Dickens Theme Park

I almost certainly should have picked up on this long ago, but one of the most bizarre news items I’ve read recently has brought to my attention the impending opening of a Dickens Theme Park in Chatham, Kent.

 While purists may object to this seeming bastardisation of a canonical literary figure and his legacy, I’m afraid I have nothing like their maturity: my inner child is squealing with delight at the prospect of the Great Expectations log flume, and I fear that, if it weren’t for the fact that the park has yet to open, I would be on the train to Chatham as we speak. 

I also think it’s important to remember (and not least because I’m trying to intellectualise my own frankly pathetic love of toys) that the Victorians themselves invented literary merchandising.  It’s well known that Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White spawned its own brand of perfume and bonnets (what I wouldn’t give for a Count Fosco scent or some Marian millinery…) but, looking a little closer to home, one of our recent titles here at Hesperus Press was Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s The Coming Race, which provided the name for Bovril.  Rather than turning in his grave, I can imagine Mr Dickens being quite thrilled by the new turn his legacy has taken.

 My only reservation is that Dickens is beginning to monopolise the market of classic fiction somewhat.  Amazon reported a 160% increase in Dickens sales last year, and while it’s fantastic to hear that more people are reading classics, what of the lesser known works?  Even within Dickens’s own canon, there are works which are, to date, known by hardly anyone outside of academic circles.  We at Hesperus are doing our utmost to bring these works to a wider audience, but it’s simply not the case that ‘Dickens’s books have never been out of print.’  For example, we recently published Mrs Lirriper, a series of stories by Dickens and his contemporaries, out of print since their initial inclusion in the 1863-1864 Christmas special edition of ‘All the Year Round’.  I haven’t visited the park, so I couldn’t say for sure, but I’ll bet that there is no waxwork of the inimitable Mrs Lirriper, despite her being a fantastic character who would hold her own next to the Jarndyces and the Jupes of the world.

What’s more, many of these more minor works were written in collaboration with Dickens’s literary peers, all too many of whom are falling by the wayside of the public consciousness as a result of Dickens-mania.  What of Edmund Yates, Amelia Edwards, Bulwer-Lytton…?

So while I’m definitely not calling for more libraries and fewer theme parks, I say why not delve a little deeper into the wells of English – and foreign – literature?  Future theme park attractions could include, say, an Anna Karenina runaway train (I’ll apologise in advance for that one)…  Captivating as the Abel Magwitches, the Tiny Tims and the Fagins of our literary heritage may be, let’s make room for some new faces.

ER.