Chapman & Hall are Entertained: Doughty Street, January 28th, 1838

Abstract

This chapter describes how Charles Dickens entertained Chapman & Hall, the firm that for many years were to be Dickens's publishers and friend, over dinner. Charles sent an invitation letter to John Forster, telling him about the invitation to Hall and his wife over the dinner. Hall had a shop in the Strand, No. 186, and it was from there that Dickens, back in 1833, had bought the Monthly Magazine in which he hoped to see his first anonymous Sketch in print. To his delight, A Dinner in Poplar got published. Confident after the success, Dickens submitted six more articles to the same magazine, all of which got printed. Two years later, William Hall called at Furnival's Inn with an offer to write a series of linked sketches of a sporting nature, each to appear as a monthly number. Dickens gladly accepted the offer and, thus, was born The Pickwick Papers. Menu for the dinner included fried whiting with shrimp sauce; lobster patties; stewed kidneys; roast saddle of mutton; boiled turkey; knuckle of ham; mashed and brown potatoes; and Swiss pudding.