The end of my little Dickens marathon was Oliver Twist. What else can I say, but love!

There was a special feature at the end of the DVD, which said that Charles Dickens was the most successful solo performer of the time. He apparently read to house of 3-4 thousand people. Apparently, he was a very good reader.

I sometimes wonder if the art of reading will be reborn in this audio society. Statistics in the publishing industry show that audiobook sales are better than ever, which means that the success of that audiobook will partly rely on the person reading the story. In my experience of authors today, many are not performers. They do not know how to read their works as entertainment, which is probably why you see so many actors fill the shoes. However, it also seems to me that the artistic person, whether actor, writer, painter, songwriter or singer, must now be well-rounded enough to fill all shoes. It’s about marketing yourself, which means that you must perform what you do in order to sell it to others who would make a bigger production of it.

Here you have Charles Dickens all those years ago mesmerizing audiences with his words and reading to them for hours. And today, with podcasts, vlogs, blogs and whatnot, it seems to me as if there is a rebirth of the solo, simple performance.

Your thoughts?