July 5, 1995 Contact: Barbara McKenna (408/459-2495)

DICKENS CONFERENCE HOSTS A SPECIAL DAY OF EVENTS FOR THE PUBLIC

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SANTA CRUZ, CA--Fans of Charles Dickens are invited to attend the Dickens Universe Public Day, a special one-day program featuring speakers, refreshments, a film, and informal discussions on the popular Victorian author. Public Day is presented as part of the fifteenth annual Dickens Universe at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and is designed for those who cannot attend the weeklong conference but would still like to study Dickens, discuss his work with other aficionados, and hear from leading experts in the field. Along with presentations from two prominent Dickens scholars, Public Day will feature an afternoon Victorian tea, an evening sherry hour, and a film. The event runs from 3 to 11 p.m. on Wednesday, August 2, at Kresge College. The cost is $15.

Featured speakers for Public Day are David Parker, curator of the Dickens House Museum in London, and Philip Collins, a professor of English at the University of Leicester and a leading authority on the life and work of Charles Dickens. Together, their talks offer an insightful, entertaining introduction to Dickens.

In a talk and slide show titled "The Great Expectations Country," Parker will discuss how Dickens incorporated real-life settings into his fiction, and how he used those settings to help tell his stories. One example of this, Parker says, is found in a scene in Great Expectations in which a boy named Pip arrives in London's Little Britain district.

"It was an area dominated by the cattle market," Parker explains. "Thousands of cattle were brought in on Mondays and slaughtered nearby. Also in that area was a cluster of prisons and St. Bartholomew's Hospital. The terrified cattle were herded through the streets, executions took place out in front of the prisons, and because St. Bartholomew's was a teaching hospital, it attracted body snatchers--people who provided bodies to the hospital for medical students to cut up. Dickens described it as 'a shameful place all asmear with blood and fat and foam.' " Philip Collins will present the talk, "How Dickens's Novels Got Written and Read." "Dickens was one of the first to write novels for serial publication. He got into publishing that way and always wrote his novels in monthly illustrated installments," Collins says. "In some ways, reading them was more like watching a television series or a soap opera than reading a novel. After reading an installment, people had a month to talk about it with their neighbors and dinner guests. A lot of expectations built up and there was a lot of anticipation for the next installment." Dickens was always working under a tight deadline, but, says Collins, "He only fell behind once; that was when his sister-in-law dropped dead in his arms."

Public Day concludes with the screening of the film, Wide Sargasso Sea (1993). Adapted from the best-selling 1966 novel by Jean Rhys, the film is directed by John Duigan and stars Karina Lombard, Michael York, Nathaniel Parker, Claudia Robinson, and Rachel Ward. The story's protagonist is based on the character of the insane Mrs. Rochester created by Charlotte Bronte in Jane Eyre. Set in Jamaica in the 1840s in a climate of postcolonialism, eroticism, madness, and magic, Wide Sargasso Sea invents the circumstances that lead to Mrs. Rochester's madness.

Public Day is presented in conjunction with the Dickens Universe, which takes place July 30 through August 5. The Dickens Universe is open to the public and is designed for university, college, and high school teachers; students; and anyone who enjoys reading the works of Victorian novelists. Along with lectures by world- renowned scholars, the weeklong event features Victorian teas, dramatic readings, film screenings, sherry hours, and a book fair. This year's gathering focuses on Great Expectations by Dickens and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. For more information on the Dickens Universe or Public Day, call (408) 459-2103.

Public Day schedule of events All events take place at UCSC's Kresge College

3 p.m.: Victorian refreshments, outside Room 321 3:30 p.m.: David Parker, "The Great Expectations Country," Room 321 6:45 p.m.: Postprandial Potations (sherry hour), outside Kresge Town Hall 7:45 p.m.: Philip Collins, "How Dickens's Novels Got Written and Read," Kresge Town Hall 9 p.m.: Film, Wide Sargasso Sea, Room 321

Press Releases Home | Search Press Releases | Press Release Archive | Services for Journalists

Maintained by:pioweb@cats.ucsc.edu