Thursday 16 February 2012

"The Election for Beadle" and a change of plans

Yes, I have decided that I am changing the order in which I am going to read the Sketches by Boz. After all, I was not alive when they were appearing in the different magazines, so I'd better read them as they are intended to be read by a 21st-century audience. I reached that decision today, after reading "The Election for Beadle" (SB 4), originally published as "Sketches of London No 16" in The Evening Chronicle on  14th July, 1835. Yesterday, when I read "The Four Sisters", I already had the feeling that I was treading on ground that was unknown to me but which Dickens's readers must have known beforehand. The parish of which the narrator talked about had already been the subject of other sketches. Given that the Delphi Classics edition only includes 25 sketches in the section "Original Published Order of the Sketches", something must be amiss. Today, in "The Election for Beadle", I had no doubt. Four paragraphs into the story, the narrator, having introduced one character, tells us that "His great opponent in public life is Captain Purday, the old naval officer on half-pay, to whom we have already introduced our readers." There! No Captain Purday has been introduced to me so far, so I presume he must have appeared in one of the first two sketches. Therefore, tomorrow I start reading the Sketches by Boz from the very beginning, with the section entitled "Our Parish". I'll revisit the beadle election and the four sisters but I am sure to meet many other characters which I should like to be acquainted with already.

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