[Victorian Web Home —> Charles Dickens —> Visual Arts —> Illustration —> Harold Copping —> Next]
Maggie
Harold Copping
1924
Photographic reproduction of line drawing
12 x 10.8 cm (4 ¾ by 4 ¼ inches), vignetted
An illustration for "Little Dorrit of the Marshalsea," p. 132.
[Click on image to enlarge it.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
One day when he was walking home with Little Dorrit to try and find out the names of some the people her father owed money to, a voice was heard calling, "Little Mother, little mother," and a strange figure came bouncing up to them and fell down, scattering her basketful of potatoes on the ground. "Oh Maggie," said Little Dorrit, "what a clumsy child you are!"
She was about eight and twenty, with large bones, large features, large hands and feet, large eyes and no hair. Little Dorrit told Mr. Clennem that Maggie was the grand-daughter of her old nurse, and that her grandmother had been very unkind to her and beat her. "When Maggie was ten years old, she had a fever, and she has never grown older since."
"Ten years old," said Maggie. "But what a nice hospital! So comfortable wasn't it? Such a Ev'nly place! Such beds there is there! Such lemonades! Such oranges! Such delicious broth and wine! Such chicking! Oh, AIN'T it a delightful place to stop at!"
"Then when she came out, her grandmother did not know what to do with her, and was very unkind. But after some time, Maggie tried to improve, and was very attentive and industrious, and now she can earn her own living entirely, sir!"
Little Dorrit did not say who had taken pains to teach and encourage the poor half-witted creature, but Mr. Clennem guessed from the name Little Mother, and the fondness of the poor creature for Amy. ["Little Dorrit of the Marshalsea," Character Sketches from Dickens, pp. 132-133]
Copping suggests Maggie's child-like character by her vacant smile as she lies among the fallen potatoes on the sidewalk. The editors of The Dickens Index describe Maggie, the daughter of Little Dorrit's old nurse, as "mentally retarded" (156), but Copping's visual interpretation emphasizes an open-hearted infantilism rather than merely arrested intellectual development or cognitive impairment. Maggy is a fitting complement to the tiny but intellectually bright Little Dorrit, for the pair together constitute a complete adult.
Left: Amy as Maggie's companion and defender, Little Mother (February 1856). Centre: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s Diamond Edition study of Amy and her awkward friend: Little Dorrit and Maggy (1867). Right: Harry Furniss's study of Maggie and Amy for the twelfth volume of the Charles Dickens Library Edition (1910): Little Dorrit and Maggie find shelter in a vestry.
Bentley, Nicolas, et al. The Dickens Index. Oxford & Troronto: Oxford U. P., 1990.
Dickens, Charles. Little Dorrit. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ("Phiz"). The Authentic Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1901 [rpt. 30 May 1857 volume].
Dickens, Mary Angela [Charles Dickens' grand-daughter]. Dickens' Dream Children. London, Paris New, York: Raphael Tuck & Sons, Ltd., 1924.
Dickens, Mary Angela et al. Children's Stories from Dickens. Introduction by Percy Fitzgerald. Illustrated by Harold Copping. London, Paris New, York: Raphael Tuck & Sons, Ltd., 1893.
Matz, B. W., and Kate Perugini; illustrated by Harold Copping. Character Sketches from Dickens. London: Raphael Tuck, 1924. Copy in the Paterson Library, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada.
Created 3 October 2023