The reader must not expect to know where I live . . .
On 4 April 1840, Charles Dickens published the first issue of a new weekly miscellany, Master Humphrey’s Clock.
Today we start reading the original weekly numbers of Master Humphrey’s Clock on the same weeks of the year that they were first published. As we shall see, they were soon entirely taken up with instalments of The Old Curiosity Shop.
If you would like to join us, we’ll read the first issue this week – details below – and we’ll discuss it next Friday 11th April.
(If you would prefer to join us when The Old Curiosity Shop starts, we’ll discuss the first chapter on Friday 2nd May.)
Our reading schedule and all the other details are here.
No.1 (4 April)
There were two items in the first issue of Master Humphrey’s Clock:
– ‘Master Humphrey, from his Clock-side in the Chimney-corner’
– ‘The Clock-Case: Introduction to the Giant Chronicles’
If you don’t have a physical copy of the book, you can read them here. (Stop before the ‘First Night of the Giant Chronicles’!)
I look forward to discussing them next Friday!
After Dickens died in 1870, his friend, the critic John Forster, wrote his biography, The Life of Charles Dickens (1872-4).
Forster describes the inception of Master Humphrey’s Clock by quoting the letter that Dickens wrote to his publishers, Chapman and Hall:
“I should be willing to commence on the thirty-first of March, 1840, a new publication, consisting entirely of original matter, of which one number, price threepence, should be published every week, and of which a certain amount of numbers should form a volume, to be published at regular intervals. The best general idea of the plan of the work might be given, perhaps, by reference to the Spectator, the Tatler, and Goldsmith’s Bee; but it would be far more popular both in the subjects of which it treats and its mode of treating them.
“I should propose to start, as the Spectator does, with some pleasant fiction relative to the origin of the publication; to introduce a little club or knot of characters and to carry their personal histories and proceedings through the work; to introduce fresh characters constantly; to reintroduce Mr. Pickwick and Sam Weller, the latter of whom might furnish an occasional communication with great effect; to write amusing essays on the various foibles of the day as they arise; to take advantage of all passing events; and to vary the form of the papers by throwing them into sketches, essays, tales, adventures, letters from imaginary correspondents, and so forth, so as to diversify the contents as much as possible.
“In addition to this general description of the contents, I may add that under particular heads I should strive to establish certain features in the work, which should be so many veins of interest and amusement running through the whole. Thus the Chapters on Chambers, which I have long thought and spoken of, might be very well incorporated with it; and a series of papers has occurred to me containing stories and descriptions of London as it was many years ago, as it is now, and as it will be many years hence, to which I would give some such title as The Relaxations of Gog and Magog, dividing them into portions like the Arabian Nights, and supposing Gog and Magog to entertain each other with such narrations in Guildhall all night long, and to break off every morning at daylight. An almost inexhaustible field of fun, raillery, and interest would be laid open by pursuing this idea.
“I would also commence, and continue from time to time, a series of satirical papers purporting to be translated from some Savage Chronicles, and to describe the administration of justice in some country that never existed, and record the proceedings of its wise men. The object of this series (which if I can compare it with anything would be something between Gulliver’s Travels and the Citizen of the World) would be to keep a special lookout upon the magistrates in town and country, and never to leave those worthies alone.
“The quantity of each number that should be written by myself would be a matter for discussion and arrangement. Of course I should pledge and bind myself upon that head. Nobody but myself would ever pursue these ideas, but I must have assistance of course, and there must be some contents of a different kind. Their general nature might be agreed upon beforehand, but I should stipulate that this assistance is chosen solely by myself, and that the contents of every number are as much under my own control, and subject to as little interference, as those of a number of Pickwick or Nickleby.
“In order to give fresh novelty and interest to this undertaking, I should be ready to contract to go at any specified time (say in the midsummer or autumn of the year, when a sufficient quantity of matter in advance should have been prepared, or earlier if it were thought fit) either to Ireland or to America, and to write from thence a series of papers descriptive of the places and people I see, introducing local tales, traditions, and legends, something after the plan of Washington Irving’s Alhambra. I should wish the republication of these papers in a separate form, with others to render the subject complete (if we should deem it advisable), to form part of the arrangement for the work; and I should wish the same provision to be made for the republication of the Gog and Magog series, or indeed any that I undertook.
“This is a very rough and slight outline of the project I have in view. I am ready to talk the matter over, to give any further explanations, to consider any suggestions, or to go into the details of the subject immediately. I say nothing of the novelty of such a publication nowadays, or its chances of success. Of course I think them very great, very great indeed,—almost beyond calculation,—or I should not seek to bind myself to anything so extensive. [. . .]
“Now, I want our publishing friends to take these things into consideration, and to give me the views and proposals they would be disposed to entertain when they have maturely considered the matter.”
Forster goes on:
The result of their consideration was, on the whole, satisfactory. [. . .] Six weeks before signature of this agreement, while a title was still undetermined, I had this letter from him:
“I will dine with you. I intended to spend the evening in strict meditation (as I did last night); but perhaps I had better go out, lest all work and no play should make me a dull boy. I have a list of titles too, but the final title I have determined on—or something very near it. I have a notion of this old file in the queer house, opening the book by an account of himself, and, among other peculiarities, of his affection for an old quaint queer-cased clock; showing how that when they have sat alone together in the long evenings, he has got accustomed to its voice, and come to consider it as the voice of a friend; how its striking, in the night, has seemed like an assurance to him that it was still, a cheerful watcher at his chamber-door; and now its very face has seemed to have something of welcome in its dusty features, and to relax from its grimness when he has looked at it from his chimney-corner. Then I mean to tell how that he has kept odd manuscripts in the old, deep, dark, silent closet where the weights are; and taken them from thence to read (mixing up his enjoyments with some notion of his clock); and how, when the club came to be formed, they, by reason of their punctuality and his regard for this dumb servant, took their name from it. And thus I shall call the book either Old Humphrey’s Clock, or Master Humphrey’s Clock; beginning with a woodcut of old Humphrey and his clock, and explaining the why and wherefore. All Humphrey’s own papers will be dated then From my clock-side, and I have divers thoughts about the best means of introducing the others. I thought about this all day yesterday and all last night till I went to bed. I am sure I can make a good thing of this opening, which I have thoroughly warmed up to in consequence.”
A few days later: “I incline rather more to Master Humphrey’s Clock than Old Humphrey’s—if so be that there is no danger of the pensive confounding master with a boy.” After two days more: “I was thinking all yesterday, and have begun at Master Humphrey to-day.” Then, a week later: “I have finished the first number, but have not been able to do more in the space than lead up to the Giants, who are just on the scene.”
You can read more of Forster’s Life of Charles Dickens here.
For now, though, I will leave you with the ‘address to the reader’ with which Dickens introduced the first issue of Master Humphrey’s Clock:
Master Humphrey earnestly hopes, (and is almost tempted to believe,) that all degrees of readers, young or old, rich or poor, sad or merry, easy of amusement or difficult to entertain, may find something agreeable in the face of his old clock. That, when they have made its acquaintance, its voice may sound cheerfully in their ears, and be suggestive of none but pleasant thoughts. That they may come to have favourite and familiar associations connected with its name, and to look for it as for a welcome friend.
From week to week, then, Master Humphrey will set his clock, trusting that while it counts the hours, it will sometimes cheat them of their heaviness, and that while it marks the thread of Time, it will scatter a few slight flowers in the Old Mower’s path.
I hope you enjoy the first issue. I look forward to discussing it with you next week.
Here are links to our previous The Old Curiosity Shop posts:
The Schedule (14 March)
Charles Dickens (28 March)
And if you’re not planning to read The Old Curiosity Shop with us, remember you can choose to opt out of our conversation. Just follow this link to your settings and, under Notifications, slide the toggle next to ‘The Old Curiosity Shop’. A grey toggle means you will not receive emails relating to this title.
I haven't read this particular Dickens so I am looking forward to this slow read experience. Thanks Henry.
It's interesting that Dickens liked the Arabian Nights and was eager to use its symmetries to animate his own characters and their perspectives on life's particular oddities, struggles and luck by chance or by bad luck engagements encountered and resolved or at least kept at bay. He was a genius in describing how people functioned or their attempted function in any circumstance or difficulty.