Royal Tunbridge Wells

Royal Tunbridge Wells (usually shortened to Tunbridge Wells) is a large town and Borough in west Kent, England, about 40 miles (64 km) south-east of central London by road, 34.5 miles (55.5 km) by rail. The town is close to the border of the county of East Sussex. It is situated at the northern edge of the High Weald, the sandstone geology of which is exemplified by the rock formations at the Wellington Rocks and High Rocks. The town came into being as a spa in Georgian times and had its heyday as a tourist resort under Richard (Beau) Nash when the Pantiles and its chalybeate spring attracted visitors who wished to take the waters. Though its popularity waned with the advent of sea bathing, the town remains popular and derives some 30% of its income from the tourist industry.

The town has a population of around 56,500 and is the administrative centre of Tunbridge Wells Borough and the UK parliamentary constituency of Tunbridge Wells. In the United Kingdom Tunbridge Wells has a reputation as being the archetypal conservative "Middle England" town, a stereotype that is typified by the fictional letter-writer "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells" ;-))

One of the stamps on the card about Royal Tunbridge Wells sent to me by Debbie depicts  My Favourite Charles Dickens character: Mr Pickwick from The Pickwick Papers (1836). And I just could not resist including him in my blog.

“There are very few moments in a man’s existence, when he experiences so much ludicrous distress, or meets with so little charitable commiseration, as when he is in pursuit of his own hat.” Yet there are few of Dickens’s characters to whom we feel as charitable as we do towards Mr Pickwick – especially near the start of The Pickwick Papers, when his hat flies away as “merrily as a lively porpoise in a strong tide”. “I thought of Mr Pickwick, and wrote the first number,” said Dickens. Part Falstaff, part Bertie Wooster, Mr Pickwick embodies the conviviality, lively appetite and good humour that is an enduring part of an Englishman’s self-image. When the rotund, bespectacled gentleman first appeared in 1836 the public immediately fell in love with him, and his creator. Even now you find Pickwick clubs and Pickwick pubs all over England; and the old Dickens £10 note was not illustrated by something from Oliver Twist or A Christmas Carol but with The Pickwick Papers’s cricket match between Dingley Dell and All Muggleton. (Then again you wouldn’t have wanted Fagin or Scrooge anywhere near your cash.)
His adventures turn slightly sour when one Mrs Bardell sues him for reneging on his offer of marriage. Needless to say, Mr Pickwick had no idea he had made such a promise, but he still ends up in debtors’ prison. When a deranged man steals his nightcap, he defends himself and then, in Dickens’s words, “communicated a revolving motion to his clenched fists, by way of appalling his antagonists with a display of science.” So ludicrous does he appear that his opponent bursts into laughter. Dickens’s advice to anyone who loses his hat could be the motto for Mr Pickwick and, indeed, for us all: while others laugh, keep “smiling pleasantly all the time, as if you thought it as good a joke as anybody else”.Royal Tunbridge Wells (usually shortened to Tunbridge Wells) is a large town and Borough in west Kent, England, about 40 miles (64 km) south-east of central London by road, 34.5 miles (55.5 km) by rail. The town is close to the border of the county of East Sussex. It is situated at the northern edge of the High Weald, the sandstone geology of which is exemplified by the rock formations at the Wellington Rocks and High Rocks. The town came into being as a spa in Georgian times and had its heyday as a tourist resort under Richard (Beau) Nash when the Pantiles and its chalybeate spring attracted visitors who wished to take the waters. Though its popularity waned with the advent of sea bathing, the town remains popular and derives some 30% of its income from the tourist industry.
The town has a population of around 56,500 and is the administrative centre of Tunbridge Wells Borough and the UK parliamentary constituency of Tunbridge Wells. In the United Kingdom Tunbridge Wells has a reputation as being the archetypal conservative "Middle England" town, a stereotype that is typified by the fictional letter-writer "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells" ;-))

One of the stamps on the card about Royal Tunbridge Wells sent to me by Debbie depicts  My Favourite Charles Dickens character: Mr Pickwick from The Pickwick Papers (1836). And I just could not resist including him in my blog.

“There are very few moments in a man’s existence, when he experiences so much ludicrous distress, or meets with so little charitable commiseration, as when he is in pursuit of his own hat.” Yet there are few of Dickens’s characters to whom we feel as charitable as we do towards Mr Pickwick – especially near the start of The Pickwick Papers, when his hat flies away as “merrily as a lively porpoise in a strong tide”. “I thought of Mr Pickwick, and wrote the first number,” said Dickens. Part Falstaff, part Bertie Wooster, Mr Pickwick embodies the conviviality, lively appetite and good humour that is an enduring part of an Englishman’s self-image. When the rotund, bespectacled gentleman first appeared in 1836 the public immediately fell in love with him, and his creator. Even now you find Pickwick clubs and Pickwick pubs all over England; and the old Dickens £10 note was not illustrated by something from Oliver Twist or A Christmas Carol but with The Pickwick Papers’s cricket match between Dingley Dell and All Muggleton. (Then again you wouldn’t have wanted Fagin or Scrooge anywhere near your cash.)
His adventures turn slightly sour when one Mrs Bardell sues him for reneging on his offer of marriage. Needless to say, Mr Pickwick had no idea he had made such a promise, but he still ends up in debtors’ prison. When a deranged man steals his nightcap, he defends himself and then, in Dickens’s words, “communicated a revolving motion to his clenched fists, by way of appalling his antagonists with a display of science.” So ludicrous does he appear that his opponent bursts into laughter. Dickens’s advice to anyone who loses his hat could be the motto for Mr Pickwick and, indeed, for us all: while others laugh, keep “smiling pleasantly all the time, as if you thought it as good a joke as anybody else”.Royal Tunbridge Wells (usually shortened to Tunbridge Wells) is a large town and Borough in west Kent, England, about 40 miles (64 km) south-east of central London by road, 34.5 miles (55.5 km) by rail. The town is close to the border of the county of East Sussex. It is situated at the northern edge of the High Weald, the sandstone geology of which is exemplified by the rock formations at the Wellington Rocks and High Rocks. The town came into being as a spa in Georgian times and had its heyday as a tourist resort under Richard (Beau) Nash when the Pantiles and its chalybeate spring attracted visitors who wished to take the waters. Though its popularity waned with the advent of sea bathing, the town remains popular and derives some 30% of its income from the tourist industry.
The town has a population of around 56,500 and is the administrative centre of Tunbridge Wells Borough and the UK parliamentary constituency of Tunbridge Wells. In the United Kingdom Tunbridge Wells has a reputation as being the archetypal conservative "Middle England" town, a stereotype that is typified by the fictional letter-writer "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells" ;-))

One of the stamps on the card about Royal Tunbridge Wells sent to me by Debbie depicts  My Favourite Charles Dickens character: Mr Pickwick from The Pickwick Papers (1836). And I just could not resist including him in my blog.

“There are very few moments in a man’s existence, when he experiences so much ludicrous distress, or meets with so little charitable commiseration, as when he is in pursuit of his own hat.” Yet there are few of Dickens’s characters to whom we feel as charitable as we do towards Mr Pickwick – especially near the start of The Pickwick Papers, when his hat flies away as “merrily as a lively porpoise in a strong tide”. “I thought of Mr Pickwick, and wrote the first number,” said Dickens. Part Falstaff, part Bertie Wooster, Mr Pickwick embodies the conviviality, lively appetite and good humour that is an enduring part of an Englishman’s self-image. When the rotund, bespectacled gentleman first appeared in 1836 the public immediately fell in love with him, and his creator. Even now you find Pickwick clubs and Pickwick pubs all over England; and the old Dickens £10 note was not illustrated by something from Oliver Twist or A Christmas Carol but with The Pickwick Papers’s cricket match between Dingley Dell and All Muggleton. (Then again you wouldn’t have wanted Fagin or Scrooge anywhere near your cash.)

“smiling pleasantly all the time, as if you thoughtas good a joke as anybody else”.

His adventures turn slightly sour when one Mrs Bardell sues him for reneging on his offer of marriage. Needless to say, Mr Pickwick had no idea he had made such a promise, but he still ends up in debtors’ prison. When a deranged man steals his nightcap, he defends himself and then, in Dickens’s words, “communicated a revolving motion to his clenched fists, by way of appalling his antagonists with a display of science.” So ludicrous does he appear that his opponent bursts into laughter. Dickens’s advice to anyone who loses his hat could be the motto for Mr Pickwick and, indeed, for us all: while others laugh, keep