A Bower of Ballads: The Potentials of Popular Print in Our Mutual Friend

Charlotte Becker, Assistant Director of the English Broadside Ballad Archive (EBBA) at the University of California, and Lecturer in the English Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, reflects on the ballads in the second instalment of Our Mutual Friend.

Chapter 5 of Our Mutual Friend is entitled ‘Boffin’s Bower,’ but the chapter begins in a far less Comfortable and Fashionable location: Silas Wegg’s station for selling fruits, nuts, gingerbread, and halfpenny ballads.  Our narrator comically details the discomforts of Wegg’s corner station, from the constantly inclement weather to the questionable condition of his edible wares.  Yet Mr. Boffin, in contrast with the narrator, is wholeheartedly delighted by Wegg’s station:

‘Lard!’ exclaimed Noddy Boffin, in a tone of great enjoyment, as he settled himself down, still nursing his stick like a baby, ‘it’s a pleasant place, this! And then to be shut in on each side, with these ballads, like so many book-leaf blinkers! Why, it’s delightful!’ (37)

Our Mutual Friend Scholarly Pages

The Dickens Universe at the University of California, Santa Cruz, has put together this fantastic page of scholarly resources on Our Mutual Friend, which includes maps, galleries of illustrations, London walking tours, and a wealth of articles on various aspects of the novel, its publication and its historical context. You may want to explore this rich resource before we begin reading and blogging in May.

The Dickens Universe will be looking at Our Mutual Friend at their annual conference this year, from 3rd-8th August in Santa Cruz, California. We’d like to welcome all of the Dickens Universe delegates who will be joining us on our serial reading adventure!