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National Geographic : 1974 Apr
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ENTHOVENCOLLECTION, VICTORIA ANDALBERTMUSEUM In hopeful reverie, the grandfather of Little Nell awaits her return from the grave in The Old Curiosity Shop (above). Be lieving the child still alive, he brings her bonnet and basket to the tomb. Dickens probably modeled the village where Nell died on Tong in what was then Shropshire, close to her fictional wanderings in the industrial Midlands. In the graveyard that Little Nell tended in the novel, strands of unkempt ivy twine about the tombstones (right), and inside the "old, dull, silent church," the sleeping figures that Nell had sat among seem to pray for her return (facing page). Both Dickens and his public were greatly affected by the death of Little Nell. Many readers of the serialized story implored Dickens not to let her die-but to no avail. "She was dead," he wrote. "Dear, gentle, patient, noble Nell was dead. Her little bird - a poor slight thing the pressure of a finger would have crushed-was stirring nimbly in its cage; and the strong heart of its child mistress was mute and motionless for ever." National Geographic,April 1974 460
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