Lente 2006 no. 56
13
The Dutch Dickensian Volume XXVI
generation of the first sociologist, the
Frenchman Auguste Comte, and of the
Rhinelander Karl Marx) and -skipping
everything else- he also mentions one or two
distinctive observables (the-man-with-the-red-
face in the Tale of Two cities, to name one); all,
th
exactly like in 19 century passports. And, thus,
he announces the limited choices of that free
person. But, thirdly, he immediately tells the
reader: which course this new acquaintance of
his has chosen already. Something like: "Let me
introduce to you: Mr. Quilp, a monster".
Such features his persons will keep from the
very beginning to the end, and till the present
day. Strangely enough this superior
achievement is held against Dickens, when
critics call his characters: "flat"; like most of us,
but unlike some students of literature, Dickens
was well aware that people change hardly and
that character-development, at best, represents
a change of environmental conditions.
Now, given this tale-telling-attitude of Dickens,
about clear and stable characters, how did he
accomplish to get these subjects in his tales
alive?
-Admiring-someone does not mean that you
may not try to find out how-the-Dickens he did
it. On the contrary! Admirers must study his
works and learn from the imitable parts.
His creative process seems to me to have
worked somewhat like this:
Dickens continuously experienced sensations of
unusual richness as outcomes of a very special
gift. Because: in his person was maintained the
vivid, physiognomic way of looking around,
present in i-to-2-year old children, living in an
animistic world, where everything has a face,
and figures detach themselves hardly from the
background -and where the background stares
at you.
This keen sensitivity of Charles Dickens's told
him quite clearly -not in children's terminology
any more, but in common terms-, how
observables-of-any-kind existed, and even: how
each individual person was transpired by a
proper soul. And he, in turn, told the people;
and he did so, in very clear terms, as cut in
stone, notwithstanding all those verbose,
rhetorical amplifications -terms so clear that,
decades later, he himself still knew exactly what
he had written. So, I think, his texts must
always, and in detail, be read with emphasis, as
if they ran like: "I, Charles Dickens, do solemnly
declare as I here write with my own hand". If
there is one thing Dickens despised, it is
cowardly vagueness. We must read him aloud,
though it is breathtaking, -also those long
sentences! Many readers did so in Dickens's
days -and we still do so, in our "reading circles".
Now let us also have a look at the road along
which his technique to bring characters to life,
developed.
In order to do that, I must, first, pause to lay
down how I conceive drama, acting, both on the
stage and in a narrative; because we need a
sètting first, before characters can come to life.
The basis of drama, acting, is the
transformation of a situation. Here also belongs
the intrigue, which outlines how the situation is
to be transformed, for instance, how, in Hamlet,
the succession to the throne takes place; how, in
the Giisbrecht. the downfall of Amsterdam takes
place. It is within this transformation, and along
this plotted outline-of-the-intrigue, that we see
people acting. That is: we see them presenting
behavior that illuminates two things: their
success against one simple criterion and their
failure against another. Those are the things the
spectator takes home: success and failure. Let
me give a few examples of what the actors may
be illuminating in the course of the situation-
transformation: they may be: finding a partner-
for-life, by self-denial; they may be: struggling
through all the failures of adolescence, to find a
position; it maybe: a rake's lustful progress,
towards self-destruction; or: chasing after one's
own imaginations, disregarding all bad omens;
or: confronting social disapproval, in order to
do what is just-right; and so on.
Now: In drama there is also something, much
overlooked, but essential, because without it,
you '11 get something like a circus-act, a dull
circus-act -that is-, without the usual but
incredible achievements: and you will attend
just someone succeeding-or-failing in
something-situation-bound. But even circus-
acts-with-incredible-achievements require this
additional something. It is: a clown, a jester,
one who, in an interlude, at the same time
giving the public a break -by means of some
gimmick-, comments: and a clown comments in
a simple, primitive, international, fit-for-all-
ages-fashion.
