LITM65: THE GLOBAL CITY
SKETCHES BY BOZ
SLIDE 2: Title
Boz = pseudonym of Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870), wrote a series of sketches for London papers
published in book form in 1836.
Dickens took the pseudonym from a nickname he had given his younger brother Augustus, whom he
called "Moses" after a character in Oliver Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield. This, "being facetiously
pronounced through the nose," became "Boses", which in turn was shortened to "Boz".
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SLIDE 4: Dickens as Londoner
Born in Portsmouth, most famous chronicler of London:
‘By accident he was not born a Londoner, but his life in London began while he was yet a child’.
George Gissing
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SLIDE 6: Blacking Factory
At 12, Dickens’s father imprisoned for debt. Dickens worked in a bottle-blacking factory – marked
him for life; [see David Copperfield (1850)].
Gave him a deep, life-long empathy with the poor and oppressed:
The deep remembrance of the sense I had of being utterly neglected
and hopeless; of the shame I felt in my position; of the misery it was to
my young heart to believe that, day by day, what I had learned, and
thought, and delighted in, and raised my fancy and my emulation up
by, was passing away from me, never to be brought back any more,
cannot be written. My whole nature was so penetrated with the grief
and humiliation of such considerations, that even now, famous and
caressed and happy, I often forget in my dreams that I have a dear
wife and children; even that I am a man; and wander desolately back
to that time of my life.
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John Forster, The Life of Charles Dickens Bk I, Ch. 2)
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SLIDE 8: Journalism
Studies short-hand, became a House of Commons reporter, 1833-5.
The origins of Dickens's literary career can be traced to his early employment as a journalist. This
work took him first to the Law Courts, including the Court of Chancery, and then to Parliament.
His contempt for these institutions, seen most powerfully in Bleak House (1853) but reappearing
consistently throughout his work, is based on the first-hand knowledge of them that he gained at the
outset of his career.
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SLIDE 10: Origin of Sketches by Boz
From reporting Dickens moved on to descriptive journalism of a more imaginative kind.
Between 1834 to 1835 he wrote a series of sketches which appeared first in the Monthly
Magazine and then in the Evening Chronicle.
Some of these, together with some additional sketches written for the occasion, were collected and
published in two illustrated volumes under the title Sketches by Boz in February 1836.
His biographer Forster remarks that
'The Sketches were more talked about than the first two or three numbers of Pickwick'
(Bk I p. 5)
Dickens was just 24 years of age.
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SLIDE 12: Novelist
At 25, Dickens became a famous novelist with the success of Pickwick Papers.
The Pickwick Papers, also known as The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, was published by
Chapman & Hall in monthly installments from March of 1836 until November 1837.
The book became Britain's first real publishing phenomenon, with bootleg copies,
theatrical performances, Sam Weller joke books, and other merchandise.
Wrote novels, stories, plays. Journalism, travel books (American Notes)
Edited weekly magazines (e.g. Household Words) gave readings, ill-health d. 58 yrs old, 1870
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SLIDE 14: Reception of Sketches by Boz
Acknowledged Influence on writers who depict the city, e.g., Poe –
Boz 1830s
Poe’s city stories 1840s
Not seen by most critics as a serious novelist until after his death.
Boz now little read - not easily available in paperback.
Very popular in its day – introduced readers to areas of London little known or little understood.
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SLIDE 16: Dickens and the City
Urban existence, new way of life. New forms of writing needed, a new sensibility.
Massive growth in London’s population – from Dickens’s birth (1812) to 1836, pop. grew by 65%
Dickens had a life-long passion for walking the city streets were his favourite haunts – regenerated
his creative powers, was a therapeutic outlet for tension at times of concentrated work.
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SLIDE 18: Dickens in Switzerland
When in Switzerland, he missed the city streets:
I can't express how much I want these. For a week or a fortnight I can write prodigiously in a
retired place (as at Broadstairs), and a day in London sets me up again and starts me. But the toll of
writing day after day, without that magic lantern, is IMMENSE! (August 30)
The absence of any accessible streets continues to worry me, now that I have so much to do, in a
most singular manner. It is quite a little mental phenomenon. I should not want them in the day time,
if they were here, I dare say; but at night I want them beyond description. I don't seem to be able to
lose my spectres unless I can lose them in crowds . (September 20)
I am still made uneasy by occasional giddiness and headache: attributable, I have not the least doubt,
to the absence of streets. (September 25)
From Charles Dickens, Letters, 1846
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SLIDE 20: Dickens and the Flâneur
Dickens was familiar with the term ‘flaneur’ – see Baudelaire, Poe, Walter Benjamin.
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In Household Words (1853), Dickens’s magazine, his friend George Sala wrote about the ‘legionary
flaneurs of Paris’ their ‘much sauntered-over boulevards’.
The verb ‘flaner’, defined in the French dictionary Roberts: ‘to walk without haste, aimlessly,
abandoning oneself to the impression and to the spectacle of the moment’.
Linked to the development in Paris of boulevards and arcades, islands of paved, dry thoroughfares
Provided safe conditions for walking in the metropolis.
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SLIDE 22: Dickens and Walking
In London: early 19thc. Developed new streets and the habit of walking – architect John Nash built
Regent St in 1825, named for the Prince Regent (later, George IV) [PP3] and the newly-widened
Strand (just over London bridge, where the Savoy Hotel is) became a place of display for dandies –
Their highly-polished boots on display without fear of mud.
Dickens took walking more seriously – allowed him to have a heightened form of observation
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SLIDE 24: Blake’s Poem
Earlier, William Blake’s famous poem, ‘London’(1794)
I wander through each charter’d street
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow,
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
Being able to ‘read’ the faces, ‘read’ the city, is what we value in Boz – and in Poe next week, where
we will confront the disturbing ‘unreadable’ city.
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