Charles Dickens is "the greatest novelist in English," according to Dickens Universe Director John Jordan.
Sitting outside at a picnic table underneath the redwood trees near UCSC’s Humanities Department, I chat with John Jordan and JoAnna Rottke, the director and project coordinator of the Dickens Universe, an annual conference being held on campus this week. The sun shines in our eyes and a group of children plays loudly with hula hoops nearby, but these two are delighted to be outside.
“We live the Dickens way,” says Rottke with a jovial laugh.
The Dickens Universe, held on the USCS campus for one week every summer since 1981, is “a scholarly conference, not a festival, although it is probably the most fun scholarly conference anywhere,” says Rottke. She says people often confuse it for various Dickens festivals and fairs that occur, often at Christmastime—costumed, “commercial” endeavors, she says dismissively.
The Dickens Universe brings together around 300 Dickens scholars and fans for one week of full-time Dickens immersion, focused on a different Dickens novel each year. (Recent conferences have been built around David Copperfield and Oliver Twist; this year it’s Bleak House.) Daily lectures and scholarly discussions are a staple of the event, as are tea parties, parties hosted by graduate students and even a Victorian dance party that, last year, featured three costumed Miss Havishams (the wealthy spinster in Great Expectations).
“It’s not a festival, but it has aspects that are festive,” admits Jordan, a sprightly fellow who fiddles with a twig while we chat and looks as if he’s perpetually on the verge of letting out a delighted giggle. “It is a summer camp, book club, festival and scholarly conference all kind of rolled into one. It’s at once a serious thing and a fun thing.”
Jordan says Dickens, aside from being “the greatest novelist in English, for one thing,” is special because his work is appealing to both scholars and the general public.
“Steinbeck, for example, is popular with the general reader but not as highly esteemed among scholars,” he says. By the same token, “Dickens as a writer is fun. I don’t think you could do something like this about James Joyce or Thomas Hardy.”
More than 35 universities worldwide send participants to the Dickens Universe, from as far away as Israel and India to Australia. Marriages have come about from relationships that formed at the Dickens Universe. A woman died at the Universe once.
“We subsequently found out that she was estranged from her family and didn’t really have a lot of friends…This was a really special place where she gathered with people of like mind. We were kind of glad that she could die in our presence, really. Among people who enjoyed her.”
One year, a séance was held to contact Dickens who, if alive today, would be 200 this year.
“The people who attended it claimed that they all experienced something, which they’ve never really shared,” says Rottke.
“They were sworn to secrecy,” says Jordan.
This year, thanks in part to a recent New Yorker article, the Universe has enjoyed higher registration rates from members of the general public, and 55 percent of the people coming this year are brand new to the Universe. About 100 attendees this year will be professional scholars and graduate students, and 200 will be members of the general public. Jordan eagerly anticipates the lessons both groups can teach each other and foresees no turf wars. Far from it.
“People who like Dickens are nice people. They like to have fun. They like to eat and drink and party and talk. Conviviality is part of the texture of Dickens’ novels. And part of the spirit of what we try to do.”
The Dickens Universe began Sunday and continues until Friday, Aug. 3.
