Writing Charles Dickens' biography is like writing five biographies. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
After Shakespeare, Dickens is the great creator of characters, multiple characters. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Dickens was a part of how the whole celebration of Christmas as we know it today emerged during the 19th century. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
As a young man, Dickens worked as a reporter in the House of Commons and hated it. He felt that all politicians… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Dickens had more energy than anyone in the world, and he expected his sons to be like him, and they couldn't be. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I have been fascinated by Dickens worshippers who strenuously deny that he did anything wrong in relation to his wife, even though… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
'A Christmas Carol' has been described as the most perfect of Dickens's works and as a quintessential heart-warming story, and it is… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I've behaved badly in my life. I hope I haven't behaved as badly as Dickens! In a way, if you're a woman,… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
When you live with Dickens for years, reading him and trying to present him as faithfully as you can, you can't fail… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Dickens never joined a political party nor put forward a political programme. He was a writer who rightly saw his power as… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Everyone finds their own version of Charles Dickens. The child-victim, the irrepressibly ambitious young man, the reporter, the demonic worker, the tireless… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
As he approached his 28th birthday in February 1840, Dickens knew himself to be famous, successful and tired. He needed a rest,… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
“Poor Nelly, she was not to know that fashions in sin change as much as other fashions.” — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I continually get more information about a subject after the book has been published. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I was working at the 'Evening Standard' when I heard that there was a job going as deputy literary editor on the 'New Statesman.'… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I've behaved badly in my life. I hope I haven't behaved as badly as Dickens! In a way, if you're a woman, you're not… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Simon Russell Beale is an incomparable speaker of Shakespeare and a superb all-round actor. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
I sometimes think that, since I started writing biographies, I've had more of a life in books than I have had in my real… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Poetry was one of the things that interested me most as I was growing up. I used to write it in my head all… — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
Biographers search for traces, for evidence of activity, for signs of movement, for letters, for diaries, for photographs. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
You become more tolerant when you become older. You're not interested in rapping people over the knuckles; you're interested in understanding them. — Claire Tomalin Copy Share Image
