Dickensblog

The big day is tomorrow, and the news is pouring in faster than I can type! I'll share just a few highlights with you:

• Some 350 Dickens descendants will be at Poets' Corner on Tuesday for the wreathlaying! The Telegraph's Nigel Farndale, a friend of Adam Charles Dickens (one of the great-great-grandsons), has the story.
• Two Rivers Press has just published A Mutual Friend: Poems for Charles Dickens, a new collection edited by poet Peter Robinson. Today the Guardian is running one of the poems, "I Am Greatly Changed," by Richard Price, as its Poem of the Week.
• An Australian radio station has compiled a mix tape (or what we might call a fanmix) for Dickens.
• Newsweek and the Telegraph have heartfelt new tributes. The latter is written by Simon Callow. And CNN has a report on the celebrations around the world, with a nice photo gallery including pictures of Dickens, his family members, and some of his books and his belongings.
• A peal of bells and a lecture in Southwark, and a booksigning in Washington, D.C., have been added to the celebrations.
• The Times of India has a brief report on celebrations going on in that country. And the BBC World Service is running a radio documentary called Dickens and India — Mutual Friends.
• The Washington Post tackles "five myths about Charles Dickens." I am, of course, vastly pleased to see them debunk that ridiculous old "paid by the word" smear. However, I must take issue with their assertion that Great Expectations is not a good novel to teach high school students. After all, if a certain ninth-grade student hadn't had it in her syllabus many years ago, this blog might never have existed!