Charles Dickens Charles Dickens ( died 1870 ) was a famous 19th century British author . Gwyneth referred to him as " the great man " . In the last years of his life , he entered a period of melancholy , seemingly brought on by emotional estrangement from his family . Biography . Writing career . By 1845 , Dickens was married to a woman named Kate , with whom he had several children . An earlier work , " The Pickwick Papers " , was notorious for the accusation that he had stolen the idea for a character from his illustrator . He believed in the reality of spontaneous human combustion ( PROSE : " The Death of Art " ) and incorporated it into his novel " Bleak House " . ( PROSE : " All - Consuming Fire " ) In December of 1845 , after numerous delays , he was close to publishing the first edition of his newspaper , the " Daily News " , from its London offices , but events on the 18th would unsettle him and drive him to leave the city . His writing after that point became colder and bleaker . Montague , an irate toy maker , confronted Charles Dickens about his recent Christmas book " The Cricket on the Hearth " , in the belief that Dickens was prying into his history . Intending to visit the man later to explain that the book ' s character was not based on him , Dickens turned to the proofs for his paper , only to be shocked by an unnerving poem about living doll s that wasn ' t there when he looked a second time . He later travelled toward the Billingsgate address of Montague ' s shop , only to flee in terror from dolls crawling towards him . Twenty years later , he told his friend Wilkie Collins part of the story and the two went to see Montague ' s shop , only to find it had burned down years ago . ( PROSE : " The Death of Art " ) Later years . In 1866 , Dickens encountered the Eighth Doctor and Charlotte Pollard at the Reform Club while they were looking for Pieter Montmarche . Dickens got into a row with the Doctor over an error in " Great Expectations " . ( AUDIO : " The Man Who Wasn ' t There " ) In 1869 , he was on a gruelling tour of public performances of " A Christmas Carol " , a work he had written many years earlier . During this period , he despaired of his life being merely a series of recitations of his past successes . In the Taliesin Lodge in Cardiff , on 24 December , his reading of " A Christmas Carol " was interrupted when the Gelth - inhabited corpse of Mrs Peace had blue smoke coming from her . He accused the Ninth Doctor of creating a light show . The Doctor , seeing his companion , Rose Tyler , being taken by the Sneed and Company hearse after the hearse had reclaimed Mrs Peace ' s body , followed after them with Dickens ' in Dickens ' coach . Even after seeing more reanimated corpses in the funeral parlour upon saving Rose , Dickens clashed with the Doctor , as he firmly believed in the rational world . Dickens was not prepared to entertain the more fantastical elements of life . The Doctor , however , saw that things human s considered " supernatural " were in fact just extra - terrestrial reality . Thus the Doctor was open to participating in a séance as a way of communicating with the Gelth , while Dickens viewed such things as the antithesis of rationality . The Gelth began breaching through , thanks to the servant girl , Gwyneth , but instead of finding temporary bodies until the Doctor could find something permanent , " a few billion " came through , and cornered the Doctor and Rose . Dickens opened the gas throughout the funeral parlour , sucking the Gelth out of the corpses and back into the gas . He told the Doctor to do the same . Though not able to send them back where they came from , Gwyneth was able to hold the Gelth on the building by setting the parlour alight , saving the world . By the end of the ordeal , Dickens emerged with a belief that he had only just begun to learn about the universe . With his re - invigorated sense of wonder , he resolved to tell the tale of the Gelth affair in the form of the ending to his novel " The Mystery of Edwin Drood " . The Doctor knew he would not live long enough to do so , but knew that when he did die , he did so a happier man . He died the following year . ( TV : " The Unquiet Dead " ) Legacy . According to the Ninth Doctor , Dickens ' books lasted " forever " . ( TV : " The Unquiet Dead " ) A Charles Dickens Museum was in London by 2016 . ( TV : " For Tonight We Might Die " , " The Metaphysical Engine , or What Quill Did " ) In the 2010s , at Coal Hill School , Clara Oswald was teaching a lesson about Dickens and his work " David Copperfield " . ( TV : " Kill the Moon " ) Alternative timeline . In a world where all of history occurred at once because River Song didn ' t kill the Doctor , Dickens appeared on BBC " Breakfast " being interviewed about his " new Christmas special . " ( TV : " The Wedding of River Song " ) Works . Dickens was the author of several works : " David Copperfield " , ( TV : " Kill the Moon " ) " The Signal - Man " , " A Christmas Carol " , " Great Expectations " , " Oliver Twist " , " Martin Chuzzlewit " , " Bleak House " , " The Mystery of Edwin Drood " , and " The Old Curiosity Shop " , which contained the character Little Nell . ( TV : " The Unquiet Dead " ) Behind the scenes . The Sixth Doctor and Melanie Bush referred to the character of Sydney Carton , implicitly taken from " A Tale of Two Cities " by Charles Dickens , in TV : " The Ultimate Foe " . Dickens ' real - life great - great - great - grandson Harry Lloyd is an actor who played Jeremy Baines and Son of Mine in the 2007 two - part story " Human Nature " and " The Family of Blood " .