Re: Miss Havisham
Mr. JT Riendeau (jtriende@STUDENTS.WISC.EDU)
Fri, 3 Oct 1997 12:36:09 -0500
My dear Mr Hoffner,
Or perhaps it is Miss Hoffner? You ask what made me imagine Miss
Havisham. The roots of imagination are buried deep, and not all of them are
accessible, even to the author himself. Miss Havisham grew in part, I think
I can say, out of my preoccupation, around 1860, with the effects of
brooding upon ancient wrongs, something I had experienced myself, dwelling
upon painful episodes in my childhood. But there was an eternal stimulus
too. Readers of "Household Words," the weekly journal I edited in the
1850s, during the first part of that decade also received a monthly
supplement entitled "The Household Narrative of Current Event." Study that
and you will find an account of a poor mad creature who wandered the West
End of London at that time, dressed all in white, and believed to have been
a wronged bride. It was impossible for her not to enter my mind, when I was
conceiving Miss Havisham.
Faithfully yours,
Charles Dickens
____________________________________________________________________________
____
>Dear Sir:
>My class would like to know how Dickens came up with the idea for Miss
>Havisham.
>
>Sandy Hoffner
>topgun@iw.net
>
>
======================
Charles Dickens
charles_dickens@rmplc.co.uk
Author