Life's ups and downs

Ah, so you'll stay and talk, then? Splendid, splendid!

What was I saying, now ... ah yes, Charles. I first met Charles when he was just a boy. Would you say, sir, that you're familiar with life's vicissitudes? Good and bad fortune, that kind of thing? When it comes to taking the rough with the smooth, I must confess I know a thing or two about such matters.

However, Mr Dickens' life was rather remarkable by any standards.

Did you know his father went from happiness and prosperity to being locked up in the debtors' prison? No? Well, overnight young Charles discovered life wasn't all about having a big house and servants: at just twelve years old he was sent to work in a factory which made boot blacking.

Imagine! In those days child labour was common - but for young Charles, used to easy living, the harshness of the factory came as an incredible shock. And the effects were profound.

Here, let me show you. Where's that book again? Take a look, here in the cover, at the portrait of the man Mr Dickens would become. Look at his eyes! Such sadness, such humanity.

They're not so different from the eyes of that twelve-year-old boy who looked at me all those years ago, as he made his way home from a long day's dispiriting work.



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