Voorjaar 2005 no. 52
The Dutch Dickensian Volume XXV
Frequented by Charles Dickins - one of the
oldest pubs in Gorleston-on-Sea.
Recently Refurbished
Good Food
42" Plasma Screens
Sky Sports
Latest music
A great atmosphere
Het oude Yarmouth waar ik hier een kaart van
heb geplaatst leek in niets op het in omvang
ontplofte toeristenoord van nu. Helaas valt er in
de stad voor de hedendaagse Dickensian niet veel
te ontdekken. Tweede wereldoorlog (At 74
Middlegate, known in Dickens' time as Gaol Street,
stood the original of the shop of Mr Ormer, draper
and funeral furnisher, where Emily worked. It was
destroyed by bombing during the Second World
War) en de moderne tijd hebben hun tol geëist.
Bulldozers hebben dat wat mogelijk Dickens heeft
geïnspireerd van de aardbodem doen verdwijnen.
Hooguit het stratenplan kan nog enige
aanwijzingen geven, maar dat is volgens mij alleen
iets voor de echte Dickens purist.
Als laatste punt van aandacht nog het boot-huis
van Daniel Peggotty, dat volgens de beschrijving
op de open Denes vlakbij het monument van
Nelson moest staan heeft ook nog enkele
onderzoekers bezig gehouden. Natuurlijk heeft
men eerst in Yarmouth gekeken, en ook het wat
zuidelijker in Suffolk gelegen
Lowstoft doet een gooi naar de
originele omgekeerde woonboot.
(Descriptions of people living in
upturned boats in that novel, were
based on what Dickens saw during a
visit to the Lowestoft Beach Village).
Het meest waarschijnlijke is toch
dat Dickens de werkelijkheid heeft
gezien in de monding van de
Thames Michael and Mollie
Hardwick) en het vervolgens zoals
hij vaker deed op literaire wijze
verplaatst.
The original ofPeggotty's hut has
been the subject of much inconclusive speculation.
Bately states that at the foot of Nelson's Monument
in the mid-nineteenth century stood a rough shed
left by the builders in 1815. There Dickens met the
custodian of the monument James Sharman who
had lived in it with his family (Sharman had earlier
been involved in a daring rescue, which some have
conjectured was the original of Ham Peggotty's
attempt to save Steerforth, in which both perished).
Sharman had enlarged and improved it chiefly with
wreckage, until it looked half-shed, half-ship, with
an iron chimney funnel. Bately considered it the
original, but admits that Dickens never saw it, as it
was pulled down in 1845. Another suggested
original was a kind of shanty in Camden Road
looking more like the bottom boards of a boat. It
was demolished in 1889.
A third suggestion concerned the Gravesend and
Higham canal consisting of an inverted fishing boat
or navy cutter on low brick walls, 30ft x 7&fracl2ft.
Dickens is known to have been in the vicinity in
1836 and 1841. Numerous similar examples,
however, no doubt existed in the past and Dickens
may have seen any of these. An interesting fact is
that as described in David Copperfield, the hut is a
real boat resting on it's keel, but Phiz, the first
illustrator places it upside down, and Dickens
appears to have accepted this, (website Great-
Yarmouth)
Although Mr. Tuggs, in 'The Tuggses at Ramsgate',
considered Gravesend "too low for a family holiday",
Dickens was sufficiently impressed with Waites's
Hotel on the waterfront to hold his birthday dinners
therefor several years. Later known as the
'Commercial Hotel', it was demolished around 1930.
The old cottage with an upturned boat for a roof
built on the banks of the Thames and Medway canal
could well have been the model for Mr. Peggotty's
Great Yarmouth home in 'David Copperfield' (1849-
50). It was demolished in 1942.)
1 3
