Visitors to his former home – where he wrote classics such as Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby – can get into the festive spirit by attending a live performance or taking a special tour to see it decked out for Christmas.
Dickens himself enjoyed jolly Yuletide gatherings with wife Catherine at the house in Doughty Street, Bloomsbury, which is now a museum.
The couple moved into their first proper marital home in 1837 and by the time they left nearly three years later, budding author Charles was a literary celebrity.
It was his 1843 novella A Christmas Carol that gave us many of our associations with the season, and the Charles Dickens Museum is currently hosting an exhibition, Showtime!, about the various film adaptations of his books.
Set up in Dickens’ study, it explores stage and screen outings of Dickensian characters including posters, playbills, photographs and props.
Elsewhere, the halls of the house are decked in Victorian-style; the dining room set for Christmas lunch; and the living room where Dickens entertained his guests has a fir tree – made popular in the 1840s by Queen Victoria and her husband, who brought the tradition from his native Germany.
Dickens himself loved to perform Christmas ghost stories, and a highlight of the museum’s seasonal entertainment includes live one-man performances by James Swanton of chilling ghost story The Haunted Man, and a chance to get up close to Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol.
There are also enchanting magic lantern shows by maestros Jeremy and Carolyn Brooker, projecting vivid and fantastical images and tales of goblins, ghosts and the supernatural.
Scrooge was famously visited by four spirits on Christmas Eve, and Dickens’ old home is possibly the most atmospheric place to spend December 24.
Throughout the day, every guest will receive a free mince pie and mulled wine or festive soft drink.
A Christmas Carol will be screened regularly, and every visitor who books a ticket in advance will have a chance of winning a Dickensian Christmas bumper prize, including books and a mug.
The Charles Dickens Museum is at 48-49 Doughty Street, London. Tickets for all events are from www.dickensmuseum.com
