You do a great job condensing the facts. I tried to read Peter Ackroyd's bio but found it too self-indulgent.

Instead I read Claire Tomalin's, which relates his andropause; his relationship with the Tiernans is clearly a complicated one! He was bipolar in several ways and learning about him made me view the phrase "to write like the Dickens" differently. So trust the tale and not the teller.