Possible Clues:

• Landor's friend got up with Sir Felix, Dickens scholar
• Contrived
• Unnatural like some circus performers
• Saint inclined to be unnatural
• Pole, not on the level but stiff and pompous
• Wooden
• Son inclined to be awkward in delivery
• Affected, in a way
• Up in the air as start of seminar's one-sided
• Hardly natural-sounding