Pickwick Goes to Jail

Ah, further reading in Dickens' Pickwick Papers has found our amazing little man behind bars. As he has steadfastly refused to pay the monies owed stemming from the lawsuit and the judgement against him, he would rather stay in the airless dungeon (or gaol) rather than give in to the unjust situation in which fate has placed him.

On his entry into jail at Fleet, he undergoes a rather hysterical intake process known as 'Sitting for a portrait.' In this case, Pickwick is surrounded by all the jailors, turn-keys and watchmen and observed as closely as possible, so that they know him from memory, lest he should slip away. Clearly, the debtors prisons of the mid-nineteenth century in London weren't the highest in security.

Just before his long and draining first night in the place, faithful servant Sam Weller relates a fascinating tale to Pickwick about a previous tenant at the jail. A certain character who'd been stuck there for owing as little as 9 British pounds sterling remained at the jail for seventeen years. When he convinces the turn-key to let me look around outside for just a bit (7 years after the beginning of his imprisonment) he comes running back to the jail within two minutes, so flabberghasted by the crazy carriages and horses, and his general fear of being outside the safety of the prison walls.

Eventually the turn-key lets the prisoner become more familiar with the outside world via a new public house that has opened across the road. Soon he's alowed out a few nights a week (clandestinely), but falls in with a bad crowd. He always returns at night, but many times drunk. The turn-key decides that it's high time he had a chat with the prisoner.

'"Now I don't wish to do nothing harsh," he says, "but if you can't confine yourself to steady circles, and find your vay back at reglar hours, as sure as you're a standin' there, I'll shut you out altogether!" The little man was seized with a wiolent fit o' tremblin', and never vent outside the prison walls arterwards!'

Oh the poor fellows who've grown so used to prison walls that they can't conceive of life outside it. What melancholy humor!

It will be a wonder to see how long Pickwick can stand the strange characters of the place, and when his will may be broken. Some resolution is bound to occur, and Snodgrass, Tupman and his other chums will undoubtedly find some way to fetch him out.