A brief but curious story of Charles Dickens

The writer kept ravens as pets. His most beloved raven was named Grip. After its death, Dickens replaced the raven with another one, also called Grip. When the second raven died, Dickens stuffed the bird.

Charles Dickens and heiress Angella Coutts set up and effectively managed “Urania Cottage”. It was a rehabilitation home for homeless women, ex-prisoners, and prostitutes. The main goal of the cottage was to reintegrate these women into Victorian society.

Dickens always slept facing north, he thought it would help him stimulate his creativity. What’s more, he constantly combed his hair and rearranged furniture.

When the writer was 45, Charles Dickens was a co-writer of a play called “The Frozen Deep”. He fell in love with one of the actresses hired to act in the production. Ellen Ternan was only 18 years. Their affair became the end of his marriage to Catherine Hogarth. He left his wife and their children.

The writer often modified his plot and character development based on such feedback. For example, when his wife’s chiropodist expressed distress at the way Miss Mowcher in “David Copperfield” seemed to reflect her disabilities, Dickens improved the character with positive features.