In some of his latest books,
as _Great Expectations_, 1861, and _Our Mutual Friend_, 1865, there are
signs of a decline. This showed itself in an unnatural exaggeration of
characters and motives, and a painful straining after humorous effects;
faults, indeed, from which Dickens was never wholly free. There was a
histrionic side to him, which came out in his fondness for private
theatricals, in which he exhibited remarkable talent, and in the
dramatic action which he introduced into the delightful public readings
from his works that he gave before vast audiences all over the United
Kingdom, and in his two visits to America. It is not surprising, either,
to learn that upon the stage his preference was for melodrama and farce.
His own serious writing was always dangerously close to the
melodramatic, and his humor to the farcical. There is much false art,
bad taste, and even vulgarity in Dickens. He was never quite a
gentleman, and never succeeded well in drawing gentlemen or ladies. In
the region of low comedy he is easily the most original, the most
inexhaustible, the most wonderful, of modern humorists. Creations such
as Mrs. Nickleby, Mr. Micawber, Sam Weller, Sairy Gamp, take rank with
Falstaff and Dogberry; while many others, like Dick Swiveller, Stiggins,
Chadband, Mrs.
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