Callow legally changes name to Charles Dickens

Acclaimed actor and writer Simon Callow is to legally change his name to ‘Charles Dickens’, saying that ‘he might as well’.

Callow, who has completed his 40th biography about the Victorian novelist, says he’s been thinking about changing his name for a while, but feels that the 200th anniversary of Dickens’s birth would be the perfect time.

“Dickens is as relevant today as he was 200 years ago,” said Callow/Dickens.

“Why, just the other day an urchin attempted to pick my pockets. I thwarted his attempt by batting him away with my top hat. I then witnessed said orphan crawl off into an alleyway to die of typhus.”

“I immediately went home and told the shocking story to my housekeeper, Mrs. Honeypipe Bumblechunk.”

“If I’m not dressed as Dickens and reading Dickens out loud to people, I’m always saying the word Dickens to myself at home, staring at all the pictures of Dickens I’ve got on the wall,” said Callow, adding “Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens, Dickens. Dickens!”

Story: Simon Swatman