Editing A Christmas Carol (section)

==Publication==
[[File:Charles Dickens-A Christmas Carol-Title page-First edition 1843.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Left-hand page shows Mr and Mrs Fezziwig dancing; the right-hand page shows the words "A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas by Charles Dickens. With illustrations by John Leech|upright=1|First edition frontispiece and title page (1843)]]
As the result of the disagreements with Chapman and Hall over the commercial failures of ''Martin Chuzzlewit'',{{sfn|Kelly|2003|p=17}} Dickens arranged to pay for the publishing himself, in exchange for a percentage of the profits.{{sfn|Douglas-Fairhurst|2006|p=xix}} Production of ''A Christmas Carol'' was not without problems. The first printing was meant to have festive green [[endpapers]], but they came out a dull olive colour. Dickens's publisher Chapman and Hall replaced these with yellow endpapers and reworked the title page in harmonising red and blue shades.{{sfnm|1a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|1y=2006|1p=xxxi|2a1=Varese|2y=2009}} The final product was bound in red cloth with gilt-edged pages, completed only two days before the publication date of 19 December 1843.{{sfnm|1a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|1y=2006|1p=xix|2a1=Varese|2y=2009|Sutherland, British Library}} Following publication, Dickens arranged for the manuscript to be bound in red [[Morocco leather]] and presented as a gift to his solicitor, Thomas Mitton.{{sfn|Provenance, The Morgan Library & Museum}}{{refn|In 1875 Mitton sold the manuscript to the bookseller [[Francis Harvey]]&nbsp;– reportedly for £50 (equal to £{{formatnum:{{Inflation|UK|50|1875|r=-2}}}} in {{CURRENTYEAR}} pounds)&nbsp;–{{sfn|UK CPI inflation}} who sold it to the autograph collector, [[Henry Churchill|Henry George Churchill]], in 1882; in turn Churchill sold the manuscript to Bennett, a Birmingham bookseller. Bennett sold it for £200 to Robson and Kerslake of London, which sold it to Dickens collector [[Stuart Samuel (politician)|Stuart M. Samuel]] for £300. It was purchased by [[J. P. Morgan|J. Pierpont Morgan]] for an undisclosed sum and is now held by the [[Morgan Library & Museum]], New York.{{sfnm|1a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|1y=2006|1p=xxx|2a1=Provenance, The Morgan Library & Museum}}|group=n}}

Priced at five shillings (equal to £{{formatnum:{{Inflation|UK|0.25|1843}}}} in {{CURRENTYEAR}} pounds),{{sfn|UK CPI inflation}} the first run of 6,000 copies sold out by Christmas Eve. Chapman and Hall issued second and third editions before the new year, and the book continued to sell well into 1844.{{sfnm|1a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|1y=2006|1pp=xix–xx|2a1=Standiford|2y=2008|2p=132}} By the end of 1844 eleven more editions had been released.{{sfn|Jackson|1999|p=6}} Since its initial publication the book has been issued in numerous hardback and paperback editions, translated into several languages and has never been out of print.{{sfnm|1a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|1y=2006|1p=viii|2a1=A Christmas Carol, WorldCat}} It was Dickens's most popular book in the United States, and sold over two million copies in the hundred years following its first publication there.{{sfn|Tomalin|2011|p=150}}

The high production costs upon which Dickens insisted led to reduced profits, and the first edition brought him only £230 (equal to £{{formatnum:{{Inflation|UK|230|1843|r=-3}}}} in {{CURRENTYEAR}} pounds){{sfn|UK CPI inflation}} rather than the £1,000 (equal to £{{formatnum:{{Inflation|UK|1000|1843|r=-3}}}} in {{CURRENTYEAR}} pounds){{sfn|UK CPI inflation}} he expected.{{sfnm|1a1=Kelly|1y=2003|1p=17|2a1=Douglas-Fairhurst|2y=2006|2pp=xx, xvii}} A year later, the profits were only £744, and Dickens was deeply disappointed.{{sfn|Kelly|2003|p=17}}{{refn|Dickens's biographer, [[Claire Tomalin]], puts the first edition profits at £137, and those by the end of 1844 at £726.{{sfn|Tomalin|2011|p=150}}|group=n}}