Literalily Speaking: Dickensian, A Literary Mashup, Well Done

Its Christmas vacation, but leading up to it the weather has been miserable in Maine. Fall was actually winter, and now that it is winter, the weather is acting a bit more fallish. This drop in the temps put us into hibernation mode a tad bit earlier than usual and we wanted to curl up and find something to watch. One of our Christmas favorites is A Christmas Carol. This year we watched what I think was the very first film version. It was very grainy and didn't even show every ghost. Everyone who loves this story has their favorite movie version.

There are many published
versions of the beloved classic
A Christmas Carol. 

In scrolling through the streaming choices one evening I spotted something called Dickensian (2015-16), and we gave it a try. Being an English literature nut, the show instantly brought me back to English literature class and my early forays into reading the tomes of Charles Dickens.

In Dickensian you will meet the characters of Dickens's famous novels as their stories unfold in the same London neighborhood and their lives intersect daily. It starts out with a whodunit. The main story focuses on a murder mystery (I won't reveal whose murder) on Christmas Eve, and throughout the series, Dickens characters are called into question by Inspector Bucket (who is from Bleak House, a Dickens I have not read yet).

The series gives an inside look into the lives and homes of the Cratchits of The Christmas Carol, the Barbarys of Bleak House, and the Havishams of Great Expectations, and the dockside hovel of Fagan, as well as the curiosities of The Old Curiosity Shop. Other characters play minor roles but have their own stories to tell. There are secrets and surprises, backstories and other pathsways taken that you never knew about Dickens's beloved characters.It is wonderfully done without straying completely from Dickens's originals, and it emphasizes all the themes of Dickens--poverty, human and child rights, as well as rich versus poor. At the core are classic themes of money and status and how it drives personal decisions and society.

My streaming service allowed us only about ten episodes. IMBD and Wikipedia assure me that 20 were made, but even only after ten episodes, most of the story lines wrapped up. New stories opened up at the conclusion of number 10 though, such as when we realized the bug-eyed sweetheart vagrant child seen walking away with Dodger is..., oh I'll let you watch it for yourself!

The show has inspired my husband to hunt for a copy of Great Expectations (mine went missing or was donated years ago), and my son was asking questions about why certain things happened and he declares that an old woman living in her wedding dress forever is the creepiest thing he's ever heard of.

Old classics are classics because the stories they tell are neither old or new but always with us, and when they are remade, the old stories remind us of shared values. When these old tales interest someone who is unfamiliar with them, interests them in reading the old novels or discovering more about a character or the writer, than I'm all for it. Bring on the tried and true classics!

Viewer alert: This series is not for young children. There is some violence and adult-themed conversations (more like double entendres that older teens and adults will get but children should not, I would hope) and implied sex scenes, all suggestive but fairly tame.

This Dickens-inspired movie
 is worth watching.

For a list of all Dickens novels, see:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/239579.Charles_Dickens

For another redo, watch The Man Who Invented Christmas, a creative story about Dickens and his ghosts that helped him write A Christmas Carol.