Phew! I've never done anything with this many characters in before!
I've been reading Dicken's Little Dorrit aloud to my mother in the evenings (we read a lot of books like that) and Dickens is annoyingly visual, so I wanted to draw some of the characters.
This started out as just the protagonists – Arthur Clennam and Little Dorrit – but then I decided that I always draw either solitary or couple pictures, occasionally stretching to 3 or so characters; perhaps I should stretch myself a bit, and add other characters. I may well be mad.
Click for a larger view, please.
From left to right, in two rough rows, we have:
In the back:
Tattycoram, Miss Wade, Daniel Doyce, Flora Finching, Mr Casby, Monsieur Rigaud, Edward (Tip) Dorrit, Frederick Dorrit, William (Father of the Marshalsea) Dorrit, Arthur Clennam, Mrs Merdle, Mr Merdle.
In the front:
John Chivery, Mr Panks, Affrey Flintwinch, Jeremiah Flintwintch, Mrs Clennam, Fanny Dorrit, Maggie, Amy (Little) Dorrit, Minnie (Pet) Gowan, Mr Meagles.
This isn't all the characters – try as I would, there just wasn't enough space for the huge cast of a Dicken's novel across two pages of a moleskine sketchbook.
If you're familiar with the book, you'll know I had to leave out a large number of characters, such as John Baptist, the entire Plornish family, Mrs Meagles, Mr Gowan, Mr Sparkler, Mrs General, Mr F's Aunt..... and probably more that have momentarily slipped my mind.
Pencil, 26x21cm
Slight personal reference for a couple of poses.
Full of errors, I know, but considering I didn't even plan out what I was doing beforehand, not too bad. =P
Excellent portait of these characters. I'm currently teaching with Little Dorrit to my grade 5-6 students and your illustration will be very useful. (The abridged text I'm using doesn't have all the characters in it but the series does of course so your sketch will help them work out who is who.)
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