Before I read any novels by Charles Dickens, one of my most vivid movie memories as a child was watching the classic version of David Copperfield in black and white. A favorite line: "Barkis is willing." Barkis, one of the characters, kept sending a message through David to Clara Peggotty, the maid of David's mother, indicating he was willing to marry Clara. Such a low‐key way of expressing the desire to marry.
In Mrs. Sumpter's English class at Thornridge High School, Dolton, Illinois, I remember the intensity of reading A Tale of Two Cities. Over the years I've enjoyed reading A Christmas Carol, watching many versions of it including A Muppet's Christmas Carol, and giving a speech on it for my Toastmaster's group. When we lived in Pennsylvania, one of our theatrical friends presented an amazing one‐man show of A Christmas Carol in his living room to the delight of friends and neighbors.
Recently my husband and I watched the recent Masterpiece Theatre version of Little Dorrit. Such terrific, three‐dimensional characters—the underdogs you cheer on such as Amy and Arthur, the villains whose world finally crashes down on them, and the ones like Mrs. Clennam who surrender their pride and become truly human even as they take their last breath.
Which novel is your favorite? Bleak House, Our Mutual Friend? When we took a group of Global Studies students from Southwest Minnesota State University to England, we made a pilgrimage to Dicken's home in Portsmouth. From that humble beginning, such a gifted writer, so many stories still being told today almost two hundred years after his birth (1812). I'm sure they're planning all kinds of anniversary celebrations next year in the UK. Since my husband is a Victorian literature specialist, we'll probably have our own celebration—far from Dicken's England on the prairie in Marshall, Minnesota.
In Mrs. Sumpter's English class at Thornridge High School, Dolton, Illinois, I remember the intensity of reading A Tale of Two Cities. Over the years I've enjoyed reading A Christmas Carol, watching many versions of it including A Muppet's Christmas Carol, and giving a speech on it for my Toastmaster's group. When we lived in Pennsylvania, one of our theatrical friends presented an amazing one‐man show of A Christmas Carol in his living room to the delight of friends and neighbors.
Recently my husband and I watched the recent Masterpiece Theatre version of Little Dorrit. Such terrific, three‐dimensional characters—the underdogs you cheer on such as Amy and Arthur, the villains whose world finally crashes down on them, and the ones like Mrs. Clennam who surrender their pride and become truly human even as they take their last breath.
Which novel is your favorite? Bleak House, Our Mutual Friend? When we took a group of Global Studies students from Southwest Minnesota State University to England, we made a pilgrimage to Dicken's home in Portsmouth. From that humble beginning, such a gifted writer, so many stories still being told today almost two hundred years after his birth (1812). I'm sure they're planning all kinds of anniversary celebrations next year in the UK. Since my husband is a Victorian literature specialist, we'll probably have our own celebration—far from Dicken's England on the prairie in Marshall, Minnesota.
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