Today we pour some out for Charles Dickens, who dropped dead on June 9, 1870.  His death was likely due to a stroke, though the exact cause remains a subject of historical speculation.  He had been in declining health, suffering from fatigue and possibly a prior minor stroke, before collapsing at his home in Gad’s Hill Place, England.

Uncle Chuck, an absolute beast behind the quill, left behind an unfinished masterpiece, The Mystery of Edwin Drood.  His works, his sprawling epics and a certain dual-city saga, went beyond simple entertainment…they sliced through the fog of Victorian pretense with razor-sharp wit and characters so vivid they practically leap off the page, reshaping the literary landscape forever.  He wasn’t some polite putz scribbling tame tales…he was a bona fide literary rockstar who flipped the script on the status quo, dragging the gritty, unvarnished truths of poverty, class, and corruption into the spotlight.  With a narrative weave so compelling it could hypnotize, he roared for social reform.  Dying mid-novel only amps up the enigma, leaving a legacy that still echoes like a thunderclap through time.

In more temporally local news, my work continues apace.  I’m busy as hell, but getting it done.  On a sidenote, the degree to which my day-to-day existence is dictated and controlled by an 8lb girl puppy is the source of great shame and embarrassment.

N.P.: “Barbaras Rhabarberbar” – Bodo Wartke, Marti Fisher, Matthias Kräutli