Most of us are aware of the work of Charles Dickens. Even small children will have some knowledge of Scrooge at Christmas time even if that knowledge has been imparted through the Muppet’s version of ‘A Christmas Carol’. Some of Dickens’ characters are more familiar than others, and because of the many illustrations, films and television adaptations we have pictorial reference as well as the written word. What I have found fascinating whilst researching this play, was how many of Dickens’ characters directly relate to people that he knew in his lifetime. The women were of particular interest and started me thinking about how our own memories are formed through our experiences. At times our memory is selective, whitewashing incidences and erasing detail. At other times, we paint our memories with a very large, colourful paintbrush.

Dickens’ early childhood was generally very happy when he lived with his parents in Chatham . The fact that his father was repetitively in debt did not affect the boy, Charles other than the inconvenience of frequent home moves. It was later when his family were in serious debt that Charles experienced one of the most terrible childhood miseries. He was sent to work in "Warren’s Blacking Factory". A rat infested, sweat house where his only friend was a small boy called Fagin. When his father had an argument with the factory owner and took his son back home, his mother on the next morning went back to the factory to beg they take Charles back. He never forgave his mother.

Later, when he fell in love for the first time to a young girl called Maria Beadnell, his pride was to be dented once more. Maria loved to flirt but when it came to the crunch, she rejected him and laughed about him with her friends.

When he did get married it was to a young girl called Catherine Hogarth. Life was bliss to begin with as Catherine’s young sister Mary came to live with them. Dickens was in bliss, he could parade two young beauties, one on each arm. But, after a theatre trip one night, Mary (aged 17) died suddenly. Unknown to anyone, she had a brain tumour.

Charles was devastated.

He remained married to Catherine for twenty years, and together they had twelve children, but as Catherine grew older Charles became more and more intolerant of her. Things were to get to such a pitch that eventually, Charles walled up the partition in their bedroom and only allowed Catherine down to entertain friends. Catherine was at last disposed of, given an allowance of £600 a year and one of their children for company. That child was a boy called Charles.

Dickens was having an affair with another 17 year old, Ellen Ternan, and was positively outraged when he was criticised in the press for it. He was at this time on his grand tour of England , reading from his novels and traveling around the country at break neck speed. He was making himself ill and had been warned by the doctors to stop. But stubborn as ever, he carried on with his one man show, the actor at last. One of his favourite recitals involved the death of Nancy which was guaranteed to upset his health. It has been suggested that by doing this rather gruesome murder scene he was showing his hatred of women. It is hard to say. But what we can see is how his extraordinary life is reflected in his work. And the women in his novels show us how he felt towards the women in his life.