proposed the idea of a series of illustrations of city-dwellers inexpertly hunting etc., shot himself before the second instalment's publication – though that probably wasn't just down to Dickens's increasing level of artistic control.

The collection of illustrations and story-captions detailing the exploits of the Pickwick Club eventually attracted a wide readership – and it's easy to see why. While not quite the soap opera of its day, The Pickwick Papers is a running light comedy, with each instalment dropping its increasingly familiar (dare I say predictable?) characters into fresh situations full of potential mishaps and fumbles.

Handily, the members of the Pickwick Club take copious notes of their bungled adventures and the mishaps they endure. A few select members, who seem to have unlimited reserves of money and free time, set out with Pickwick to discover curious things about England, people and life in general. The exception is Pickwick's manservant, Sam Weller, credited with much of the book's popular success – in part, no doubt, due to his down-to-earth worldliness, as compared with Pickwick's utter cluelessness. Think Jeeves and Wooster, but with a cockney Stephen Fry who doesn't have that smug, quietly superior face.

The Pickwick narrator's style is either naïve or sly, often telling us one thing and probably meaning quite another. Much of the comedy of the book lies in the discrepancy between, on one hand, the narrator's interpretation of the notes taken by the Pickwickians, and on the other hand, the likely reality of the situation. For example, while staying in the house of a regional newspaper editor, Pott, who spends the evening reading his editorials to Pickwick, Pickwick has his eyes closed in rapturous enjoyment of the prose...or has fallen asleep in boredom. Here is a narrator who, like the world of people he describes, seems to have fallen for the legend of Pickwick's intellect and popularity, interpreting his notes accordingly. In reality, Pickwick is a bumbling, inept man with more money and self-importance than sense.

Dickens' audience may have also fallen for Pickwick's charm, but either way the novel's popularity rose and made Dickens a household name. Not only that, but The Pickwick Papers gave Dickens his first experience of writing weekly instalments of novels – a pattern he followed for years afterward. It's a light read, quicker perhaps than some of Dickens' later work, but no weaker for it. While not so mature or impressive as, say, Bleak House, The Pickwick Papers is a solid debut into long-form fiction.

Everyman at Hull's Holy Trinity Church

There's something about a play's character crying to God for forgiveness that makes me veer between two thoughts. One, the distant 'At least I'll never be like that', the other, a humbler, and perhaps more realistic 'There but for the grace of God go I'. Of course, it's the second of those two that the original performers of this play were after; the audience is supposed to recognise their own fragile state of grace, their own dependence on divine mercy, and to repent sharp-ish before their fate catches up with them.

The title alone should give it away. Everyman. That character crying out to God, to mercy, to charity and to all the things he's held dear through his life? That's Everyman, and he represents, yep, you've guessed it, every one of us (in this production, he's played by three people, including one woman). We are each as guilty as him of the faults he admits by the play's end – it's the usual: greed, lust, anger, gluttony, sloth.

Though we aren't quite complicit in Everyman's sins, we (and I mean the play's immediate audience, rather than mankind as a whole) are drawn into his repentance all the same. He stands barely metres in front of us, asking that he be forgiven, asking who he can turn to, and it's that insistent questioning that raises questions for the audience. Questions like: what would I do if called to give an account to God? Of course, you might not be too worried, if your opinion of an afterlife is that it's non-existent, but just go with it for a minute. There's a value to questioning the balance and account of your life when near its end, even if you don't believe that anyone supernatural's going to check up on you in your grave. Everyman is especially concerned about the balance of Good Deeds in his own account, and finding the book empty (like he does) should be a cause of concern even for a hardened atheist.

Good Deeds (Mondé Sibisi) sleeps until Everyman repents

But Everyman is hardly aimed at atheists; it's aimed at Catholic believers, reminding them that they're going to be checked up on on death, and they'd best keep their house in order. So of course, it makes perfect sense to stage Everyman in the Minster, in God's house; here is the perfection of God, aspire to it, everyone. And the church is perfectly suited to being a performance space – what is the church mass if not an elaborate performance by actors before an audience? - with the acoustics and (mostly natural) lighting to rival many more modern theatres. Religious ceremony is the birthplace of theatre, the elaborate and stylised address to the masses, the faintly poeticised and increasingly stage-y message preached to an audience sitting in hushed rows.

The University of Hull Drama Department's production immerses its audience in Hull's Holy Trinity Church (increasingly being opened up as a venue these days), where the architecture serves to hammer home the message of obedience to the divine will and serves as a reminder of both God's majesty and God's grace. We follow the story through the church on foot, taken to four different stations along Everyman's journey from frail sinner to reconstructed penitent. As Everyman hovers close to death, we walk – fittingly, perhaps, gingerly, certainly – over the graves of past generations, the inscriptions and memorials a fixed and literal reminder of the the transitory nature of human life. Again, the church's architecture reinforcing the message Death has already given to Everyman: Life was but lent thee:/ for as soon as thou art go,/ Another a while shall have it and then go therefro.

Jack Fielding's Everyman is left with no doubt about the message from Death (Johnny Neaves)

The University Drama Department – and specifically Dr Philip Crispin – has produced this living examination of medieval drama, following on from Mankind in 2010. Mankind was declamatory, static (literally and figuratively) and in a theatre. This is a much more immersive, flowing piece. A series of strong individual performances give life to a poetic depiction of human life close to the brink of death – the great unknown, guidance on which can be found in the Bible and, of course, this morality play.

Images thanks to Elizabeth Coombs Photography.

Bleak House - My Charles Dickens #12in12

Bleak House (1852-3), Charles Dickens

Unlike previous entries in the #12in12 Charles Dickens project (The Chimes and Hard Times), March's (delayed) instalment is rather long. This month it's Bleak House, published in twenty monthly issues in 1852 – 1853 – in my defence, it took Dickens much longer to write it than it has taken me to read it.

Bleak House came just before Hard Times in Dickens' writing career, although it feels much more mature – like the achievement of a much more accomplished writer. Perhaps that's because any moral or ethical point Dickens is making with Bleak House is much more subtle than the hammer blows of Hard Times. This makes Bleak House a subtle, complicated and downright imposing book.

The house of the title, Bleak House in St Albans, is a warren of twisty, interconnected corridors, rooms heaped upon one another and obscure little windows. It's a convoluted jumble of a building, presided over by a pair of charmingly selfless characters – John Jarndyce and Esther Summerson – and is the ideal object for Dickens to use as a title. The house itself isn't all that miserable (in fact, it's usually quite pleasant, and the northern house named after it in later chapters is especially pleasant), but it is a perfect reflection of much the book's content.

The twisty corridors of Bleak House, which sounds like the sort of house where someone could easily wander about getting lost and going round in circles, are reflected in the goings-on of the Court of Chancery in London. Until 1875, the Court of Chancery was the part of the British justice system overseen by the Lord Chancellor and, in this case, often concerned not with criminal cases but with cases involving inheritance, commerce and land ownership. Complaints about the slow and drawn-out procedures of the Chancery Court had been common since Tudor times, and Dickens not only lambasts them in his introduction but also provides a mirror for them in not only the structure of the physical Bleak House, but in the structure of the novel Bleak House itself. It isn't without humour, and Dickens clearly takes delight in spinning out descriptions of just how long Chancery takes over resolving the now infamous case of Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce:

'Innumerable children have been born into the cause; innumerable young people have married into it; innumerable old people have died out of it. Scores of persons have deliriously found themselves made party to Jarndyce and Jarndyce without knowing how or why; whole families have inherited legendary hatreds with the suits. The little plaintiff or defendant who was promised a new rocking horse when Jarndyce and Jarndyce should be settled has grown up, possessed himself of a real horse, and trotted away into the other world. Fair wards of court have faded into mothers and grandmothers; a long procession of Chancellors has come in and gone out; the legions of bills in the suit have been transformed into bills of mortality; there are not three Jarndyces left upon the earth perhaps since old Tom Jarndyce in despair blew his brains out at a coffee-house in Chancery Lane; but Jarndyce and Jarndyce drags its dreary length before the court, perennially hopeless.'

Like the physical house, Bleak House the novel has two characters presiding over it: Esther Summerson and an all-knowing, all-seeing narrator. The two of them take it in turns to tell the story and so we see Jarndyce and Jarndyce from the perspective of a ward of the court (apparently orphaned and abandoned Esther) and also from inside the court itself, as well as from wide-ranging perspectives outside – parties to the case and otherwise.

It's this wide-ranging perspective that I really admire about Dickens' writing here, especially in Bleak House. I've said before that his ability to write a striking character is his great strength, and in Bleak House Dickens has excelled himself. There are a great many characters, in a narrative that spans England geographically and socially – from Jo the crossing sweeper to high society's Lady Dedlock – and yet every one of those characters is sharply drawn and memorable. Even with a few words, Dickens creates a loving portrait of some person, and that person can be recognised when they return ten chapters later (as they have a habit of doing with this twisty, jumbled narrative) and appear just as fresh.

There's much more to Bleak House than the Court of Chancery and the social satire Dickens lays in with (Chancery isn't the only thing to be satirised; do-gooding philanthropists so focused on foreign shores they neglect their own offspring also take some flak) – though whether it really needs to be so long is another matter. The middle drags somewhat, and I hope Dickens won't mind me saying that the introduction of a detective late on smacks of an author needing to quickly tie up several lose plot ends with a character deliberately setting out to discover and expose the truth. Even so, the detective, Mr Bucket, must be one of the most finely-characterised plot devices in Western literature.

Like the physical house, the novel Bleak House has a dozen or more little compartments and rooms, all huddled up on top of one another, and connected by twisting corridors; the reader may get lost wandering the house, but Dickens as guide makes sure each room is beautifully decorated and somehow reminds the reader of the route back.

The Breaker of Hearts (ENO Mini-Opera)

The Breaker of Hearts

The Chorus of Sleepers appear, shuffling, shambling, (un)dressed for sleep – sleepwalking. They could be all ages, all races, but they move as one, united in sleep. There is a low hum. When they sing, they are usually divided into either boys and girls, or men and women, depending on their ages.

GIRLS	Here he comes.
BOYS		Here he comes.
GIRLS	Here he comes.
BOYS		Hear his tread on the stair.
GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		Smell his scent in the air.
GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		Feel the twinge of despair.
GIRL	He comes.
BOYS		Know he is near.
GIRLS	Softly-slinky and grimly-gory.
BOYS		Heart-Breaker prowls in the witching hour looking out for joy to devour, never letting new hopes flower and turning every sweet dream sour.
GIRLS	Touting lies and the barely true he swigs a cup of witches' brew, takes a face you thought you knew and turns it into something new.
CHORUS	He comes – the Lurker of Dreams, the Breaker of Hearts. Closer and closer, rising up from Hell; The actor of the Id, he plays many parts and now you must fall for his spell.
GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		He comes.
	Already, this Breaker of Hearts can be seen approaching
CHORUS	He comes. He'll bring your fear to you, it's a gift to you of his; it won't be anything new you know already what it is.
GIRLS	Hear him closer.
BOYS		He comes.
GIRLS	Getting closer.
BOYS		He comes.
GIRLS	Drawing closer.
BOYS		He comes.
CHORUS	Here he comes. He comes to play with your greatest fear; to hurl you from heights or drown you in ice, to scorch you, scald you, burn you. He'll chase you with dogs and with wolves, he'll chase you down flights, you'll get into fights; you'll murder, rape and maim. Here he comes. He'll show you the deaths of those you hold dear, make it your fault, make you feel the blame; it'll scar you, scare you, bleed you. He'll send his creatures to devour you, and takes a care to send your biggest scare - his snakes, his crows or his bugs. Here he comes.
GIRLS	He comes from the depths of deepest Hell.
BOYS			Nearer.
GIRLS	Even the angels fear his tread.
BOYS			And nearer.

CHORUS	He comes with: Legal writs and rich men's Wills, money bags and heart burn pills.
DREAMER 1	In my dream, my son is on trial for treason and starting a fire. I swear he's an innocent boy; and even the judge says I'm a liar.
	The shadowy Breaker of Hearts resembles a distant judge
CHORUS	He'll take your heart and he'll tear it.
DREAMER 1	I fall on my knees to beg for his life, 'He has a child just a few days old, please, won't you show him some mercy?' but the judge's smile is bloody and bold.
CHORUS	He'll take your fears and he'll make them real.
GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		He comes.

CHORUS	He comes with: A dozen corpses, a deathly moan; a childhood terror, now re-grown.
DREAMER 2	In my dream I'm back in the camp, condemned once more to a lifetime of pain, back where the Jew should fear to be. And the Commandant is there again.
	The Breaker of Hearts appears to assume a military aspect
CHORUS	He'll take your memories and he won't spare you.
DREAMER 2	Every night he comes to take me back, back to Dachau where my people burned. Every day I must endure my life To which my people can never return.
CHORUS	There is no escape from the dread of sleep.
GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		He comes.

CHORUS	He comes with: a diagnosis ready-made; his only hope is to get paid.
DREAMER 3	The doctor could have cured my sister. Now I see him every night, leaning over me in my dreams - I can't shake him from my sight.
	The Heart-Breaker now looks faintly medical
CHORUS	He'll take your trust and he'll snap it.
DREAMER 3	The operation was easy but not that cheap and we had no way to pay. Now she's cold and in the ground, and it's too late even to pray.
CHORUS	The Heart-Breaker grinds the bones of hope.

GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		He comes.

CHORUS	He comes with: a cross in his hand, and a rosary, pouring on guilt and misery.
DREAMER 4	Sins and sinner you find here, clutching feebly at a cross. Twenty Hail Marys twice a day, else he says that my soul is lost.
	The Heart-Breaker now bears a striking resemblance to a priest, and looms larger than ever before
CHORUS	He sees your sins, he knows your fears.
DREAMER 4	I've tried to do as I've been taught, but I've fallen into a snare. Well you know, oh my God, women's beauty is not fair.
CHORUS	He'll burn your guilt right into your soul.

GIRLS	He comes.
BOYS		He comes.
GIRLS/BOYS	Touting lies and the barely true he swigs a cup of witches' brew, takes a face you thought you knew and turns it into something new.	Heart-Breaker prowls in the witching hour looking out for joy to devour, never letting new hopes flower and turning every sweet dream sour.
CHORUS	He's come!
	Finally, the Breaker of Hearts comes into focus. The Chorus, in their sleep, are probably terrified of him, though strangely immobile.
HEART-BREAKER	Sleep no more!
	They all scream, briefly, as if awaking from a nightmare.