Dickens’s Letters Concerning David Copperfield

The following letter excerpts (and annotations) relate to the composition, publication, or reception of David Copperfield. Many of these excerpts can also be found in John Forster’s Life of Dickens.

To Catherine Dickens, 9 Jan 1849 [5.471-2]
We have had a two or three and twenty mile walk to day—to Lowestoft in Suffolk (Mrs. Gibson’s country) and back, and are sitting round the fire, giving encouragement to Lemon, who did his walking admirably, but is somewhat disposed to snore.

[The walk on which he passed the town of Blundeston, which became Blunderstone in the novel.]

To John Forster, 12 Jan 1849 [5.473-4]
Norwich, a disappointment; all save its place of execution, which we found fit for a gigantic scoundrel’s exit. But the success of the trip, for me, was to come. Yarmouth, sir, where we went afterwards, is the strangest place in the wide world: one hundred and forty-six miles of hill-less marsh between it and London. More when we meet. I shall certainly try my hand at it.

To John Forster, Late Jan 1849 [5.483]
What should you think of this for a notion of a character? “Yes, that is very true: but now, What’s his motive?” I fancy I could make something like it into a kind of amusing and more innocent Pecksniff. “Well now, yes—no doubt that was a fine thing to do! But now, stop a moment, let us see—What’s his motive?”

[In a letter reporting that he had decided to call his newborn son Henry Fielding instead of Oliver Goldsmith, as a kind of homage to the style of the novel he was about to write]

To John Forster, Early Feb 1849 [5.494]
Deepest despondency, as usual, in commencing, besets me.

[On his anxiety in selecting a name for the novel]

To John Forster, ?18 Feb 1849 [5.498]
A sea-fog to-day, but yesterday inexpressibly delicious. My mind running, like a high sea, on names—not satisfied yet, though.

To John Forster, 23 Feb 1849 [5.500]
I should like to know how the enclosed (one of those I have been thinking of) strikes you, on a first acquaintance with it. It is odd, I think, and new; but it may have A.’s difficulty of being “too comic, my boy”. I suppose I should have to add, though, by way of motto, “And in short it led to the very Mag’s Diversions. Old Saying” Or would it be better, there being equal authority for either, “And in short they all played Mag’s Diversions. Old Saying”?

“Mag’s Diversions.
Being the personal history of
MR. THOMAS MAG THE YOUNGER,
Of Blunderstone House.”

To John Forster, 24-26 Feb 1849 (summary in Forster 6.6.524) [5.501]
“Mag’s Diversions, being the Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of Mr. David Mag the Younger, of Blunderstone House.”

1-2 days later: omitting “Adventures” and calling his hero Mr David Mag the Younger, of Copperfield House.

1-2 days later: transforming Mr David Mag into Mr David Copperfield the Younger and his great-aunt Margaret.

To John Forster, 26 Feb 1849 [5.502]
I wish you would look over carefully the titles now enclosed, and tell me to which you most incline. You will see that they give up Mag altogether, and refer exclusively to one name—that which I last sent you. I doubt whether I could, on the whole, get a better name.

The Copperfield Disclosures. Being the personal history, experience, and observation, of Mr. David Copperfield the Younger, of Blunderstone House.
The Copperfield Records. Being the personal history, experience, and observation, of Mr. David Copperfield the Younger, of Copperfield Cottage.
The Last Living Speech and Confession of David Copperfield Junior, of Blunderstone Lodge, who was never executed at the Old Bailey. Being his personal history found among his papers.
The Copperfield Survey of the World as it Rolled. Being the personal history, experience, and observation of David Copperfield the Younger, of Blunderstone Rookery.
The Last Will and Testament of Mr. David Copperfield. Being his personal history left as a legacy.
Copperfield, Complete. Being the whole personal history and experience of Mr. David Copperfield of Blunderstone House, which he never meant to be published on any account.

Or, the opening words of No. 6 might be Copperfield’s Entire; and The Copperfield Confessions might open Nos. 1 and 2. NOW, WHAT SAY YOU?

To John Forster, 28 Feb 1849 [5.503]
The Survey has been my favourite from the first. Kate picked it out from the rest, without my saying anything about it. Georgy too. You hit upon it, on the first glance. Therefore I have no doubt that it is indisputably the best title; and I will stick to it.

To John Forster, ?5 Mar 1849 [5.505]
Pen and ink before me! Am I not at work on Copperfield! Nothing else would have kept me here until half-past two on such a day.

To Angela Burdett Coutts, 24 Mar 1849 [5.513]
I regret to say that I cannot meet you at Shepherd’s Bush today. In pursuance of virtuous resolutions to be beforehand, I am hard at work finishing the first Number of my new book.

To John Forster, ? Mar 1849 (From Forster 6.6.525) [5.518]
Why else should I so obstinately have kept to that name when once it turned up? [In reply to Forster’s having pointed out that the initials of David Copperfield were his own in reverse, Dickens declared that, though much startled, such a coincidence was but in keeping with the fates and chances that were always befalling him.]

To Forster, ?19 Apr 1849 [5.526]:
Telling Forster that the novel was to begin on 1 May, with the title: “The Personal History, Adventures, Experience, and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger, of Blunderstone Rookery, which he never meant to be published on any account.”

My hand is out in the matter of Copperfield. To-day and yesterday I have done nothing. Though I know what I want to do, I am lumbering on like a stage-waggon. I can’t even dine at the Temple to-day, I feel it so important to stick at it this evening, and make some head. I am quite aground; quite a literary Benedict, as he appeared when his heels wouldn’t stay upon the carpet; and the long Copperfieldian perspective looks snowy and thick, this fine morning.

To Dudley Costello, 25 Apr 1849 [5.527]
Many thanks for your note. I hope David Copperfield will “do”, for your good correspondent. The world would not take another Pickwick from me, now; but we can be cheerful and merry I hope, notwithstanding, and with a little more purpose in us.

To F. M. Evans, 1 May 1849 [5.530]
I hope and trust we have made a good start, and that we shall fetch up Dombey.
I send you the second chapter [of David Copperfield]. The Third is to come, yet. The first, I will send to Browne tomorrow. As the second subject is in this now sent, proofs are important.

I am glad to hear your children are doing well. Let me know about them whenever you write, as Mrs. Dickens is much interested…

P. S. You mustn’t get into the habit of asking for Copy.-It’s a bad one.

To H. K. Browne, 4 May 1849 [5.531-2]
I send you the second chapter. The proofs have been delayed, I find, by Bradbury’s illness, and Hivins’s [F.M. Evans’s] absence.

Will you come and dine here tomorrow week, at 1/4 before 7? We shall have two or three people to dinner, and perhaps a little good music in the evening.

To F. M. Evans, 5 May 1849 [5.533]
I send you herewith, the end of the Number [2]. If it should make a little too much (as I think it may) let them begin chapter 5 on page 46, where there is now a great blank. As soon as you have proofs, send me the whole, made up, and send me Mr. Forster’s proofs too. I will correct and give them to him.

I am very sorry that we cannot get on, without calling forth such letters as the enclosed [Evans’s letter to Dickens]. What does it mean? Is it not ill-advised, and very ill-advised, to give any semblance of color to such complaints? [Dickens had earlier complained that the wholesalers were being overcharged by Bradbury & Evans]. They used never to be made, and how is it that they begin now? Pray see into this without delay, and let me know what the case is, and what you have done, before I answer the letter.

I think it excessively injudicious if there be any departure on your parts from the old course of my books.

I am very glad to hear that your children are so much better.

To Angela Burdett Coutts, 7 May 1849 [5:534]
Pending some further enquiries of Mr. Tracey’s, I have arranged to be at his prison on Wednesday at 12, to see a young girl of 16, whose case he hopes is a good one. The worst of it, is, that she is committed for six months, and has only been there three; but possibly we might get her sentence commuted, if the circumstances seem favorable. I will report to you after seeing her. [Referring to a possible recruit for Urania Cottage, Dickens and Burdett Coutts’s“home for homeless women”]

I want to ask you to give me your permission to put you down as a Subscriber to a certain book of poetry price ten Shillings. I have a horror of Subscription-books in general, but the Writer of this is Mr. Charles Whitehead (the author, some years ago, of a very clever novel indeed, called Richard Savage). He has been struggling with poverty all his life, and resorts to this form of publication as a means of keeping his brother (a lunatic) another year in an asylum. I am much interested in helping him to good names.

To Hablot Browne, 9 May 1849 [5.536]
I think the enclosed [“The Friendly Waiter and I”] capital. Will you put Davy on a little jacket instead of this coat, without altering him in any other respect?

To F. M. Evans, 10 May 1849 [5.536]
I am sorry you took the complaints [see To F. M. Evans, 5 May] which, of course, are not mine, and I can know nothing about, until you tell me) so much to heart. It is necessary, I need not say, that I should enquire into them. . . .

In reference to that of Mr. Gilbert ([a wholesaler complaining about the increased price of monthly numbers] whom I have referred to you) I must say that I think it would have been infinitely better, not to have departed in the least from Chapman and Hall’s usual course of proceeding. The saving is a great and tempting one, but that is no proof of the wisdom of the alteration. We might save as much again, I dare say, by doing something that would nevertheless be very impolitic and ill-advised.

To Thomas Noon Talfourd [original of Tommy Traddles], 14 May 1849 [5: 538-39]
My Dear Talfourd I write in great haste to say that I have only just now got your letter, and that I am in a state of the utmost vexation at not being able to come today. I feel that we ought to dine somewhere together, afterwards; and I am engaged (for my sins) to go with Mary Barton [i.e., its author, Elizabeth Gaskell] to the German opera, and to dine with her, first.

But do let us make a day, for one of our old-time walks. Can you give me any notion of what days there are in perspective, when you can be idle? I will compare them with mine, then, and we can fix one with which nothing foreseen, shall interfere.

To Mrs. Joll, 15 May 1849 [5:540]
I regret that I cannot add my name to your subscription list.

It would have given me real satisfaction to comply with your request, after reading your letter, if I felt it consistent with a principle of right which I have always maintained, to do so. But I cannot understand that you are justified in republishing portions of the works of living writers, without their consent. I think there is a confusion of ideas abroad, on this subject, which it is the duty of all who are devoted to literature, to discourage. And therefore I must very reluctantly decline doing what you ask me.

To Angela Burdett Coutts, 16 May 1849
I send you, enclosed, a document relating to Mary Jones, which Mr. Hill the Recorder of Birmingham has sent me. I stated Mary Jones’s case (as she puts it) in writing for him, that there might be no mistake, and at his request.

I am afraid her story is quite untrue. There is still a possibility of its being true, because there is a possibility of the neighbour represented to have seen her take money out of the till, being false. But the probabilities are very strong indeed against her. . . .

I have been at Shepherds Bush three times lately, and have seen a good deal of Mrs. Morson and taken counsel with her in reference to a dispute between Isabella Gordon and Rachael Bradley. I have a very strong hope that she is exactly the person we have always wanted. [Referring to Urania Cottage concerns]

To Angela Burdett Coutts, 17 May 1849 [5:541-42]
I have read both the pamphlet and your letter.

It seems to me (I may be wrong, knowing nothing of the hand from which it comes), that the pamphlet is written by somebody who has conceived Puseyite ideas, and who has got one foot and the best part of one leg into the Romish Church. The suggested place is but a kind of Nunnery. If it be meant to be anything else, it is a mere vision, which, reduced to practice, would come to that. I think such places very promising offshoots from the root of all mischief, and believe this sprig would blow, in time, like the rest.

Your letter is perfectly plain and clear, and does not omit any strong point of objection. It seems to me to state all the points of objection very strongly and extremely well. The proposed Sisterhood, in particular, is most wisely handled. It would be difficult, to my thinking, to devise any-not wicked-scheme, of a more pernicious and unnatural nature. As if every home in all this land, were not a World, in which a woman’s course of influence and action is marked out by Heaven!

Upon the nature of their repentance and the inculcation of Christianity as an essential part of every phase of life, I think you take the only true, sensible, and practical ground. “All others”, as they say in the advertisements of patent things “are counterfeits”, I am perfectly convinced.

In short, I really do not think that you have left any part of the question untouched, except that one into which you are not called upon to enter, even if you think with me-and that is, that the model of this scheme is in the practice of a perverted form of religion which all experience shews us to be irreconcileable <[sic] em>with the peace, welfare, and improvement of mankind.

Of course I do not doubt the good intentions of the writer, but I must confess that every day I live, I grow more and more afraid of these amiable ships without any rudders that drift about the crowded ocean called Life, and get into the best-intentioned entanglements with all sorts of things.

To Forster, 6 Jun 1849 [5.551]
Copperfield half done. I feel, thank God, quite confident in the story. I have a move in it ready for this month [the death of David’s mother]; another for next [Steerforth’s first meeting with Mr Peggotty and Ham]; and another for the next [David’s experiences at Murdstone & Grinby’s warehouse].

To Angela Burdett Coutts, 8 June 1849 [5:552]
When I spoke to my brother in law [Henry Austin], the Board of Health Secretary, about Mr. Scott’s ponds, he had no doubt that we could present them [i.e., bring a suit against a property owner adjacent to Urania Cottage]. But I had a very strong doubt, in return, whether Mr. Scott, if he were well advised, could not present us, as a counter-move, for emptying our drain on his property. Which I decidedly think he could. But I will ascertain before this next week is out, whether there is any other way of making him drain the ground. And if we seem to have any reasonable security for his not turning round upon us to your annoyance, I will write to him and make a formal demand to have those ponds cleared, and see what he says to it.