Charles Dickens

I lived a happy life ‘til I was ten years old

When debt landed dad in prison and our country house

Was sold

Lodged with a lady in her London flat so cold

Worked at a good polish factory, labelling jars quite

Dull be told

Goodness only knows

I was a miserable soul

For a time I went to school but then I found a job

As a clerk to a lawyer, oh it made my poor head throb

I failed to be an actor, despite my loud gob

Ended up reporting speeches of the parliamentary mob

Then as everybody knows

I started writing pros

Put my life into my books

Friends and enemies and crooks

Legal bosses of the crop

In “The Old Curiosity Shop”

Fagin in “Oliver Twist”

A factory pal, you get the gist

And although my memory’s quite foggy

Got Scrooge from the grave of Ebenezer Scroggy

My first book was an overnight sensation

But I drove myself too hard to enjoy the agilation

Despite my wealth, my family begged for money

I wrote of it in “Chuzzlewit” which people said was

Funny

Didn’t sell like books before

My family still asked for more

“Little Dorrit” is a tale

About my dad in debtor’s jail

While “Hard Times” tells my life ‘bout

When I tried to leave my wife

“Little Nell’s” here was my poor dear

Departed sister-in-law

And “David Copperfield”, working in a factory

I must confess that that was really me

In my life, felt shamed ‘bout poverty in childhood

Wrote about sadness, suffering and fears

Also wrote about people with funny names

Bumble, Smallweed, Scrooge, Uriah Heep

And Wackford Squeers

Whilst writing “Edwin Drood”

Train crashed in, helped my mood

Still I drove myself on

With readings far across the pond

Died before I wrote Drood’s end

Something drove me ‘round the bend

So Dickens, take a dickens, take a bow

And Heaven knows

I’m miserable now