Sketches of Foggy Bottom
While The Pickwick Papers was Charles Dickens' first novel, it was
not his first substantial literary work. Prior to Pickwick, Dickens
published Sketches by Boz, a collection of short sketches
describing the characters and places that made up the environs of London
where Dickens grew up. Sketches is rich in its descriptions of
individuals, their activities and the places where they would congregate.
Reading it, one gets a sense of returning to early Victorian London and
participating in the hustle and bustle of daily life.
Personally, I find Foggy Bottom to be an equally interesting place. We
have interesting landmarks, points of congregation, and no end of odd and
interesting characters. But, alas, we take this all for granted because it
is part of our daily lives and thus relegated to the mundane in our
eyes.
This collection, which I am calling Sketches of Foggy Bottom, after
Dickens' inspirational work, will be a series of glimpses into the unique
character of Foggy Bottom and its environs. If you are one of my
colleagues
or students, you may even recognize yourself in one of these sketches. If
the character that I turned you into is not exactly to your liking, please
step back, take a breath and try to keep your humor about it. What I do
with characters is simply my attempt to find the fascinating in the
mundane.
In addition, I am going back to my old writing approach where I will write
pieces periodically and send them out to interested persons via email.
That process worked very well for the Wentworth series and I think it
best that I return to it. If you would like to be on the email list,
please send an email to jartz@gwu.edu. Or, if you wish to remain
anonymous, that is fine too. After I have sent out a series of sketches
and gotten comments back from readers on the email list, I will do any
necessary revisions or final edits and put the sketches online.