Modern children 'lack the attention to read Dickens' Ms Tomalin, author of the book Charles Dickens: A Life, said major themes in his work reverberated in 21st century Britain, including the "great gulf between the rich and poor, corrupt financiers, corrupt Members of Parliament, how the country is run by old Etonians." But she said key failings in the education system - combined with the influence of modern technology - meant many children could not fully appreciate his books. "What Dickens wrote about is still amazingly relevant," she said. The only caveat I would make is that today's children have very short attention spans because they are being reared on dreadful television programmes which are flickering away in the corner. Children are not being educated to have prolonged attention spans and you have to be prepared to read steadily for a Dickens novel and I think that's a pity. Events taking place to mark the anniversary of Charles Dickens' birth on Tuesday, include a street party in the road where he was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, and a wreath-laying ceremony at his grave in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, London. On Sunday, it emerged that Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary, is arranging for each member of the Cabinet to receive a volume of Dickens" work to mark the anniversary. David Cameron will receive Great Expectations and Hard Times, summing up the birth of the Coalition Government and the bleak economic outlook. In a move that is likely to be interpreted as a swipe at the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg will be given a copy of Oliver Twist - a novel famed for the line "please, sir, I want some more." Ms Tomalin, who has also written biographies of Samuel Pepys, Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, Mary Wollstonecraft, said Dickens remained the "greatest creator of characters in English," after Shakespeare. "He has gone on entertaining people since the 1830s and his characters' names are known all over the world," she said. And because of the way he wrote, he adapts very well for theatre and even people who do not read him know about him from films, the TV and musicals.