Gerry Mooney Illustrating Dickens

The E-book Has Landed

Notice that title has no exclamation point. But the e-book of BLEAK HOUSE has indeed finally made its appearance on Amazon. As Dickens’s longest novel, my illustrated e-book version weighs in at over 1,000 pages and retails for $9.99.

The 40 illustrations, and the demands of placing the art adjacent to the proper text, was what made this project intimidating, but the real drawback was that I had been looking at nothing but BLEAK HOUSE for six years, give or take, and having someone, anyone (!) to do the work sounded pretty good. Anyway I found someone online who could design an e-book and they offered a few other bells and whistles that weren’t as important, and which in any case never happened!

At the very end of the process it was the oddest thing, but I ran into a title problem. I couldn’t call the e-book “Bleak House”! The woman managing the book design was vague about it, though she always seemed a little under informed and nervous, so I ran down the issue with a Google search:

BLEAK HOUSE is public domain, meaning it, along with all of Dickens’s work (and almost all published work up to and including well into the 20th Century), is not protected by copyright, and anyone can use or reprint his work in any way they wish.

It turns out that Amazon’s e-book marketplace is totally awash in endless e-book editions of tons and tons of public domain works, and in an effort to cope with this flood, they have rules about titling
e-book editions of public domain works. As an example, a search for “Bleak House” on Amazon returns about 281 entries.

So, approaching the finish line on a process that had gone on for more than six months, I was told I couldn’t name the e-book “Bleak House”.

So it is now “The Illustrated Bleak House” and you can download it here!

Dickens On The Boulevard

Coming up right here in Downtown Claremore, OK, is our local annual holiday street event, Dickens On The Boulevard, on Sunday, Nov. 22. Main Street takes on a Victorian air, and I will be participating in a book signing extravanganza at Boardinghouse Books at 300 W. Will Rogers Blvd.

I’ll be signing copies of BLEAK HOUSE, and I’ll have a few t-shirts and art prints for your viewing pleasure and holiday shopping!

I attended “Dickens On The Boulevard” once a few years ago and there were strollers in period outfits up and down Main Street, folks in costume sitting or posing in store windows, and holiday decor everywhere. It’s no “Dickens Universe” but really, what is?? It’s all great fun and worth a leisurely stroll up Main Street.

Speaking of T-shirts…

I still have several left of three designs, which are now available for $20, with postage of $15. Not all sizes, though.

And here’s how they look on real people! This is sisters Elise and Zilan, Zilan’s husband and my best friend since first grade Pete Spaulding, and me. Elise and her husband Paul were nice enough to let me stay in their home in Campbell, CA, after the week in Santa Cruz so we could all visit. It was great!

If you’re interested, leave me a note below, or you can email me at dickens@mooneyart.com.

Dickens Universe Recap

I had a great de-briefing Zoom call on my experience at Dickens Universe with the program coordinator. Apparently everyone who took my linoleum-printing class absolutely raved about it! And so did I! It was way more fun than I can express.

It’s a valuable thing when I can clearly explain things and processes that I take for granted when I’m working in my studio. Having the opportunity to share this knowledge with a roomful of people who are eager to have it, made the experience genuinely unique and fulfilling.

I’m still trying to get some of the footage that was shot by the videographer in my class and I will post it here when it arrives. Even the coordinator asked about pictures, and I told her that their own video guy had some film on the class. She had some contact info for him, so now I’m just waiting to hear back.

Thanks again for stopping to visit. I’ll leave comments open below, so you can leave a comment or drop me an email.

The Inimitable Dickens Universe!

Before I write about the privelege of attending this event, I want to thank ALL MY FRIENDS (and a few strangers!) for supporting my gofundme campaign, which allowed me to attend the Dickens Universe at all.

The Dickens Project has been doing this incredible, week-long event at UC Santa Cruz for 46 years, so they’re certainly good at it! The Dickens Universe so far surpassed anything I anticipated that I am still gathering my thoughts, but I wanted to put something down before it faded, like some fantastic dream.

First of all, and most of all, everyone I met and talked to was an absolute delight. In a crowd of about 250 attendees, ages ranged from…actually, age seems a silly delimiter in this context, to be honest! What made everyone instant best friends was a deep, abiding and humble admiration for the work of Charles Dickens.

My Fortune Cookie

So I’ve been pretty psyched about this trip to Santa Cruz. I walk around the house “writing” my class lectures in my head, making lists of supplies we’ll need, and I’ve gotten a couple of questions from students already, about what they need to bring, what to expect, etc.

I correspond pretty regularly with the event organizer, and among other things, have learned that UC Santa Cruz has been putting on The Dickens Universe for 46 years! It’s all exciting and the anticipation has pretty much taken over, and I’m fine with it.

One Thing I Got Is Class.

…and it’s getting bigger! Namely, the enrollment for my linoleum-printing class at the Dickens Universe in July is growing. The Dickens Project, organizer of the event at UC Santa Cruz, have been promoting the class in their newsletter and on Facebook, and it’s getting results. 17 so far have enrolled and I believe they’re limiting it to 40, which should be workable.

Many of the enrollees have posted questions, however it’s all posted on a Google sheet, not set up to easily post answers. They did start asking folks for email addresses, so that will help.

The Dickens Universe Heats Up!

First I would like to thank those of you who have contributed to my GoFundMe campaign. I’ve already begun making lists, and buying paper, supplies and equipment for this adventure, and the lists keep growing!

I know folks have reservations about contributing money online, and maybe some folks just dislike GoFundMe and their ilk, and I understand. I would like you to know that if you want to help me in this endeavor, I can also accept money through the following methods, which don’t take a fee out of the donations.

The Dickens Universe

I’m sure this title sounds like the place I commute to for work every day, but it is in fact a very real thing!

The University of California, Santa Cruz, has this week-long annual event called The Dickens Universe that I heard about, and it sounds like a fun, immersive adventure, chock-a-block with Victorian events, games, dances, and general Dickensian foofaraw.

Initially I approached them to ask about being a speaker there, in case they hadn’t filled out their schedule. I had so much fun in London last October at Dickens Day that I thought it would be like that only a whole lot better (or longer anyway!).

Happy Anniversary, Charles Dickens!

Today, March 19, is the anniversary of the publication of Charles Dickens’s epic BLEAK HOUSE, the brilliant novel that of course is the subject of this entire blog for the last four+ years.

Published in 1853, I’ve learned from Compulsive Historian and legendary Disney animator Tom Sito (this is a Facebook link) that BLEAK HOUSE was the very first novel to mention dinosaurs (on the first page!)

It is strictly a happy coincidence that I chose to have these beautiful T-shirts printed with my linoleum cut portrait of “The Inimitable”, in fact I just picked them up from the screen printer yesterday.

They’re available in S, M, L, and XL. Wear one and people will instantly know how smart you are! They are available directly from me for the great price of $25.95 + $7.50 shipping, for a total of $33.45.

I can accept checks, money orders, Venmo, or, if you prefer PayPal, I can send an invoice so they don’t take a percentage. I have Square on my phone and can probably accept money that way. Email me with your preference at the link below.

There’s a limited supply, but if there’s a demand I can always print more.

Email me at dickens@mooneyart.com for questions or to place an order, and thanks once again for stopping by!

My London Video

When I was prepping my last blog post about my London adventures, I was a little leery of posting (or announcing) a 20-minute video because I thought most folks would just click away from it! Although it was included in my previous post, it was at the very bottom and I soft-pedaled it in my email. After some time to think about it, though, I decided that it was worth sharing and watching in all its glory.

There were two folks shooting video of my presentation, and although the one that live-streamed on FB had some technical problems for the first two minutes, I was able to cut the two versions together so well that it’s like I was using a two-camera setup.

London Hit-and-Run

Well yes, I made my marathon journey to London and I will never, ever do it again this way!

First and foremost I want to say that the event I traveled for, the annual Dickens Day gathering at the University of London, was everything I could have hoped it to be. Largely a group of “locals”, i.e., folks from within the U.K., there were also a couple of Asians, one other American, who currently teaches over there, and one Brit who has lived in Hungary for several years, so technically a local, but not really!

I only got to chat with a few of the other 100-odd attendees, so all my impressions are pretty selective. Everyone was extremely welcoming and interested in my work, and likewise the other speakers had some very interesting and surprising topics and visuals. The theme of the event this year was “Dickens and Art”, and the topic embraced quite a range of subjects.

London? Definitely MAYBE!

It’s been pretty hectic around here, planning my trip to London to speak at Dickens Day at the University of London. My sweet wife Vicki is currently on hospice care due to her strokes, and her sister who was planning to come from Charlotte to take care of her, went and broke her arm about two weeks ago. Planning for home health aides was a process, but ultimately we worked it out and Vicki will have good care while I’m gone.

In London I’ll be speaking in some detail as to how I arrive at and design the linoleum cut illustrations I’ve completed for BLEAK HOUSE. I’ve selected ten out of the forty completed pieces that are in the published book. The audience will be international and made up mostly of academics and Dickens experts. I have no idea at all of the number of attendees expected.

I’ll also be meeting up with several of the fifteen speakers at a pub the night before, which should go a long way toward feeling at ease on the day of the event.

I’ve been making lists and working on my speaking notes. I’ve rehearsed it a few times before friendly audiences (mostly Vicki but had some other folks stop by for a listen), been making packing lists, got my passport and visa, downloaded the American Airlines app to keep track of my flights, emailing with the event organizers, and a few other things probably!

What comes next is news as it happens, but as of last night (Tuesday) the Republican-authorized shutdown of the federal government has now affected the reliability of air travel in the U.S., with a spreading sick-out of air traffic controllers.

At this exact moment I am proceeding as if the trip will actually happen. I’m packing, making arrangements with the home health aides, and mining my world-traveling friends for travel trips, as I haven’t been out of the country since the 80s.

All these preparations have sort of taken over my life lately and social media seems more and more distant, however I do hope to do some live-streaming of my trip. Stay tuned to my Facebook page and send me a friend request if we aren’t already!