Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 March 1911 — LETTERS OF DICKENS [ARTICLE]

LETTERS OF DICKENS

LAST ONE H £ WROTE WAS SHAKY AND BIGNED “C. D.” ( . ‘ % Signatures of the Famous Novelist on Business Epistles Almost Invariably Were Accompanied by a Flourish That Showed Ego. *V The last paragraph of the last letter written by Charles Dickens reads; “Butil hope I may be ready at three o’clock. If I can’t be, why, then I shan’t* be. Ever affectionately, ,r C'D.” This was written an hour or so before the fatal seizure. Every word droops below the level from which each starts, each line of writing descends across the page, the simple C. D. is very shaky, and the whole letter is broken and weak. Charles Dickens was not “ready" at “three o’clock” —he died at ten minutes past 4 six p. m. This last signature of the novelist is one of fifty-five reproduced in the Strand in an article by John Holt Schooling. Among them is a very famous signature, the original of which Is on a great parchment called “Deed of License Assignment and Covenants Respecting a Work Called ‘The Pickwick Papers,’ ” and which, *- after a preamble, contains the words: “Whereas the said Charles Dickens is the author of a book or work entitled ‘The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club,’' which has been recently printed and published in twenty parts or numbers,” etc. It is probable that the fact of the seal being placed between “Charles” and “Dickens” prevented the flourish which almost invariably accompanied his signature on business documents; the marked enlargement of this signature takes the place of the flourish and shows an unconscious emphasis of the ego. It would be almost unreasonable for us to expect that so impressionable a man, who was also feeling his power and fame, could abstain from showing outward signs • of his own consciousness of abnormal success. Yet In the private letters of Dickens the.simple “C. D.” is very frequent. It may at once be said that this point of difference is alike interacting to the student of gesture and to bhe student of Dickens’ character. He was certainly a very able man of business, and the wording of his business letters fully bears out the Idea conveyed by his business signature — bo to speak—that sickens was fully aware of hlB own powers, and that, quite fairly, he did not .’omit to Impress the fact upon other people when he thought st. Both the wording and the signature of many of his private letters are simple and unostentatious to a high degree. This curious fact ought to be remembered when people talk about Dickens’ "conceit” and “love of show.”