Dr. Lillian Nayder, an expert on Charles Dickens and currently the chair of English at Bates College in Maine, will present a public lecture at 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 8, on the marriage of the novelist and his wife.

The lecture, “Marriage and Mesmerism: The Union of Charles and Catherine Dickens,” kicks off the spring schedule of the William G. Cooper, Jr., Honors Program in English.

The lecture in Donaghey Student Center Room 205G is free and open to the public. A reception will follow the presentation.

Zabelle Stodola, director of the UALR Honors Program in English, said the talk will examine the fascinating but highly fraught relationship between Charles and Catherine Dickens.

Nayder has published three books, most recently “Unequal Partners: Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, and Victorian Authorship,” published by Cornell University Press in 2002.

A fourth book is forthcoming this year, also from Cornell, titled “The Other Dickens: A Life of Catherine Hogarth.” Nayder is also the author of many articles on Dickens and other Victorian writers.

For more information, contact Stodola at 501-569-3161 or kzstodola@ualr.edu.