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While submitting contributions to the Monthly Magazine, Dickens formed his pen-name – ‘Boz’. He juggled parliamentary reporting (he was adept at shorthand) with creative writing, submitting additional ‘sketches’ to the Evening Chronicle, edited by his future father-in-law George Hogarth. Dickens was an excellent observer, and his Sketches by Boz include memorable descriptions of people and places, especially of London. ‘Thoughts about People’ is but one, ably illustrated by George Cruikshank, the ‘modern Hogarth’, who was equally secretive about his personal life (unbeknown to all, he had a mistress by whom he fathered 11 illegitimate children).

[Thoughts about People. Illustration by George Cruikshank, opposite page 90 from Charles Dickens's Sketches by Boz. Illustrative of Every-day Life and Every-day People.]

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In December 1833 Dickens’s first published literary work appeared in the Monthly Magazine; it was entitled ‘A Dinner at Poplar Walk’ (later called ‘Mr Minns and his Cousin’). His first book was Sketches by Boz, and it contained sketches and tales written during 1833 and 1836, including the above ‘Mr Minns’. On display is the Second Series edition, which contained stories not in the First Series of February 1836. Published by John Macrone, the two volume set was illustrated by George Cruikshank, who, along with Dickens, is depicted as a flag waver in this engraved title page. In 1834, Dickens was 22 and a little known Parliamentary reporter; by 1837 he was famous. Sketches by Boz, well-received on publication, did much to establish his reputation.

[Vauxhall Gardens by Day (left) and Sketches by Boz- Second Series (right). Illustrated frontispiece and title page by George Cruikshank, from Charles Dickens's Sketches by Boz. Illustrative of Every-day Life, and Every-day People. Second Series.]

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