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Dickens' London
Charles Dickens's works are especially associated with London, which is the setting for many of his novels. These works do not just use London as a backdrop but are about the city and its character. Dickens described London as a magic lantern, a popular entertainment of the Victorian era, which projected images from slides. Of all Dickens's characters, "none played as important a role in his work as that of London itself"; it fired his imagination and made him write. In a letter to John Forster in 1846, Dickens wrote "a day in London sets me up and starts me", but outside of the city, "the toil and labour of writing, day after day, without that magic lantern is IMMENSE!!" However, of the identifiable London locations that Dickens used in his work, scholar Clare Pettitt notes that many no longer exist and, while "you can track Dickens' London, and see where things were, but they aren't necessarily still there". In addition to his later novels and short stories, Dickens's descrip ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mathew Carey
Mathew Carey (January 28, 1760 – September 16, 1839) was an Irish-born American publisher and economist who lived and worked in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was the father of economist Henry Charles Carey. Early life and education Carey was born in 1760 in Dublin into a middle-class Catholic family. He entered the bookselling and printing business in 1775 and, at the age of seventeen, published a pamphlet criticizing dueling. He followed this with a work criticizing the severity of the Irish penal code, and another criticizing Parliament. As a result, the British House of Commons threatened him with prosecution. In 1781 Carey fled to Paris as a political refugee. Adelman, 2013, p. 538 There he met Benjamin Franklin, the ambassador representing the American Revolutionary forces, which achieved independence that year. Franklin took Carey to work in his printing office. Carey worked for Franklin for a year before returning to Ireland, where he edited two Irish nationalist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bleeding Heart Yard
Bleeding Heart Yard is a cobbled courtyard off Greville Street in the Holborn area of the London Borough of Camden. The courtyard is probably named after a 16th-century inn sign dating back to the Reformation that was displayed on a pub called the Bleeding Heart in nearby Charles Street. The inn sign showed the heart of the Virgin Mary pierced by five swords.Philpotts, Trey. ''A Companion to Little Dorrit''. Helms Information Ltd. 2003, p. 172. Urban legend has it that the courtyard's name commemorates the murder of Lady Elizabeth Hatton, the second wife of Sir William Hatton, whose family formerly owned the area around Hatton Garden. It is said that her body was found here on 27 January 1646, "''torn limb from limb, but with her heart still pumping blood.''" Elizabeth Hatton did own a house in this vicinity, known as " Ely Place", but she died of natural causes. In literature Bleeding Heart Yard features in the Charles Dickens novel ''Little Dorrit'' as the home of the Plorni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The George Inn, Southwark
The George Inn, or The George, is a public house established in the medieval period on Borough High Street in Southwark, London, owned and leased by the National Trust. It is located about from the south side of the River Thames near London Bridge and is the only surviving galleried London coaching inn. History The pub was formerly known as the George and Dragon, named after the legend of Saint George and the Dragon. It is possible that it was used for Elizabethan theatrical productions (Inn-yard theatre), as other galleried inns were. A pub has existed on the site since medieval times. But in 1677, it was rebuilt after a serious fire destroyed most of Southwark. The medieval pub was situated next door to an inn where Chaucer set ''The Canterbury Tales''. Later, the Great Northern Railway used the George as a depot and pulled down two of its fronts to build warehousing. Now just the south face remains. Charles Dickens visited The George, and referred to it in both ''Litt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
St George The Martyr Southwark
St George the Martyr is a church in the historic Borough district of south London. It lies within the modern-day London Borough of Southwark, on Borough High Street at the junction with Long Lane, Marshalsea Road, and Tabard Street. St George the Martyr is named after Saint George. The church is a Grade II* listed building. The church has strong associations with Charles Dickens, whose father was imprisoned for debt in the Marshalsea prison. The surviving wall of the prison adjoins the north side of the churchyard. Dickens himself lived nearby, in Lant Street, lodging in a house that belonged to the Vestry Clerk of St George's. This was during the darkest period of his life when, as a teenager, with his father in prison, he had to work in the 'blacking factory', and his literary career must have seemed an impossible dream. Later, he was to set several scenes of the novel ''Little Dorrit'' in and around St George's Church. There is a small representation of Little Dorrit in the e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Borough High Street
Borough High Street is a road in Southwark, London, running south-west from London Bridge, forming part of the A3 route which runs from London to Portsmouth, on the south coast of England. Overview Borough High Street continues southwest as Newington Causeway, here co-inciding with ancient Stane Street, the Roman road between London and Chichester. Another important connection is with the Dover Road (the modern A2 route) which diverges in a south-east direction from Borough High Street at a junction of five roads adjacent to Borough Underground station as Great Dover Street. The Dover Road mostly follows the alignment of Roman Watling Street, though, here, the original Roman route was along Tabard Street closely parallel with Great Dover Street to the north. The stretch of Borough High Street south of the junction with Long Lane, Marshalsea Road, and Tabard Street, where stands the ancient church of St. George the Martyr, was formerly called Blackman Street after a lo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Little Dorrit
''Little Dorrit'' is a novel by Charles Dickens, originally published in serial form between 1855 and 1857. The story features Amy Dorrit, youngest child of her family, born and raised in the Marshalsea prison for debtors in London. Arthur Clennam encounters her after returning home from a 20-year absence, ready to begin his life anew. The novel satirises some shortcomings of both government and society, including the institution of debtors' prisons, where debtors were imprisoned, unable to work and yet incarcerated until they had repaid their debts. The prison in this case is the Marshalsea, where Dickens's own father had been imprisoned. Dickens is also critical of the impotent bureaucracy of the British government, in this novel in the form of the fictional "Circumlocution Office". Dickens also satirises the stratification of society that results from the British class system. Plot summary Poverty The novel begins in Marseilles "thirty years ago" (c. 1826), with the notor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Southwark London Borough Council
Southwark London Borough Council is the local authority for the London Borough of Southwark in Greater London, England. It is a London borough council, one of 32 in the United Kingdom capital of London. History There have previously been a number of local authorities responsible for the Southwark area. The current local authority was first elected in 1964, a year before formally coming into its powers and prior to the creation of the London Borough of Southwark on 1 April 1965. Southwark replaced the Metropolitan Borough of Southwark, the Metropolitan Borough of Camberwell and the Metropolitan Borough of Bermondsey. It was envisaged that through the London Government Act 1963 Southwark as a London local authority would share power with the Greater London Council. The split of powers and functions meant that the Greater London Council was responsible for "wide area" services such as fire, ambulance, flood prevention, and refuse disposal; with the local authorities responsible for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Southwark
Southwark ( ) is a district of Central London situated on the south bank of the River Thames, forming the north-western part of the wider modern London Borough of Southwark. The district, which is the oldest part of South London, developed due to its position at the southern end of the early versions of London Bridge, the only crossing point for many miles. London's historic core, the City of London, lay north of the Bridge and for centuries the area of Southwark just south of the bridge was partially governed by the city. By the 12th century Southwark had been incorporated as an ancient borough, and this historic status is reflected in the alternative name of the area, as Borough. The ancient borough of Southwark's river frontage extended from the modern borough boundary, just to the west of by the Oxo Tower, to St Saviour's Dock (originally the mouth of the River Neckinger) in the east. In the 16th century, parts of Southwark became a formal City ward, Bridge Without. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marshalsea
The Marshalsea (1373–1842) was a notorious prison in Southwark, just south of the River Thames. Although it housed a variety of prisoners, including men accused of crimes at sea and political figures charged with sedition, it became known, in particular, for its incarceration of the poorest of London's debtors. Over half the population of England's prisoners in the 18th century were in jail because of debt. Run privately for profit, as were all English prisons until the 19th century, the Marshalsea looked like an Oxbridge college and functioned as an extortion racket. Debtors in the 18th century who could afford the prison fees had access to a bar, shop and restaurant, and retained the crucial privilege of being allowed out during the day, which gave them a chance to earn money for their creditors. Everyone else was crammed into one of nine small rooms with dozens of others, possibly for years for the most modest of debts, which increased as unpaid prison fees accumulated. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Debtors' Prison
A debtors' prison is a prison for people who are unable to pay debt. Until the mid-19th century, debtors' prisons (usually similar in form to locked workhouses) were a common way to deal with unpaid debt in Western Europe.Cory, Lucinda"A Historical Perspective on Bankruptcy" , ''On the Docket'', Volume 2, Issue 2, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Rhode Island, April/May/June 2000, retrieved December 20, 2007. Destitute people who were unable to pay a court-ordered judgment would be incarcerated in these prisons until they had worked off their debt via labour or secured outside funds to pay the balance. The product of their labour went towards both the costs of their incarceration and their accrued debt. Increasing access and lenience throughout the history of bankruptcy law have made prison terms for unaggravated indigence obsolete over most of the world. Since the late 20th century, the term ''debtors' prison'' has also sometimes been applied by critics to criminal justice syst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
River Neckinger
The River Neckinger is a reduced subterranean river that rises in Southwark and flows approximately through that part of London to St Saviour's Dock where it enters the Thames. What remains of the river is enclosed and runs underground and most of its narrow catchment has been diverted into other combined and surface water sewers, flowing into the Southern Outfall Sewer and the Thames respectively. Course The watercourse drained first the seasonally wet (and occasionally flooded) ground at St George's Fields, now Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park, in western Southwark. Its course was east as follows: it took the line of Brook Drive then passed by the Elephant and Castle, then passed the site of Lock Hospital, Kent Street. This upper section was also known before that hospital's closure in the early 19th century as the Lock Stream. It then passed the grounds of (since demolished) Bermondsey Abbey to the south, forming the channel north of what was the large Thames island of Bermo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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