Charles Dickens New York

The World-Wide Dickens Fellowship

Founded in 1905 The Dickens Fellowship of New York is an association of admirers, enthusiasts and scholars whose mutual interest in the life, works and times of Charles Dickens (1812-1870)

The Worldwide Dickens Fellowship founded October 6, 1902, in London has some 50 international branches including Japan, India and Australia. Headquarters is in the Dickens House Museum, 48 Doughty Street. London, where Dickens lived and wrote Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby.

The Dickens Fellowship of New York maintains close ties with the headquarters.

The Dickens Fellowship of New York

The Dickens Fellowship of New York meets monthly on Saturday afternoons. Our meetings feature book and panel discussions, dramatizations, guest speakers and videos of Dickens novels and his life. Our Dickens Birthday Luncheon in February and Dickens Commemorative Passing Luncheon in June are yearly highlights of our fellowship. We also plan group outings to events of related interest.

The Dickens Fellowship of New York encourages all members to participate in its programs and activities to their individual degree of interest, and welcomes new members from all walks of life and at all levels of interest in the writings and philosophies of Charles Dickens.

Statement of Purpose

The Dickens Fellowship of New York and its members seeks to keep the memory and study of this exceptional author alive, and in doing so continue to further the ideals inherent in what he wrote.

The Dickens Fellowship of New York reads and discusses the books Charles Dickens wrote more than 150 years ago and seeks to appreciate these novels for what they mirror our own times and what they can teach us today.

We sponsor fund raising activities to support charitable causes in keeping with the ideas inherent in Dickens’s writings. We keep our membership apprised of cultural events in New York City and nearby that relate to Dickens and his Victorian era.

Dickens Fellowship Projects:

· Tiny Tim/Oliver Twist fund raising for needy children

· The Charles Dickens Essay Competition for scholarships

· Charles Dickens Youth Fellowship

· Gad’s Hill Gazette newsletter

· Archive: Library collection and Dickens references

Our Mutual Objectives: Goals and Aims

Charles Dickens appeals to the fundamental nature of the human spirit and evokes a universal chord in the hearts and minds of his readers. He was a great man of his time – and an inspiration for all times. A renowned storyteller with a gift for creating memorable characters and plots, Dickens was also an extraordinary dramatist and orator with a zeal for justice and social reform.

Most importantly, this 19^th century author saw above and beyond the problems of his own era. In doing so, he created writings that continue to entertain us while they also mirror the problems of modern times. Dickens relentlessly attacks his own society’s preoccupations with materialism and status, the abuses and inadequacies in the school system and workplace, and the exploitation of women and children.

Our fellowship is devoted to such philanthropic and other social and public purposes as are held in keeping with the thoughts of Charles Dickens – to take such measures as may be expedient to remedy existing social evils, to better those conditions which would have appealed so strongly to the heart of Charles Dickens, and to help in every possible direction in the cause of the poor and oppressed.

The Dickens Fellowship of New York and its members seek to keep the memory and study of Charles Dickens alive in New York City. The organization has aspects of a literary society or book club but includes much more as the name Fellowship implies. Our meetings include social events and group outings. Members are kept apprised of cultural programs in New York City and the tri-state area that relate to Dickens and his Victorian era. Although we meet all the year round, as befitting Charles Dickens and A Christmas Carol, the Christmas season finds the Fellowship in especially hearty spirits.