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Lorna Doone: Dickens

DICKENS NO biographical sketch about Charles Dickens that neglects his interest in acting would be complete. He never saw a play that he did not envy one of the players. Indeed, he almost became an actor instead of a novelist. Before he began reporting, he applied for a position at Covent Garden, and only an illness, a very fortunate illness, prevented his following up this ambition. His love for amateur theatricals gave this passion full play. He played Boabdil, the braggart, so successfully in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humor" that Leigh Hunt thought him superior to professional actors. The drama pleased so many that it was repeated, under Dicken's direction, in the largest theaters in London, Manchester, Liverpool, and other large cities. In appearance Dickens impressed his friends as being under rather than over the average height and weight. His eyes were the first of his features to attract attention. They were bright and piercing, like the eyes of birds in their darting animation. They gave to his face a quality of steellike hardness that Mrs. Carlyle and others noticed.

Most Englishmen of his time preferred being correct to being themselves. They strove to look like every one else. Dickens had in him little of this. He wore velvet coats and waistcoats that were, as Chesterton remarks, "like incredible sunsets." He liked, too, "large hats of an unnecessary and startling whiteness." He wore dressing-gowns in violent colors. If he exaggerated his likes and dislikes, it was because he felt them so strongly.