linoleum printing – Gerry Mooney Illustrating Dickens

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.