From the commencement of "The Pickwick Papers," and of Charles Dickens's
married life, dates the commencement of his literary life and his sudden
world-wide fame. And this year saw the beginning of many of those
friendships which he most valued, and of which he had most reason to be
proud, and which friendships were ended only by death.
The first letters which we have been able to procure to Mr. Macready and
Mr. Harley will be found under this date. In January, 1837, he was
living in Furnival's Inn, where his first child, a son, was born. It was
an eventful year to him in many ways. He removed from Furnival's Inn to
Doughty Street in March, and here he sustained the first great grief of
his life. His young sister-in-law, Mary Hogarth, to whom he was
devotedly attached, died very suddenly, at his house, on the 7th May. In
the autumn of this year he took lodgings at Broadstairs. This was his
first visit to that pleasant little watering-place, of which he became
very fond, and whither he removed for the autumn months with all his
household, for many years in succession.
Besides the monthly numbers of "Pickwick," which were going on through
this year until November, when the last number appeared, he had
commenced "Oliver Twist," which was appearing also monthly, in the
magazine called "Bentley's Miscellany," long before "Pickwick" was
completed. And during this year he had edited, for Mr. Bentley, "The
Life of Grimaldi," the celebrated clown. To this book he wrote himself
only the preface, and altered and rearranged the autobiographical MS.
which was in Mr. Bentley's possession.
The letter to Mr. Harley, which bears no date, but must have been
written either in 1836 or 1837, refers to a farce called "The Strange
Gentleman" (founded on one of the "Sketches," called the "Great
Winglebury Duel"), which he wrote expressly for Mr. Harley, and which
was produced at the St. James's Theatre, under the management of Mr.
Braham. The only other piece which he wrote for that theatre was the
story of an operetta, called "The Village Coquettes," the music of which
was composed by Mr. John Hullah.
[Sidenote: Mr. J. P. Harley.]