'The high mimetic powers possessed by Mr Dickens...'

 Good news from Birmingham (for a change) – the city is to unveil a Blue Plaque at its fine neoclassical town hall to commemorate Dickens's first public reading of A Christmas Carol.
A contemporary report chronicled the event thus: 

'The first of the Readings generously given by Mr Charles Dickens on behalf of the Birmingham and Midland Institute, took place on Tuesday evening, December 27, 1853, at the Birmingham Town Hall, where, notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather, nearly two thousand persons had assembled. The work selected was the CHRISTMAS CAROL. The high mimetic powers possessed by Mr Dickens enabled him to personate with remarkable force the various characters of the story, and with admirable skill to pass rapidly from the hard, unbelieving Scrooge, to trusting and thankful Bob Cratchit, and from the genial fulness of Scrooge's nephew, to the hideous mirth of the party assembled in Old Joe the Ragshopkeeper's parlour. The reading occupied more than three hours, but so interested were the audience, that only one or two left the Hall previously to its termination, and the loud and frequent bursts of applause attested the successful discharge of the reader's arduous task. On Thursday evening Mr. Dickens read THE CRICKET ON THE HEARTH. The Hall was again well ruled, and the tale, though deficient in the dramatic interest of the CAROL, was listened to with attention, and rewarded with repeated applause. On Friday evening, the CHRISTMAS CAROL was read a second time to a large assemblage of work-people, for whom, at Mr. Dickens`s special request, the major part of the vast edifice was reserved.
.........
At the close of the reading Mr Dickens received a vote of thanks, and "three cheers, with three times three". As soon as the enthusiasm of the audience would allow him to speak, Mr Dickens said:-"You have heard so much of my voice since we met tonight, that I will only say, in acknowledgment of this affecting mark of your regard, that I am truly and sincerely interested in you; that any little service I have rendered to you I have freely rendered from my heart; that I hope to become an honorary member of your great Institution, and will meet you often there when it becomes practically useful; that I thank you most affectionately for this new mark of your sympathy and approval; and that I wish you many happy returns of this great birthday-time, and many prosperous years."

Not only was this Dickens's first public reading of the Carol; it was his first public reading of any of his own works. It clearly gave him a taste for such performances, to which he devoted much of his later career, exhausting himself in the process with readings of terrific emotional intensity – notably his famously terrifying reading of the murder of Nancy from Oliver Twist. Dickens judged the success of that one by how many ladies had fainted with horror in the course of it. 

In our own day, a public reading of all three hours of A Christmas Carol would be unlikely to attract many takers (even if it was given by Andrew Scott, whose one-man Chekhov, Vanya, was such a hit). But we do have the inimitable Count Arthur Strong currently touring the country with his, er, somewhat tangential take on A Christmas Carol. Here's a preview...