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The Mystery Of Charles Dickens
In this tour-de-force performance, Simon Callow portrays not only Charles Dickens but also many of his best-loved characters, from Mr Micawber and Bill Sikes to Oliver Twist and even Nancy. Readings from Nicholas Nickleby, David Copperfield and many of his other novels interweave with the author's own words and an incisive, compassionate narrative. An idyllic childhood in Chatham was swapped for his family's penurious existence in London, the city which would later provide the canvas for many of his greatest works. With a father imprisoned for debt, young Charles was deprived of an education and forced to work in a blacking factory. Such experiences moulded this lonely and unusual child into the fiercely industrious and highly ambitious writer who would later claim that his characters talked to and touched him. A fascinating insight into the circumstances how he never quite managed to escape the dark shadows cast by his earlier life.
2 pages, Audio Cassette
First published January 1, 2002
About the author
Peter Ackroyd
184 books1,395 followersPeter Ackroyd CBE is an English novelist and biographer with a particular interest in the history and culture of London.
Peter Ackroyd's mother worked in the personnel department of an engineering firm, his father having left the family home when Ackroyd was a baby. He was reading newspapers by the age of 5 and, at 9, wrote a play about Guy Fawkes. Reputedly, he first realized he was gay at the age of 7.
Ackroyd was educated at St. Benedict's, Ealing and at Clare College, Cambridge, from which he graduated with a double first in English. In 1972, he was a Mellon Fellow at Yale University in the United States. The result of this fellowship was Ackroyd's Notes for a New Culture, written when he was only 22 and eventually published in 1976. The title, a playful echo of T. S. Eliot's Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (1948), was an early indication of Ackroyd's penchant for creatively exploring and reexamining the works of other London-based writers.
Ackroyd's literary career began with poetry, including such works as London Lickpenny (1973) and The Diversions of Purley (1987). He later moved into fiction and has become an acclaimed author, winning the 1998 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for the biography Thomas More and being shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1987.
Ackroyd worked at The Spectator magazine between 1973 and 1977 and became joint managing editor in 1978. In 1982 he published The Great Fire of London, his first novel. This novel deals with one of Ackroyd's great heroes, Charles Dickens, and is a reworking of Little Dorrit. The novel set the stage for the long sequence of novels Ackroyd has produced since, all of which deal in some way with the complex interaction of time and space, and what Ackroyd calls "the spirit of place". It is also the first in a sequence of novels of London, through which he traces the changing, but curiously consistent nature of the city. Often this theme is explored through the city's artists, and especially its writers.
Ackroyd has always shown a great interest in the city of London, and one of his best known works, London: The Biography, is an extensive and thorough discussion of London through the ages.
His fascination with London literary and artistic figures is also displayed in the sequence of biographies he has produced of Ezra Pound (1980), T. S. Eliot (1984), Charles Dickens (1990), William Blake (1995), Thomas More (1998), Chaucer (2004), William Shakespeare (2005), and J. M. W. Turner. The city itself stands astride all these works, as it does in the fiction.
From 2003 to 2005, Ackroyd wrote a six-book non-fiction series (Voyages Through Time), intended for readers as young as eight. This was his first work for children. The critically acclaimed series is an extensive narrative of key periods in world history.
Early in his career, Ackroyd was nominated a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1984 and, as well as producing fiction, biography and other literary works, is also a regular radio and television broadcaster and book critic.
In the New Year's honours list of 2003, Ackroyd was awarded the CBE.
Peter Ackroyd's mother worked in the personnel department of an engineering firm, his father having left the family home when Ackroyd was a baby. He was reading newspapers by the age of 5 and, at 9, wrote a play about Guy Fawkes. Reputedly, he first realized he was gay at the age of 7.
Ackroyd was educated at St. Benedict's, Ealing and at Clare College, Cambridge, from which he graduated with a double first in English. In 1972, he was a Mellon Fellow at Yale University in the United States. The result of this fellowship was Ackroyd's Notes for a New Culture, written when he was only 22 and eventually published in 1976. The title, a playful echo of T. S. Eliot's Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (1948), was an early indication of Ackroyd's penchant for creatively exploring and reexamining the works of other London-based writers.
Ackroyd's literary career began with poetry, including such works as London Lickpenny (1973) and The Diversions of Purley (1987). He later moved into fiction and has become an acclaimed author, winning the 1998 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for the biography Thomas More and being shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1987.
Ackroyd worked at The Spectator magazine between 1973 and 1977 and became joint managing editor in 1978. In 1982 he published The Great Fire of London, his first novel. This novel deals with one of Ackroyd's great heroes, Charles Dickens, and is a reworking of Little Dorrit. The novel set the stage for the long sequence of novels Ackroyd has produced since, all of which deal in some way with the complex interaction of time and space, and what Ackroyd calls "the spirit of place". It is also the first in a sequence of novels of London, through which he traces the changing, but curiously consistent nature of the city. Often this theme is explored through the city's artists, and especially its writers.
Ackroyd has always shown a great interest in the city of London, and one of his best known works, London: The Biography, is an extensive and thorough discussion of London through the ages.
His fascination with London literary and artistic figures is also displayed in the sequence of biographies he has produced of Ezra Pound (1980), T. S. Eliot (1984), Charles Dickens (1990), William Blake (1995), Thomas More (1998), Chaucer (2004), William Shakespeare (2005), and J. M. W. Turner. The city itself stands astride all these works, as it does in the fiction.
From 2003 to 2005, Ackroyd wrote a six-book non-fiction series (Voyages Through Time), intended for readers as young as eight. This was his first work for children. The critically acclaimed series is an extensive narrative of key periods in world history.
Early in his career, Ackroyd was nominated a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1984 and, as well as producing fiction, biography and other literary works, is also a regular radio and television broadcaster and book critic.
In the New Year's honours list of 2003, Ackroyd was awarded the CBE.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
March 6, 2014
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 26, 2019
Excellent "Living biography"performed by Simon Callow and written (collaboratively)by Peter Ackroyd.My thanks for sympathy shown to the longsuffering Mrs Dickens and the superb portrayal of Dickens and many of his storybook characters.Bravo!
January 11, 2010
Simon Callow recounts the writer's remarkable life and brings a host of his colourful characters to life. By Peter Ackroyd.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007jvp1
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007jvp1
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 9, 2013
Excellent performance that really lets you get under Dickens' skin and understand the darkness within the man - that he would express in his great works - Performed by Callow - who has a great affinity for the man behind the work - he takes a much more narrative and biographical approach than in the later Dickens' Women - in a style that is much more narrative - made even stronger by being by one of Dickens' best academic biographers - I came away from this understanding and pitying the man - and loving the works even more than before - if that is at all possible - wonderful !
November 22, 2020
Peter Ackroyd has created a short, powerful biography of Dickens consisting largely of the speeches of Dickens’s characters, and Simon Callow superbly presents it as a one-man show. Bravo!
May 6, 2015
Good companion to Ackroyd’s book and TV program. Wonderfully written and superbly acted.
July 19, 2020
What a dream. A one man play about the life of Charles Dickens, written by Peter Ackroyd in collaboration with Simon Callow and performed by Simon Callow. It tells the story of Dickens' life from beginning to end, including his personal life and literary evolution, largely through the relevant readings from Dickens' fiction but interspersed with some expository connective tissue. Spellbinding from beginning to end, I'll be listening to this again.
January 21, 2021
Short and sweet. Interesting but a tad weird at the same time. It's not a story as such, but a bio with story and characters from his books. A weird combo but as 'art' interesting. Good for Dicken's fans.
January 28, 2023
Admittedly I would listen to the talking clock all day if I thought it was Mr Callow … but it truly was a fabulous performance and a captivating play… I immediately wanted to listen to it all over again… well written by Peter Ackroyd .
November 18, 2018
Informative play, but extraordinarily performed. I can see this running on Broadway or West End.
July 15, 2019
Whistle-stop wonder at Dickens through his work and stumbling upon his life! Gripping and giddying in equal measure...
May 31, 2020
Dickens. Character embodiment. Simon Callow (audiobook).
December 17, 2014
A powerful performance by Simon Callow!
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews