Issue 1: Intersections

The Offstage Theatre: Theatrical Intersections in Dickens's Novels

Anna Dever

Charles Dickens famously asserted that, 'every writer, though he may not adopt dramatic form writes, in effect, for the stage.'1 The theatre was evidently an intrinsic component in Dickens's writing, where his enthusiasm for and interest in the theatre has been well documented by literary critics in the last century.2 However, Dickens's fiction also explores the world offstage. This is a strange world, one where clowns are not performing jocundities, but are frightening beggars, a place that becomes a 'maze of dust…on the wrong side of the pattern of the universe.'3My paper will focus on this world offstage, a place that can reveal social realities and strangeness behind performances.

The dimensions of the 'offstage' are twofold: one, it can be an area situated backstage in the wings of a theatrical spectacle, or two, it can become a more abstract term for anything that advances beyond the stage, into social performance and performativity. In terms of the latter, it would seem that we are constantly acting in some way or another, as Park explains, 'It is probably no mere historical accident that the word 'person', in its first meaning, is a mask. It is rather a recognition of the fact that everyone is always and everywhere, more or less consciously, playing a role'4 adhering to the famous Shakespearean world-as-stage analogy where, 'All the world's a stage, and the men and women merely players.'5 Backstage areas, however, frequent Dickens's texts, where Sketches by Boz (1836), The Pickwick Papers (1836-7), Nicholas Nickleby (1838-9) and Little Dorrit (1855-7) include episodes situated in the wings of their respective theatres.6 In terms of spatiality, 'backstage' is situated in between onstage and offstage, therefore becoming a liminal space 'betwixt and between' performance and authenticity or supposed reality. Theatre for Dickens, and for the Victorians, was primarily a force of entertainment, claiming, 'I tried to recollect…whether I had ever been in any theatre in my life from which I had not brought away some pleasant association, however poor the theatre…and I protest…I could not remember even one.'7 Yet, even entertainment flirts with liminal discourse, wherein 'entertainment' stems from the French 'entretenir', meaning literally 'to hold apart', creating a space where the liminal can operate and play.8

In Little Dorrit, Amy and Fanny enter the 'maze of dust' backstage as they travel behind the scenes of the Covent Garden theatre finding themselves on 'the wrong side of the pattern of the universe' (LD p.196). There is an ethereal quality to this space, where 'gaslight' and 'daylight intermingle' surreally; a place of vast confusion where, 'people were tumbling over one another.' (LD p.196). Similarly a visit to the 'wrong side of the pattern of the universe' in The Pickwick Papers becomes a frightening experience:

(I) was crossing the stage on my way out, when he tapped me on the shoulder. Never shall I forget the repulsive sight that met my eye when I turned round. He was dressed for the pantomime, in all the absurdity of a clown's costume…His voice was hollow and tremulous, as he took me aside, and in broken words recounted a catalogue of sickness and privations, terminating, as usual, with an urgent request for the loan of a trifling sum of money. I put a few shillings in his hand, and, as I turned away, I heard a roar of laughter which followed his first tumble onto the stage. (PP p.34).

This glimpse from backstage therefore reveals a disparate self, here, between clown and beggar. Theatricality was a troubling idea for the Victorians, where the notion that the self could change and mutate was an idea best left onstage, as, 'the theatre, that alluring pariah within Victorian culture, came to stand for all the dangerous potential of theatricality to invade the authenticity of the best self.'9 In this sense Victorian theatricality became indicative of the post-romantic self and the failure of Romantic egoism, where the self was no longer complete, but rather subject to change.

Theatricality therefore suggested an ideology of the limitless self, the stage becoming an arena of immense possibility or a transformative zone. However, the stage is not always limitless, but is potentially imprisoning where Hard Times and Little Dorrit examine the limits of performance in regards to carceral logic and theatrical discourse on and offstage.

Little Dorrit and Hard Times examine the world offstage. In doing so, both texts use different modes of theatre: Little Dorrit allows a glimpse into forms of dance and opera, whereas Hard Times incorporates a different set of theatrical dynamics in the form of the circus. Both texts also express a disparity between on and offstage appearance. In Hard Times, the circus does not become a source of active ring-side 'amuthement', it instead seeps into the social world, infecting the narrative with a series of horrific metaphors. Similarly, the backstage area in Little Dorrit does not cohere with Maggy's dreams of a theatrical 'evn'ly place' (LD p143) it is instead a dank pit of unmitigated darkness, filled with mould-encrusted actors, who are trapped in-between performances (LD p.196). In this sense the theatre may not be, as Maggy claims 'as good as a hospital' (LD p.143) but instead may be another heterotopic zone in the form of a prison. Michel Foucault connects acting to the prison, wherein he explains that prison cells become, 'like so many cages, so many small theatres, in which each actor is alone, perfectly individualized and constantly visible.'10 This paper will discuss the various notions of 'stage trappings' as performers, social or theatrical, find themselves trapped into their roles, where if 'all the world is a stage' then perhaps there are no limits, only ongoing performance, with no escape to an ultimate offstage zone.

Different types of theatre employ different dynamics and hence incorporate different backstage/offstage rules. Stoddart indicates that the circus, for instance, differs to other forms of theatre in the way that it is, 'always undeniably a live and fully visible spectacle in which no backstage or side-stage tricks are possible'.11 Instead the circus invades all the action in the novel becoming an endless theatre, running riot in a series of circus-like themes, metaphors and structures. This circus imagery is invasive, infiltrating all aspects of the text, seemingly disrupting the apparently clear binary between fact and fancy. Gradgrind's educational establishment may pride itself on a world of stability, as Gradgrind assures, 'Now what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life' (HT p.1). However, even the school begins to resemble a circus of facts, where students are taught and trained according to Gradgrind's factual ring-mastery. Sedgwick indicates that teaching has certain performative aspects, where pedagogy enforces a structure of teacher and student, performer and audience and thus employs a set of roles to play.12 Gradgrind even rehearses his role, offstage, or out of the class room, where he, 'always mentally introduced himself, whether to his private circle of acquaintance, or to the public in general' (HT p.2). The students perform remembering facts and routines, where at one point Louisa admits, 'Father, you have trained me from my cradle' (HT p.205). Furthermore, this element of 'training' is not always useful, but can sometimes be detrimental as seen in Louisa's declaration, 'You have trained me so well, that I never dreamed a child's dream' (HT p.95). This draws parallels with the young circus performers in Sleary's troupe, who are similarly trapped into a role at a young age. Similar to Louisa, the circus child is trapped into a training routine at an early age, 'tied on a horse at two years old and made a will at twelve' (HT p.34). The use of the word 'tied', enforces the sense of stage trappings, where both children are put into different modes of work and routine seemingly without a choice.

Circus imagery, as Stoddart examines, also creates parallels with the Coketown Hands where the urban factories are described as 'fairy tale palaces', ones with 'monstrous serpents of smoke' and 'melancholy mad elephants' (HT pp.64-5).13 Even the very positioning of the factories employs a theatrical curtain, where they are, 'shrouded in a veil of mist and rain' (HT p.65). As Truzzi explains, 'The circus is a travelling and organised display of animals and skilled performances', set, 'before an audience encircling these activities'.14 The factory starts to resemble the circus, where the Hands are the 'skilled performers' performing their monotonous roles in an 'organised display.' The 'animals' in the Coketown factories are far from spectacular, they are instead, 'melancholy mad' and 'monstrous', becoming a dark imitation of the circus. Indeed, the Coketown Hands and the Circus troupe are both sets of performers, both performing for economic gain for the purpose of a select audience.

However, one might argue that the circus performers have a type of freedom in their roles, free to move from place to place. Critics have discussed the possible Bakhtinian, or carnivalesque readings of the text, which are indeed fruitful readings and raise interesting points regarding polyphony in the novel, as 'Hands' and Sleary employ colloquialisms and use tampered dialogue.15 Yet, Hard Times rather becomes a rejection of Bakhtinian ideals. The circus folk can perhaps invert the social order, as a transient entertainment force who insist that they are, 'not stationary here, being but comers and goers anywhere' (HT p.32). However, it is made abundantly clear that the workers of Coketown (though they may resemble the circus folk in their, albeit, much darker 'fairy palaces' and 'factories of elephants') are far more restricted in their social roles.

In an attempt to mimic the movement of the circus Stephen Blackpool flees to the outskirts of Coketown. On moving away from the 'black mist' (HT p.251) of Coketown, the setting resembles the positioning of the circus, set on a 'neutral ground upon the outskirts of the town, which was neither town nor country' (HT p.10). By leaving Coketown, Stephen attempts to escape from the performing role of 'the Hand', however, in doing so he becomes a performer in a macabre imitation of the circus. Stoddart agrees that this scene is wrought with circus imagery, where the 'rings', the 'rope', the suspense of revealing and concealing of the body down the 'old hell shaft', and most importantly the inclusion of a blood-lusting audience are all components, dark as it may seem, that are found in the circus. 16 In his attempt to leave the stage, to occupy the 'offstage' area, he is duly punished in ironic theatrical form and is reminded, with his life to pay for it, that he is doomed to perform, even to his death. In doing so he fails to reach an offstage space, or perhaps death is the only offstage, the only true exit from performance.

The circus is 'a live and fully visible spectacle', yet, interestingly, in both Little Dorrit and Hard Times we never actually see the respective stage or circus. Little Dorrit focuses on the sounds of the dance, where Amy stays backstage listening to the, 'sound of music and the sound of dancing feet' (LD p.196) heard from the stage above Similarly in The Pickwick Papers, the narrator turns his back on the stage explaining, 'as I turned away, I heard the roar of laughter, which followed his tumble onto the stage' (PP p.34; emphasis author's own), as he focuses on the sounds of the audience. The circus in Hard Times is both illusive and elusive, in the way that no one ever sees the circus; it is curiously absent from the text, where the children and the reader try to peep into its hidden world of wonder (HT p. 16). The 'visible' circus doesn't belong to the harsh world of facts, in that, 'You saw nothing in Coketown but what was severely workful' (HT p.20). Indeed, in terms of narrative positioning, the theatre/circus, in both texts, paradoxical as it may seem, is set offstage. In this way the circus in Hard Times hovers between absence and presence, similar to Sissy's absent father, Signor Jupe. Indeed, Jupe and the circus have much in common – they are both never seen, but are both essential catalysts for action in the texts, where Sissy Jupe – the clown's daughter – becomes the drive for most of the narrative and plot. The characters talk about Jupe, just as they talk about the circus, and although we cannot see either, they both leave a trace of themselves behind. The episode in the 'Pegasus Arms' allows us to see a trace of the lost clown, where Gradgrind and Bounderby encounter Jupe's costume, strewn across the floor:

The white night cap, embellished with two peacock feathers and a pigtail bolt upright, in which Signor Jupe had that very afternoon enlivened various performances (…) hung upon a nail; but no other portion of his wardrobe, or other token of himself or his pursuits was to be seen anywhere. (HT p.26).

This skeletal form of the clown connects succinctly to the remains of the circus found at the end of the text, where the characters, on finally reaching the circus only encounter, the 'skeleton of Sleary's circus'(HT p.264). 17

Another character that engages with this absence / presence dichotomy is Stephen Blackpool's wife. Drawing interesting parallels with Bronte's Jane Eyre, the insane wife here is kept locked away, behind the curtained bed rail, hidden from recognition. Indeed there is something curiously theatrical about the image of the woman behind the curtain, whose fate, like Jupe's, is strangely absent from the text. Furthermore, the image of the bed-curtain creates a proverbial theatrical frame, where the hand creeping out of the curtain is again reflective of the instability between stage and offstage. Like the traces of the circus and Jupe's skeletal costume, it seems that elements of the theatrical cannot be kept entirely absent. Mrs. Blackpool cannot effectively be sanctioned into the unseen region, where she instead creeps through curtains, potentially invading the affair between Stephen and Rachael.

Again fact and fancy are not separate entities; they rather conflate, somewhat surreally and horrifically, in the way that Mrs Blackpool's identity hovers between reality and illusion, between fact and fancy. A very similar scene occurs in Oliver Twist, where the image of the Jew at the window, threatening to invade the countryside idyll, becomes a distorted image, similarly hovering between dreams and reality. It is interesting that both of these illustrations form a similar type of theatrical framing. Where Mrs. Blackpool is positioned behind the bed curtains in Hard Times, Monks and Fagin are instead bordered by the window frame, suspended between inside and outside, between reality and imagination, between on and offstage perhaps. However, we are never entirely certain of the reality of either of these events. In Hard Times, Stephen is caught between dreams and reality, where he utters, 'am I wakin or dreamin this dreadfo' night?' (HT p.82). Oliver Twist is similarly situated, as, 'reality and imagination are curiously blended that it is afterwards almost a matter of impossibility to separate the two' (OT p.222). These flirtations between reality and the imagination also have theatrical qualities, where theatre, and indeed the realist novel, resemble liminal spaces, hovering 'betwixt and between' reality and fiction.18 The scene becomes ethereal, as Stephen watches the action with disbelief:

He thought he saw the curtain move. He looked again and he was sure it moved. He saw a hand come forth and grope about a little. Then the curtain moved more perceptibly and the woman in the bed put it back, and sat up. (HT p.81).

Furthermore, the wife's movement becomes a sort of performance, one that enthrals Stephen, placing him into an audience-like role, 'All this time, as if a spell were on him, he was motionless and powerless, except to watch her.' (HT p.82). In this sense, we see a double example of 'stage trappings', wherein both Mrs. Blackpool (the performer), and Stephen (the audience), are locked into their respective roles. 'Stage trappings' therefore engage with carceral logic, where, according to Foucauldian discourse, 'the gaoler (is) made watcher…and the prisoner (is) induced to enact the corresponding role of the watched.'19 In the theatre the stare of the audience is similarly unavoidable, as it is, according to Goffman, their presence that ensures a performative dynamic, claiming, 'no audience, no performance.'20 Little Dorrit is similarly aware of the on-going 'stare' of the audience, where the opening of the text emphasises the invasive 'stare':

Everything in Marseilles, and about Marseilles, had stared at the fervid sky, and been stared at in return, until a staring habit had become universal there. Strangers were stared out of countenance by staring white houses, staring white walls, staring white streets, staring tracts of arid road, staring hills from which verdure was burnt away (LD p.1).

 As we can see nature is also complicit in this strange staring match, where buildings, nature, people, houses walls, streets are all aware of the 'staring habit'. However, the penetrating gaze is not always wanted in the text, where at one point Little Dorrit whispers, 'I wish you had not watched me' (LD p.71). Yet, as in the theatre, the gaze is inescapable. Indeed, the fact that the text allows the reader and Amy access to the backstage regions of the theatre portrays something that should, in accordance with the theatrical spectacle, be completely out of view. Hence, backstage areas allow another layer of surveillance, making clear what should be 'unseen', clear for all to see. Actors onstage can seemingly escape to the wings of the stage and can escape momentarily from the gaze of the audience and the frame of illusion, whereas it is made clear that the characters in the novel cannot escape the 'stare' of the reader so easily. The reader is the ultimate panopticon, staring pervasively into the fictional universe in the pages of the novel. Indeed, their only escape may be to leave the novel entirely. However, leaving the frame of the novel is a troubling concept fuelled by marginalisation and existential dilemmas.

For instance, if Signor Jupe is absent from the text, then how can we clarify his existence? Although his costumed shell may be left behind, we have no recollection as to where he has gone, as his fate (like Mrs Blackpool's) is also curiously absent from the text. However, Mrs Blackpool's offstage position is managed and controlled by Stephen and Rachael, who attempt to conceal her from sight, where, 'Rachael's hands put a curtain up, so she was screened from his eyes' (HT p.77) mirroring Gradgrind's attempts to hide the circus.

The image of the Mrs Blackpool's hand reaching out through the frame also employs a 'trompe l'oeil' effect, wherein “the trompe l'oeil” approach to representation serves as a device to engage the spectator in a theatrical debate on the aesthetics and ethics of performance'.22A similar effect of attempting to escape the artful frame is depicted in Pere Borrell del Caso's 'Escaping Criticism,' as both Mrs Blackpool and the man in Borrell del Caso's painting attempt to escape from their respective frames. However, Stephen and Rachael make sure that escape is only an illusion, as they lock Mrs Blackpool into her frame, imprisoned between absence and presence, effectively trapped in her 'in-between-ness'. Liminality and the carceral thus conflate in these texts, where a similar liminal prison is conveyed in Little Dorrit. Theatrical metaphors are yet again invasive, where Amy's uncle, Frederick Dorrit's backstage antics haunt him more than he may realise. At first glance Frederick is an arbitrary character in the text, 'a poor useless creature fit for nothing, and whom no one would have missed' (LD p.545). However, Frederick, in terms of role playing also has a very important part to play, as he provides the link to Little Dorrit's fortune. The backstage area interestingly becomes synonymous with Frederick's role in the novel, playing his clarionet backstage, he also embodies a liminal space between being partless and having an integral part to play, as, 'He never on any occasion, had any other part in what was going on other than the part written for the clarionet; in private life where there was no part for the clarionet, he had no part at all' (LD p.198). Emphasis on the 'part written' suggests that his performance corresponds to writing, not only in the form of music notes, but also connects to his 'part written' in the novel, in his narrative purpose.

Indeed Frederick does have an extremely important part to play, his part, dark as it may seem, is to die so that Little Dorrit can claim her inheritance and marry Arthur Clennam. Ultimately Frederick's death is essential to sustain the growth of the individual, here Amy, to support the 'bildungsroman' format. Frederick with his constantly 'bowed head', pre-emptively rehearses his part, 'playing dead' where, 'he was dead without being aware of it' (LD p.198). There is, therefore, a troubling sense of reification here, as characters must be sacrificed in order to ensure the novel's purpose. This links to Marx's idea of the social role, wherein some characters must be commoditised if they are to sustain a capitalist system, where, 'it is the reification of persons and the personification of things that traps the individual in the rigid framework of roles.'23 Both texts adhere to this notion, where workers/performers such as the Coketown workers or Frederick Dorrit must operate in a certain way to satisfy either the capitalist regime of the Coketown factories, or to sustain a literary form. Furthermore, it is interesting that the clarionet is an aural device, one that is not seen but rather heard. The emphasis on sound links Frederick Dorrit ever more to the backstage, where like the reader and the children in Hard Times he is prohibited from seeing the stage, being 'confidently believed never to have seen a play' (LD p.198; emphasis author's own).

Poor Frederick Dorrit never makes it to the stage, and is instead trapped in the wings of performance, ever answering, 'I'm coming! I'm coming!' being, 'in that place six nights a week for many years' (LD p.198), waiting for his final deathly curtain call. The idea that Frederick is kept backstage associates the offstage area as a place of marginalisation, a place where useless or arbitrary performers are kept hidden. Similarly, Mrs. Blackpool is effectively silenced behind the curtains of her bed, to keep her from potentially invading the affair between Rachael and Stephen. Both texts spark debate over the 'aesthetics and ethics of performance' adhering to Elizabeth Burns's notion of theatricality and marginalisation, explaining that some performers are positioned on, 'the margin of events…because, though present they have not yet been offered a part or have not learnt it sufficiently well to enable them to join the actors.'24 Amy Dorrit is also kept backstage, 'on the margin of events' where she, like her Uncle, struggles to join the actors on the bourgeoisie stage. When attempting to adapt to his upper class role, Frederick is stripped of his clarionet, 'he never played it, now it was no longer his means of getting bread' (LD p.401) only reinforcing the idea that, 'where there was no part for the clarionet, he had no part at all' (LD p.198).

Again stage and offstage roles mirror one another, where Fanny, for instance, the talented actress, can not only perform on the Covent Garden stage with ease, she can also swiftly adapt to her new upper class role, where she, 'burst upon the scene, completely arrayed for her new part' (LD p.502). Frederick and Amy, however, are given costumes and a new setting to indulge in their new roles, but they struggle to play them. There may be 'great adaptability in Fanny' (LD p.395), but Amy struggles to adapt, for, 'the sense of not being grand enough for her place in the ceremonies was always an uneasy thing' (LD p.388). Similarly Frederick succumbs to his 'stage trappings' where he must perform the part that corresponds to his costume: 'he wore the clothes they gave him, and performed some abulations as a sacrifice to the family credit, and went where he was taken, with a certain patient animal enjoyment' (LD p.382). Fanny may be able to perform her role of the bourgeoisie efficiently but Amy and Frederick are yet again stuck backstage, in the stage of transition.

Transitional stages, according to Victor Turner are part and parcel of liminal discourse, where, 'The passage from low to high status is through a limbo of statuslessness.'25 This 'limbo of statuslessness' seems to resemble the 'maze of dust' in the wings of the Covent Garden theatre, where Amy cannot find her way to the theatrical, or social stage, she rather gets lost in the maze of transition. However, this transitional stage is far from a fortunate awakening into riches and happiness, it is instead yet another prison, in that, 'the same society in which they lived, greatly resembled a superior sort of Marshalsea' (LD p.428). It seems that despite advancing socially, Little Dorrit cannot escape her trappings, where as Kincaid admits, 'without trappings they vanish.'26 This is also applicable to Signor Jupe in Hard Times, who manages to escape his costume, his 'stage trappings', but in doing so, effectively 'vanishes' from the circus, and also the novel.

he 'bildungsroman' itself is a sort of imprisoning device, a form that promises to, 'follow the development of the hero or heroine from childhood or adolescence in the novel, through a troubled quest for identity.'27 However the very stability of the 'bildungsroman' is questionable in such a text like Little Dorrit. The title does not celebrate the name of the fully progressive female individual, it rather presents a stifling of identity, in the corrupted naming of 'Little' Dorrit. It also indicates that perhaps Amy has not progressed fully as yet, that she is still trapped in her youthful persona. It seems to ever more convey a sense of liminality, wherein Amy is effectively trapped in between youth and maturity, creating a conflicting self; her external appearance resembles 'a slender child in body', but internally, she is 'a strong heroine in soul' (LD p.322). Furthermore, this name is entrenched by masculine ideals, where 'Little Dorrit' (the name given to Amy by Arthur Clennam) is the name she will keep, even in marriage, she will remain, 'Little Dorrit. Never any other name' (LD p.685). Indeed, trappings are yet again evident as although she can make her way out of the 'maze' of transition, she only escapes into a new imprisoning role, as Amy rushes towards Arthur Clenham, only to be, 'locked in his arms' (LD p.681) trapped in what is to be her next role in life.

The circus cannot evidently be kept locked into the ring, nor can the theatre be bound to the limits of the Covent Garden theatre. However, the limits of performance in the social world are clearly bound into certain rules, locking characters into respective purposes or roles. If the stage is endless, then it is ongoing, illimitable and ultimately inescapable. Sleary in Hard Times seems aware of the inescapable force of entertainment in that, 'People mutht be amuthed…you mutht hath uth' (HT p.278) wherein his insistence on the importance of 'amuthement' conveys a duality of trappings. Firstly through his lisped dialect, Sleary is locked into a discourse of polyphony, yet also, he conveys the absolute necessity for performance. The troupe and the Hands are ceaseless performers, theatrical or social. The circus supposedly moves on only to perform in another town, and similarly, the Coketown Hands will go on performing, trapped in their roles of necessity on the circus-like stage of industrialism. Furthermore, we must not forget that these characters are fictitious, illusive entities who 'play' their parts on the novelistic stage in order to ensure the reader's enjoyment, thus complying to a sense of literary necessity. In this sense, the novel itself becomes an imprisoning stage, a 'caged' arena that traps its 'actors' in its fictional universe. However, if the novel is a theatrical space, then 'offstage' would respectively correspond to anything outside of the novel, into our supposed world of reality. Yet, as I discussed in the opening of the paper, 'performativity' argues that we are constantly ruled by theatrical discourse and various essences of social, cultural and political role play. It seems therefore, that the limits of performance and the 'offstage' are ever more difficult to locate. Performance is by no means limited to a circus ring or a theatrical stage, it is ongoing, endless, and potentially imprisoning. Moreover, perhaps there is no offstage; perhaps it is an illusion in itself, a term that borrows unreality and illusion paradoxically from theatrical discourse. It should be a space exempt from theatricality, a space that promises escape from performance, but it is instead a space that can never be entirely seen, reached or realised, thus adding an existential element to the strange world of the 'offstage'. I began this paper by referring to the infamous world-as-stage analogy, but I'm going to end by questioning it, where if all the world is indeed a stage, where, therefore is offstage?

References

1Charles Dickens (29/3/1858) in The Speeches of Charles Dickens: A Complete Edition, ed. K. J. Fielding (Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1988), p. 262.

2There are many critical works that explore Dickens's relationship with the theatre. Paul Schlike's Dickens and Popular Entertainment (London: Unwin Hyman, 1988), for instance, discusses the social implications of entertainment in the novels, whereas The Actor in Dickens: A study of the Histrionic and Dramatic Elements in the Novelist's Life and Works (B. Blom, 1969) by Van Amerongen is interested in the auto-biographical influences of the theatre in Dickens novels, examining the novelist's personal relationship to the theatre and his acting career. Robert Garis, however, takes an antitheatrical stance in his critical reading of Dickens's works in The Dickens Theatre; A Reassessment of the Novels (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965).

3 Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999) p.196. All subsequent references will be given parenthetically in the text, as LD followed by page number.

4 Robert Ezra Park Race and Culture (Glencoe Illinos: The Freepress, 1950) p.249.

5 William Shakespeare, As You Like It (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) II.VII. ll..139-40.

6 Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby (Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 2000), The Pickwick Papers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), Sketches by Boz (London: Oxford University Press, 1963). All subsequent references will be given parenthetically in the text as NN, PP, and SB followed by page number.

7 Speeches p.76.

8  Victor Turner, 'Liminal and Liminoid, in Play, Flow and Ritual' in Performance Analysis an Introductory Coursebook (London & NY: Routledge, 2001) edited by Colin Counsell and Laurie Wolf p.206.

9  Nina Auerbach, Private Theatricals; the Lives of the Victorians (Massachusetts: Harvard University press, 1990) p.8.

10 Michel Foucault Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (New York: Panthean Books, 1977) p.200.

11 Helen Stoddart Rings of Desire; Circus History and Representation (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000).

12 Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Touching Feeling: Affect, Pedagogy, Performativity (Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2003).

13 Stoddart, p 126.

14 Truzzi, Marcello, 'The decline of the American circus: the shrinkage of an institution' in M. Truzzi (ed.) Sociology in Everyday Life (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1968) p.315.

15 Roger Fowler, 'Polyphony and Problematic in Hard Times' in The Changing World of Charles Dickens. Edited by Robert Giddings (London: Barnes & Noble, 1983).

16  Stoddart, p.1.

17 Deconstructing the absence/presence dichotomy is explored extensively by Jacques Derrida in 'Of Grammatology' and 'From “Difference”' in A Derrida Reader, Between the Blinds ed by Peggy Kamuf (Hemel Hamstead: Havester Wheatsheaf, 1991).

18 Victor Turner, The Ritual Process; Structure and Anti-Structure (London: Routledge,1969) p. 95.

19 Colin Counsell, 'Political Bodies' in Performance Analysis an Introductory Coursebook (London & NY: Routledge, 2001) p.127.

20 Erving Goffman, Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience (London: Penguin Books, 1975) p. 125.

22  Elaine Aston & George Savona, Theatre as a Sign System (London: Routledge, 1991) pp.43-4.

23 Elizabeth Burns, A Study of Convention in the Theatre and in Social Life (London: Longman, 1972) p.125.

24 Burns p.11.

25 Victor Turner, The Ritual Process; Structure and Anti-Structure (London: Routledge,1969) p. 95.

26 James R. Kincaid, 'Performance, Roles and the Nature of the Self' in Dramatic Dickens ed by Carol Hanbery Mackay (London: Manmillan Press, 1989) p.24.

27Chris Baldick, Oxford Concise Dictionary of Literary Terms (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) p.27.