What the Dickens?

Yesterday was Charles Dickens’s 200th birthday.

Someone in another place remarked how similar Mr Dickens appeared to Cowdenbeath FC chairman and former Rangers vice chairman Donald Findlay.

               (From left Charles Dickens, Donald Findlay, Donald Dickens, Charles Findlay – Thanks Al)

And that set me thinking about Dickens and some of his characters.

Mister Micawber from David Copperfield was the very man for extolling the virtues of prudence. “Annual income £50 million, annual expenditure £49.5 million – result? happiness! Annual income £50 million, annual expenditure £55 million and some payments allegedly made from offshore accounts – result? misery!”

WC Fields was the first man to play Micawber on the silver screen. He reminds me of someone

Former Rangers Chairman W.C. Fields

Early Hollywood actor John McClelland

Meanwhile to borrow another Micawber phrase, it seems that Craig Whyte is waiting for something to turn up…..

What the Dickens?

Passing the Kings Arms in Berwick last week I spotted this plaque on the wall outside:

I found this account of Dickens’s visit:

On his second visit to Berwick in 1861 Charles Dickens objected violently to performing in the Corn Exchange:-

“A most ridiculous room was designed for me in this odd out of the way place. An immense Corn Exchange made of glass and iron, round, dome-topped, lofty, utterly absurd for any such purpose. Full of thundering echoes with a little lofty crow’s nest of a stone gallery breast high, deep in the wall, into which it was designed to put me! I instantly struck, of course.. Terrified local agents glowered, but fell prostrate”

He read in the Assembly Rooms at the Kings Arms instead.