A remarkable collection of Charles Dickens artifacts, including a copy of David Copperfield that survived an Antarctic expedition, will take center stage at the Charles Dickens Museum’s centenary exhibition this February.
The exhibition celebrates 100 years since the Victorian author’s former Bloomsbury home at 48 Doughty Street narrowly escaped demolition to become London’s premier destination for Dickens enthusiasts. This historic Georgian terraced house, where Dickens penned his early masterpieces including Oliver Twist and The Pickwick Papers, stands as the only surviving London residence of the literary giant.
Among the exhibition’s highlights is a never-before-displayed chalk and pastel portrait of Dickens created during his time at Doughty Street. The sketch captures the young author at the precipice of his meteoric rise to international literary fame, offering visitors a rare glimpse of Dickens during his most creatively fertile period.
Perhaps the most evocative item on display is a blubber-stained copy of David Copperfield that accompanied Captain Scott’s ill-fated Terra Nova expedition to Antarctica in 1910-12. The book bears the sooty fingerprints of Scott’s crew, who gathered around seal-blubber fires in their ice cave shelter to read a chapter each night for sixty consecutive evenings. This extraordinary artifact uniquely demonstrates how Dickens’s words provided solace and entertainment in one of the world’s most inhospitable environments.
Art enthusiasts will appreciate the exhibition’s collection of original illustrations from Dickens’s most celebrated collaborators, including Hablot Knight Browne, John Leech, George Cruikshank, and Fred Barnard. The display features preliminary sketches from the first edition of A Christmas Carol, offering insight into the visual evolution of Dickens’s beloved characters.
Museum Director Cindy Sughrue promises an immersive journey through both Dickens’s life and the museum’s century-long legacy. The exhibition transforms the historic Doughty Street residence – where Dickens lived with his wife and first child from 1837 to 1839 – into a treasure trove of personal effects, portraits, photographs, and historic items that illuminate the author’s enduring impact on literature and popular culture.
The exhibition, “Dickens in Doughty Street: 100 Years of the Charles Dickens Museum,” opens February 5th and runs through June 2025.
Author: Jonathan Thomas
Jonathan is a consummate Anglophile who launched Anglotopia.net in 2007 to channel his passion for Britain. Londontopia is its sister publication dedicated to everything London.