Bleak House is a great baggy thing, the plot doesn't work in...

Bleak House is a great baggy thing, the plot doesn't work in all sorts of parts, so you've got to tinker with it. Usually I tell myself, find the spine of the story and stick to that and chuck out anything not related to the spine of the story, but that doesn't work with Dickens. You lose the flavor of him if you don't include all those other extra comic characters that he couldn't stop himself from creating. The plot bulges out. It's like horrible boils or something, but in a nice way.