Lucinda Hawksley gave a nice long interview to The Sunday Post to promote her newest book about her great-great-great-grandfather, Dickens and Travel: The Start of Modern Travel Writing. Here's an excerpt:
“The first trip on a steamship … sounds absolutely terrifying. Dickens writes home and says that never again would he trust himself and his wife to a steamship, because it’s so frightening.
“It’s either far too heavily laden with coal at the beginning, or frighteningly unladen at the end. He also talks about the fact the chimneys belching out fire are so unstable that if you got caught in a storm, and they were knocked over, the whole ship would go up in flames.
“All these Victorian travellers were so brave. Today, no matter how much we think we’re intrepid, it’s nothing compared to putting yourself in these terrifying vessels and heading out to places unknown.”
Go here to read the full interview, and go here to order Lucinda's book!
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