One of Britain's [?] writers, Charles Dickens is most associated with Victorian London and in particular the misery and poverty we call Dickensian, so he hasn't - [?] - been much used as a literary brand. Now on an industrial estate in the rather [?] town of Chatham in Kent where the writer grew up, Dickens World is opening, a theme park dedicated, so it says, to giving a [?] of life in Dicken's England.
The centrepiece is a boat ride through an elaborate interactive stage set of picturesque [?] and their associated smells, to conjure up an illusion of real Victorian life - and misery. It's [?] a familiar debate of entertainment versus education. While critics have attacked the trivialisation of Dickens's legacy, the organisers [?] that the writer was a great popular entertainer who would have [?] approved of such a theme park.
The critics say the real Dickens experience is in the books - and trips down [?] Victorian sewers won't get people reading. But it is of course ultimately a business proposition, investing [?] million dollars, and predicting [?] visitors a year. That shows a lot of confidence in both the [?] power of Dickens and of theme park versions of misery and poverty.
Lawrence Pollard, BBC
Source, intro and vocabulary work