A.N. Wilson

Dickens’s London is more elusive than the artful dodger himself

Admirers of the novels have always enjoyed identifying their settings where possible, but Dickens’s old haunts are now mainly glimpsed in street names or blue plaques

Field Lane, off Saffron Hill, Fagin’s lair in Oliver Twist. Illustration from Old and New London, with numerous engravings from the most authentic sources, by Walter Thornbury. [Alamy]
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  • Dickensland: The Curious History of Dickens’s London

    Lee Jackson

    Yale University Press, pp. 272, £20

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