Dickens' London

Few novelists have written so intimately about a city in the way that Charles Dickens wrote about London. A near photographic memory made his contact with the city indelible from a very young age and it remained his constant focus. Dickens was drawn to the character of London itself, all aspects of the capital from the coaching inns of his early years to the taverns and watermen of the Thames; these were the constant cityscapes of his life and work. Based on five walks through central London, Peter Clark illuminates the settings of Dickens's greatest works, his life, his journalism and his fiction. He also explores 'The First Suburbs' (Camden Town, Chelsea, Greenwich, Hampstead, Highgate and Limehouse) as they feature in Dickens's writing. Peter Clark will focus on the walk from Bermondsey to Holborn Circus, sharing highlights which feature in Dickens' all-time favourite Oliver Twist.